No Hop Berliner Weisse

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Keyes88

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Why add hops at all if its only 3-8 IBUs? I tried searching for an answer and found nothing. Does it relate to Reinheitsgebot?

Thanks!
 
I don't know, but I'd guess it's because hops aren't just about alpha acid units, but also contribute other flavor components. Try a batch without hops and see!
 
Not in low quantities... I think you are supposed to hop up to 10ibus and can get away with 20ibus
 
BJCP states 3-8. I was curious if it kept out other bacteria but with the lacto in their producing a low level of alcohol, I doubt anything could form.

Today I did a no boil no hop Berliner with only lacto. I'm curious how this will turn out. I hope nothing dangerous grows!
 
The hops won't inhibit the lacto if you use a sour mash. If you utilize lacto with a sacch strain in primary, you need to keep the IBUs low since the L. debrueckii is inhibited over about 10 IBUs (assuming you are using the wyeast strain, i assume the WL strain is the same). There are other strains that are hop-insensitive like L. brevis.
 
Ok, so I did 5 gallons with the WL Lacto at about 90 degrees for 5 days. Added dry German ale yeast and gave it a day. Gravity reading went from 1.036 down to 1.010. It's not that sour, fermentation was very fizzy. I hope I have not poisoned myself drinking this.
 
if it fermented out, i'm 100% positive you wouldn't have poisoned yourself.

If you watch "how beer saved the world" they made beer with duck pond water... had enough bacteria to kill someone... so they made beer with it, all microbes were gone and on top of that, people were tested THEN told what they were drinking... i would have drank it knowing that before or after hand :).
 
I saw that. Great program. I'm only nervous bc of the no boil.
 
Brew-tuber homebeerbrewey made a batch of beer from his pond water- and it still maintained some "pond" taste in the final product- but he's still kicking & making youtube videos!
 
Ok, so I did 5 gallons with the WL Lacto at about 90 degrees for 5 days. Added dry German ale yeast and gave it a day. Gravity reading went from 1.036 down to 1.010. It's not that sour, fermentation was very fizzy. I hope I have not poisoned myself drinking this.

Keyes, how long do you plan on letting this sit before bottling/kegging?
 
I can't think of a good reason to add hops to a Berliner weisse as a homebrewer (to get label approval, commercial "beers" have to have hops). As was said the primary "preservative" power of hops is their inhibition of Lactobacillus, which isn't something that is desirable in this case (as it is in spontaneous fermentations).

Ok, so I did 5 gallons with the WL Lacto at about 90 degrees for 5 days. Added dry German ale yeast and gave it a day. Gravity reading went from 1.036 down to 1.010. It's not that sour, fermentation was very fizzy. I hope I have not poisoned myself drinking this.

Sadly White Labs Lacto produces very little sourness. I fermented with nothing but, and a year later the beer tastes like an American wheat not a Berliner.
 
When do you even add hops to get any IBU if you're doing no boil? I have a berliner souring right now, and I ordered hops for it, but I think once it's sour I'm just going to pasteurize the liquid, forget about the hops, and pitch some yeast.
 
[QUOTE="Oldsock"
Sadly White Labs Lacto produces very little sourness. I fermented with nothing but, and a year later the beer tastes like an American wheat not a Berliner.[/QUOTE]

Initially I felt this way too ... And then I had a few craft (American) Berlinners. First few sips were great, but then I noticed this growing "I just threw up in my mouth a little" type of flavor. After 12 months, my bottle conditioned white labs version (used Grolsh bottles to avoid bottle bombs) were pretty darn good. Not as sour as I wanted, but they ended up as a great summer quencher.
 
dcHokie said:
Keyes, how long do you plan on letting this sit before bottling/kegging?

As soon as I hit my FG I'm going to keg it and prime the keg. Then tap it when I have the space.
 
Oldsock said:
I can't think of a good reason to add hops to a Berliner weisse as a homebrewer (to get label approval, commercial "beers" have to have hops). As was said the primary "preservative" power of hops is their inhibition of Lactobacillus, which isn't something that is desirable in this case (as it is in spontaneous fermentations).

Sadly White Labs Lacto produces very little sourness. I fermented with nothing but, and a year later the beer tastes like an American wheat not a Berliner.

I fermented hot, like over 90 for the 5 days and it has some tartness. I'm trying to get the ECY Berliner Blend but it hasn't been made in awhile.
 
Initially I felt this way too ... And then I had a few craft (American) Berlinners. First few sips were great, but then I noticed this growing "I just threw up in my mouth a little" type of flavor. After 12 months, my bottle conditioned white labs version (used Grolsh bottles to avoid bottle bombs) were pretty darn good. Not as sour as I wanted, but they ended up as a great summer quencher.

Mine is already more than a year old, sadly no budge in the sourness.

A lot of American breweries use sour mashes. Even the best ones have a bit of that objectionable flavor in my experience.
 
If sour mashing is done at such a high temp, why isn't fermentation done at the same level??
 
Keyes88 said:
If sour mashing is done at such a high temp, why isn't fermentation done at the same level??

Typically it leads to a lot of off flavors in the fermentation. You want sour, but your base yeast could give bandaid, rubbing alcohol, etc.. However, in the mash you're looking to create a lot of lactic flavors.
 
But what if I only have lacto in my primary? Then I won't have off flavors, right?
 
I'm just going off the idea of sour mashing at 110 or whatever it's suppose to be. Why not ferment at that if possible?

I think OldSock should try it while in San Diego, it's hot enough there and he's not busy or anything right now! :p
 
When I made mine, I mashed as normal and boiled for about a minute without any hops. When the temp was under 110, I used the lacto that was on some spare malt and let it ferment in my Texas garage in July. After a couple days, I added some saison yeast, since I figured it could handle the garage equally well. Came out blazingly sour and very enjoyable.
 
I'm just going off the idea of sour mashing at 110 or whatever it's suppose to be. Why not ferment at that if possible?

I think OldSock should try it while in San Diego, it's hot enough there and he's not busy or anything right now! :p

This is actually a fairly common technique, pre-souring the wort anaerobically before pasteurizing and finishing the fermentation with brewer's yeast. Holding it warm speeds up the process, but isn’t necessary.

The problem is that if you let the pH drop too low (< 3.4) you can have issues with the health of the primary yeast. We’re kicking around an idea to use a 100% Lacto souring followed by a 100% Brett fermentation. Brett is acid tolerant down much lower than Saccharomyces, and we’ll get all sorts of fun flavors to go along with the acid. I did something like that a few years ago with decent results, but we’ll see if we can make it work on the big system.
 
The problem is that if you let the pH drop too low (< 3.4) you can have issues with the health of the primary yeast.

I've seen this same idea mentioned a lot. Without specifically saying it's 100% false, I feel obligated to point out that apple and grape juices each have a pH below 3.4, and ale yeasts seem to chew through those easily. Whatever off-flavors you get from stressed yeast at a pH of 3-3.5 will probably be covered up by that same pH anyway.
 
I've seen this same idea mentioned a lot. Without specifically saying it's 100% false, I feel obligated to point out that apple and grape juices each have a pH below 3.4, and ale yeasts seem to chew through those easily. Whatever off-flavors you get from stressed yeast at a pH of 3-3.5 will probably be covered up by that same pH anyway.

Good point. Maybe the issue is a combination of pH and sugar profile? Much easier for yeast to ferment the simple sugars in juice than the more complex sugars in wort?

What do you mean by off flavors being covered up by the pH? Lactic acid really doesn't do much to hide off flavors. A friend did a pre-pitched Lacto ferment and ended up with some pretty bad (phenolic) off flavors.

Here is a quote from "The Effect of pH on Yeast (Saccharomyces cerivisae) Alcohol Production in Beer" that looked at the fermentation in various buffered solutions:

"At pH 3, the average alcohol by weight (ABW) percentage was 3.788% ± 0.026% (±SEM, N=5); at pH 5, the average ABW percentage was 4.370% ± 0.026% (±SEM, N=5); at pH 6, the average ABW percentage was 3.761% ± 0.026% (±SEM, N=5); at pH 8, the average ABW percentage was 3.141% ± 0.058% (±SEM, N=5)."

So lower attenuation at a low pH. Sadly, the more standard final pH of ~4 was not included.
 
What is a "good" pH level for a berliner weisse? Im going to get some wine strips today and test it out.
 
I test my berliner and the pH was at 3.4. I then opened an 1809 Berliner and rested that at about 3.2. The crispness if that was amazing. Hopefully in time I can get down to a 3.2 or less. With this current batch, I'm tossing in some Quince for a bit then tapping it. I understand Berliners take time on achieving a high quality sourness but I need a summer drink on tap now.

I also did a one gallon batch and added the slurry from the current berliner plus dregs from the 1809. Hopefully I can get something interesting to grow in there. If anyone knows of other beers that have lacto in it that I can add to the mix, please let me know!
 
Lacking the means, I never pH tested mine. But as sour as it got, I can't imagine too many subtle flavors coming through. Obviously, your sour beer experience dwarfs mine, both brewing and tasting. As usual, the lesson seems to be that beer is more fool-proof then it's given credit for.
 
Update: beer has now had fruit for about a week and is going to get cold crashed for almost another week. The quince adds a very strong lemon acidic quality to the beer.
 
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