Brett noob w/ questions

Made my starter of brett c. last night - no activity yet but I'll give it some time, and I periodically rouse and shake it. The vial itself was curious looking to me, as I'm used to using Wyeast smack packs and pitching more like a slurry into my carboys or starters. This was very liquidy looking, almost just like wort or beer really - I'm guessing there's a smaller cell count in these vs. a smack pack?

the brett vials have a very small cell count (like 1/10th IIRC). they're meant for secondary use, so it can take a bit to build them up

I know alot of people let their brett starters go for a week to 10 days bc of the low cell count, I let mine go for 5 days and it seemed to be fine.

Coff said:

I know alot of people let their brett starters go for a week to 10 days bc of the low cell count, I let mine go for 5 days and it seemed to be fine.

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Oh wow, that's even a bit longer than I thought. I think I'll schedule my brew day for Monday then.

Did you step yours up a few times - or did it just take 5 days to actually reach peak activity?

Well, this is my first all brett experience so take it for what its worth, I didnt step it up at all. I felt that if I did a moderate sized starter for ~5 days I would get enough growth to get the job done, I guess you could call it cutting corners.

I did a 750ML starter that I got good activity from by the time I pitched, I used some yeast nutrient and some intermittent shaking of the starter. By brewday it smelled great, I pitched and had activity within 12 hours.

What did your starter smell like, exactly? Mine doesn't smell bad but I wouldn't call it fruity or anything like that. It actually reminds me of a smell that I didn't really enjoy that I got out of a batch of English mild a little while ago - kind of a harsh sour grainy smell. A little sourdough-y maybe. That yeast was S-04 and the smell/flavor wasn't there in the finished beer but I hated the smells that batch gave off in primary.

I'm starting to see some stuff settle out to the bottom, nothing really interesting on top though. I do hope I've made the right choice picking this yeast strain for a 100% fermentation on a pretty basic blonde beer. Almost dumped some Jolly Pumpkin dregs in there last night but resisted the temptation...

My starter put out a Sulfur smell for a few days, as did the fermentation for a few days. Once I pitched it it was smelling pretty funky so I got excited. I wouldnt worry about it, from what Ive read your picking a good strain for 100% brett fermentations. I actually think youre going to get a better result with your base recipe then mine, Im not so sure I will get the result I was looking for but we will see.

Dont pitch the dregs of a Jolly Pumpkin beer bc you be including Pedio and Lacto I believe. Someone with more knowledge can correct me if I am wrong since I am still a noob. I think your beer would be very good with that addition but it would take longer and be fairly sour.

yup, the JP dregs would have added in 2 strains of sacch, pedio, lacto, and whatever brett they get in their air. they make for a great sour tho so i recommend building up those dregs for another beer at some point

the brett C should be great solo in that blond.

The reason I didn't pitch the dregs is exactly as you guys mentioned - the non-brett microbes. Part of the reason I wanted to do this 100% brett is so I wouldn't have to wait a year to drink it.

Maybe what I'm smelling is what most people refer to as sulfur, I dunno... to me, I've always associated sulfur with egg farts, I guess.

Smelling much better this morning, I think I'm going to step it up with a dose of fresh wort tonight!

Nice, let us know how the brewday goes.

Im shooting for a 6-8 week primary on mine, Im about 2 weeks in.

I will be curious to hear where yours is at when you hit the six week mark. I'm hoping that mine won't need to be in primary much longer than that. It can spend many, many months longer in the bottle (and I hope it does), but I hope I can get it in and out of a carboy in a similar time frame.

Brew day went pretty well, despite the fact that I wanted to brew a biere de garde the same day and that yeast ended up being dead.

By the time I pitched my started it was on its fifth day. On Saturday I had made a little bit more wort to step it up with, so altogether I probably pitched almost 1L. I didn't decant, which made for a full carboy, but I feared that I'd be pouring out too much yeast that would've been floating around.

I have activity & a little layer of krausen and hop material up in the top, and it's been 12 hours or so.

One thing I did wonder - my starter, at a few points, gave off slight plastic smells. There were some good aromas in there too, and I didn't get the plastic every time I went to smell it, but it was definitely there a few times. Is this normal & does it normally make it into the finished product?

I didnt notice any plastic smells from my starter but tbh there were tons of smells going on in my brew room that week. Between the Brett C starter and a Burton Ale starter it was kind of stinky.

How is it coming along? Id think the krausen would be dropping by about now?

Mine has an ever changing dusty white pellicle on it, really cool looking. I'll snap a photo and post it tonight, assuming it hasnt changed and isnt so cool looking anymore.

The krausen climbed up to the top of the neck of my 3 gallon Better Bottle and has since dropped back down to a thin cap. I still get some gurgling in my blowoff container, but will probably replace it with a regular airlock tonight.

Popped the top off last night and took a smell - awesome! If I was smelling it blind, I'd probably guess that it was just a Belgian saach yeast of some kind, smells bready, estery and a little phenolic. I didn't smell any of the plasticy aroma that I had been getting from the starter.

It's still very cloudy and murky, of course, being less than one week old, but a lot of the trub has settled to the bottom. Hopefully I'll be able to take a taste in 4-5 weeks!

Yea mine is still really cloudy to, from what Ive read Brett is a low flocculator when used as a primary strain. Sounds like the aroma on yours is pretty similar to mine, no real Brett aromas but Im sure they will come out with time.

You plan on bottle conditioning yours? I'm hoping to be able to keep at least a few of these around for a while since it's my first brett batch. Got some Jolly Pumpkin bottles, some bombers and some thicker walled 12 ozers ready.

Yea Im going to bottle condition, Im not quite reading to keg a Brett'ed beer. Im kind of afraid of cross contamination there and am fine with these beers being bottled any since Id like to age it a decent amount.

I believe that Duvel bottles, the short stumpy ones, are thicker walled and should be good for what we are doing. My plan was to buy a case of it each of the next few weekends and save those bottles for this and other batches.

If I'm wrong about the Duvel bottles please correct me.

cross contamination shouldnt be an issue. i dont find brett any harder to clean/sanitize and dont keep separate equipment for them.

the duvel bottles should work great

Not even in serving lines?

The little Duvel bottles are awesome. I was saving those for a while too but I think they may have ended up getting recycled.

I don't know why but kegging a brett beer just sounds weird to me.

ive yet to have an issue and right now im sharing the same line between several beers til I get my new keezer. if your lines are kinda beat up it might be an issue, but PBW or some other CIP and then sanitizer should be sufficient

On the ride home from work I was trying to figure out why we need thick walled bottles for a 100% Brett ferment. If it acts like sacch when used as the primary strain the. We really should have to worry right? Since The Brett has been trained to ferment more simple sugars and not the long chain sugars?

I could be way off base but I'm trying to lay out a plan for my now 20 gallons of Brett and or sour beer fermenting.

I think it depends more on what volume you want to carbonate it to, right? If you want it big and effervescent, then the thicker ones make sense - but I'm not sure how suitable that is for brett beers in general, as I'm a noob to all of this.

I was thinking the same thing, with mine Id prefer a softer carbonation so maybe I can get away with a standard 12 oz bottle.

You don't need thick bottles if you are willing to wait for fermentation to end. Brett can take 8-10 months to completely stop in an all brett fermentation.

I plan on going at least 6-8 weeks, but I'll be checking the gravity a few times over the course so I think I might be ok with some standard bottles carbed to 2.7 vols.

Dusty white Pellicile on my 100% Brett C Bitter.

Interesting, I will check mine out again but I don't think I have anything like that sitting on top. It's actually fairly clear at this point too, but there's constant positive pressure on the airlock and I always see little co2 jets rising up. Gotta get something else brewed so I can leave this alone for a few months!

I couldnt agree more, I need to brew something with a quick turnaround so I can ignore this damn thing. Ive been obsessing over it.

Im glad I snapped that photo bc I had a pipe burst in my bathroom and had to move the fermenter somewhere else while there is work being done in there. So unfortunately I broke that pellicle but it will reform quick. It has almost no activity though, no bubble shooting up, not airlock activity, almost completely still so I dont think Im too far from being done.

Speaking of next batches...

I have a grain bill weighed out from a 2.5 gallon batch I was planning on doing. I am going to start doing larger batches, and since I can't separate all this out - I'm going to have to use what I've got.

4.5 lbs Belgian Pils
1.0 lbs Vienna
4 oz Belgian Biscuit
4 oz Aromatic

I am thinking about turning it into a dubbel:

11.0 lbs. Belgian Pils
1.0 lbs. Vienna
6 oz Caramel 120L
4 oz Belgian Biscuit
4 oz Aromatic

I have 1lb of D-45 amber candi syrup that I would like to add at the end of the boil. A couple of questions:

1. Do you guys think 7.2% candi syrup is enough for a dubbel?
2. Is the D-45 acceptable vs. a darker syrup like D-90

Second part of my idea is this - what if I split this in half and ferment half with my Brett C. yeast cake? For people that are doing 100% Brett primaries - if I check the gravity on my currently-fermenting pale/blonde batch and I have 70-something% attenuation, would it be ok to take it off the cake? I would not bottle it at that point, in case there was still enough yeast in suspension to eat a few more gravity points.

+1 on the Brett C split batch.

The candi sugar is just there for fermentability. If it gets you to your OG, you're good.

For all-Brett beers, you don't need special bottles or extreme patience. I bottled a Brett C ale 2-3 weeks after brewday in Mexican Coke bottles. That was over a year ago, and the bottles haven't exploded and don't foam over upon opening. I don't really like the beer, but that's not the point.

With Brett as a secondary yeast, you still don't have to wait a year to bottle, just until you are 100% sure the gravity has stabilized. The flavor will continue to evolve even after the gravity stops dropping. If you're worried about bombs & gushers, it's not a bad idea to add a little less sugar than you otherwise might. I've bottled a month after adding Brett B Orval Dregs, and everything turned out fine.

Hey guys, I brewed a 100% Brett L beer and gravity dropped from 1056 to 1015 in 2 weeks. I was kind of surprised since most hope their beer finishes in 4-6+ weeks. Im planning on leaving it on the brett for another 1-2 weeks, then packaging. Thoughts? Also, keg or bottle?

I vote bottle, so you can see how it changes over time. Plus, you'd hate to tie up a keg with something you'll probably only have one of at a time.

I took a sample of my batch over the weekend - gravity was at 1.010. Tasted pretty much like the Northern Brewer Patersbier recipe. Not surprising, I guess, since both are mostly Pilsner malt and noble hops. Will probably leave it alone for a while longer & see what happens.

Oh, and people complain about bottle-conditioned homebrews giving you gas if you drink the sediment? Drinking a yeasty sample from a carboy is waaaay worse. I dropped bombs on the wife all day... she was not pleased.

Sebas83 said:

The candi sugar is just there for fermentability. If it gets you to your OG, you're good.

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the darker candi sugars definitely add flavor as well, its not just a fermentability thing

bjohnson29 said:

Hey guys, I brewed a 100% Brett L beer and gravity dropped from 1056 to 1015 in 2 weeks. I was kind of surprised since most hope their beer finishes in 4-6+ weeks.

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mine are usually like 99% done within 2weeks, but tend to take another 2 weeks to fully clear and trickle down a lil more. its also kinda like any other yeast, just cuz its done fermenting in that time, doesnt mean its ready.

kingwood-kid said:

Plus, you'd hate to tie up a keg with something you'll probably only have one of at a time.

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why would you drink it any less than others?