Consecration kit from MoreBeer

I've got my kit ready for racking to secondary. There is no sour taste like RR's sour taste, so I would hate to have the "lackluster" sourness i've been reading about in this and other threads (regarding other sour attempts).

I've followed some of the pedio/lacto question, as to pedio being the predominant source of the delightful sourness I so crave from RR. And that the IBUs here might suppress the lacto. I'm also confused as to why Roselare is used - appears to have lots of stuff (sach, brett) that comes with the lacto and pedio. We need this when we've already pitched a pure brett in secondary, and yeast before?

So, my thought was this:

Brett Brux only (at secondary, w/ currants). Then when time for the Roselare, instead I will only pitch Pedio.

Will the Brett Brux, pitched earlier, still have the strength to eat any unwanted flavors coming from the pedio? I cite earlier posts here, and this thread, as to this issue: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f127/lacto-pedio-vs-pedio-only-436466/

Any insight would be much appreciated! To sour sours!

I'm a bit of a Noob at brewing sour beers as well. I recently tasted mine which is still aging. I had split mine into two 5 gallon buckets and then racked into two separate carboys. The first I did the Vinnie Way - primary ferment with WLP530, then add Brett when I rack to secondary and let it set for a 8 weeks with the currants added during racking, then after that add the roeselare pack. I waited a few months to add any oak, which I soaked in a nice cabernet, and added a few ounces of the cabernet as well. The other half of the batch I pitched the roeselare from the very beginning. I believe I added some dregs along the way, though I didn't take good notes on which ones I used, it was probably some from Almanac, Cascade, and possibly also Jolly Pumpkin. At tasting which was earlier this week, I found the first half, fermented in the well documented RR manner (following multiple interviews, threads, etc) to be complex, but not as pleasant as the second half. Furthermore, the first half simply isn't ready to package yet, and it isn't as sour as I would like. I pitched dregs from a 375ml bottle of Jolly Pumpkin La Roja to that carboy and I am letting it rest. I will taste in another month and if still not complex enough, more dregs (Cascade). I will also point out that the currants have not fully dropped from the first half (the Vinnie way).

That is exactly what I would recommend to you as well: add some dregs, particularly if your roeselare is from a smack pack. I think you will be happier with that. Mine is about 8 months old now, as I brewed it on Jan 1st 2014 if my notes are to be believed. It is possibly that the additional sourness and complexity will come with time, without adding the dregs. FWIW neither of my carboys exhibited a ropy or sick phase, but that probably doesn't mean anything at all. Another option might be to snag a pack of the lacto Brevis which is supposedly more tolerant of hop compounds and try adding that if you cannot get dregs.

TD

I have a good plan for my next 15 gallon batch. I intend to ferment it with WLP530 and then add the Brett. 8 weeks later I will add the strained (not washed) yeast cake from my first 15 gallon batch. That should add some solid punch to that second and all batches afterwards until I retire the cakes. Or maybe as the cakes age I will only add a quarter of the cake (4th batch and beyond). Any thoughts on this idea?

Also any thoughts to an addition of maltodextrin at the 9 month point to feed the pedio and Brett?


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My indecision led me to stick with my plan for the time being. Pitched brux today in secondary with the currants. Also bought a pure pedio for the 6-8 weeks mark. Will report my findings as the months wear on.

Another question - I may have let the Abbey Ale bring the gravity down more than I should have, closer to 1.010-1.012. Do you think there will be enough "stuff" left, with the currants, including all the other stuff the pedio and brett will munch on, to provide adequate sourness over time? If not, could perhaps a simple addition of extra sugars help? Such as some malt extract.

I'm no sour expert, but on this one I lowered the IBUs to ~14, added 6 oz maltodextrine, pitched brett B & brett L for 5 weeks w/ currents at 1.018, then 2 packs roselare about a month ago. Haven't tasted it yet but I'll report back when I do.

To answer your question, it's possible waiting until 1.010 will result in less sourness over time. Instead of adding malt extract, maltodextrine can be broken down by the brett & bugs, but not the sacc... so in theory, it can work well for adding sourness or brett character. I stress the "in theory" part because I have no idea for this recipe. I don't think pitching simple sugars would be as effective if the sacc is still active or even dormant.

I wouldn't sweat it too much. It'll still turn out great I'd bet.

Do what you feel comfortable with. At the end of the road, you can always add food grade lactic acid to taste (or until your pH meter reads correct value (the commercials stuff pH is in the thread somewhere).

As far as maltodextrin adding additional brett character, I think that this may not necessarily be true per Chad Yakobson interviews available on You tube. He said they take existing esters in the wort (such as those produced during primary fermentation especially with belgian strains) and turn them into something different, and funky. I've never tried it personally, but I have a couple bags on hand for when I want to try it.

TD

Almost ready to oak with the RR oak. Consensus on how long to leave it on the wood?

TrickyDick said:

... I pitched dregs from a 375ml bottle of Jolly Pumpkin La Roja to that carboy and I am letting it rest.

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Those have a very quick souring lacto in them. Every time I use JP dregs they always finish out quick and sour, but not very complex. They seem to overpower anything else I add in there. I'm interested to hear how your complex beer turns out after adding the JP dregs.

Sorry i'm being lazy here and this is a long thread. Are people still buying the kit to make this beer or no? I'm thinking of ordering it but wondering if I should just buy the ingredients and figure out my own oak/wine/currant thing. It's a rather pricey kit for not coming with any yeast.

suprchunk said:

Those have a very quick souring lacto in them. Every time I use JP dregs they always finish out quick and sour, but not very complex. They seem to overpower anything else I add in there. I'm interested to hear how your complex beer turns out after adding the JP dregs.

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It had already been aging for nearly a pear before adding them, and it wasn't sufficiently sour enough for my liking. It did have some complexity in flavor already, and a mild tartness and some Brett character. I will most definitely post my comparison of the two I made with the RR original when the time is ready, probably around the new year or week before is my guess.

TD


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Update-

Today I tasted again and made some measurements of both batches I brewed on 1/1/2014 (if my record keeping can be trusted.)

So the method outlined by V.C. and discussed throughout this thread is batch A, and Batch B is basically the same with the exception of the fermentation- Roeselare Blend was pitched immediately. Both were made from the same wort which for me had an OG 1.092 IBU (can't really tell here from my Brew Step printout page, but I used some 5 or 6 year old S Goldings plus less old Goldings and year+ old sterling hops. My notes tell me I made three additions of 1.3 oz each:
4.0% S Goldings 1 oz, plus 1/3 oz of the vintage s goldings for 60 minutes
7.0% Sterling 1 oz plus another 1/3 of the vintage hops for 30 minutes
7.0% Sterling 1 0z plus last 1/3 of the vintage hops for 1 minutes
This was for 11 gallons of collected wort into the fermenter

So today, about 10 months after pitching the yeast, here are the numbers:

Batch A:
1.092 OG / 1.009 FG - ABV 10.9 (AE 90%) pH=3.77 (target pH= 3.4)
note that the currants never fully dropped out. The tasting of the hydro sample is interesting. It has a lot going on. Not nearly as tart as it should be. Very pronounced raisin and grape-like vinous quality and moderate oak presence, slightly tart. There is a fruity quality that implies sweetness that was surprising at 1.009 finishing gravity. I had previously added JP dregs about 6 weeks ago. Its been at 72 degrees "cellar" temp in FL this whole time.

Batch B:
1.092 OG, 1.013 FG ABV+10.4 (85% AE) pH=3.08
This stuff tastes fantastic! Very tart, lots of funk, lots of flavor, far less fruity and vinous than batch A. I am considering blending batch A & B. Its ready to bottle, but if I blend I may want to wait a bit more on batch A to see if things change much, though at 1.009 at ten months old I rather doubt much more is going to happen.

TD

edit-
tonight I tried a bottle of the soured portion of this brew. It is probably the most complex flavor of any beer I've ever made, or possibly ever drank. I ended up using 5oz corn sugar for the bottling which yielded 30 bottles (12 oz). It seems a bit flat after three weeks in the bottle. Near still. What to do? Temps have been 71-75 F.
Taste is amazing but needs more fizz..

TD

Oops! That edit was for a different beer! KBS clone that I used Roeselare and jester King dregs on.

Should I have seen some pellicle or some sign of infection after adding the Roselare?
Two months since and nothing hinting at souring. Granted, I haven't taken a sample yet but I haven't "seen" anything to hint towards it souring..

Oddly. I never saw much of a pellicle on mine. As posted, one hit 3.08 pH. It's working!
TD


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Medic218 said:

Should I have seen some pellicle or some sign of infection after adding the Roselare?

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not necessarily. taste and drop in gravity are the only certain signs that the bugs are at work.

Tricky, thanks for the detailed updates on the 2 batches.

Today I added the pedio. I avoided Roselare for reasons mentioned earlier in the thread. Hoping the previously pitched brett can cure any possible sickness that may occur.

Before pitching the pedio, I sampled the brew. The brett brux has only been in the carboy for 2 months. The taste is incredible. One of the best funky/sours I've ever had, and it is nowhere near complete. Kudos to the recipe.

Just in case my pure pedio addition ruins what is already amazing: I filled a carboy with the beer, and filled with a half gallon of the beer with stopper and airlock. Pleasantly surprised at the way the brett plays out on it's own.

One surprising thing that I noticed in my experiment was that the batch I brewed and then split into halves for different fermentation methods (temps were all the same), is that the beer with the higher FG is actually more complex and tart than the beer with the lower FG. The only difference really was the yeast in the half with lower FG was WLP 530, they both got the roeselare blend. Also the one with WLP530 I pitched some jolly pumpkin dregs later on at about 8 months.

TD


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DOH!!!
Tonight I noticed that when taking samples of the beer to test and taste from the carboy, that I had left the stopper off one of the two carboys!!! For 55 hours approximately!!! Well, that was the one lacking complexity. I guess the additional oxygen will give it some complexity!!!!

Feeling like Tommy Boy right about now, by forgetting to put the stopper back in!

i brewed this recipe up last night and pitched it onto a 4 month old cake of roeselare that also had jp La roja dregs in it. i'm hoping this gets funky quick. as of this morning no sign of fermentation, hopefully when i get home from work today it is fermenting.

For my second batch I'm switching things up a little. Local shop only had out of date Wyeast Trappist HG when I brewed so I figured what the heck. With a 2L starter the batch went off like a rocket for the first 3 days. At about a week I racked onto the supplied currants, and added 1 each - ECY Bugfarm, and ECY Bugcountry which resulted in some moderate activity for a couple days. Last night at about a month I decided to go a little further off the ranch and added the oak cubes from a recent batch of Winexpert Stags Leap Merlot. No visible pelicle at this time but a sample revealed a decent tartness already using the ECY. The flavor is good. I'll check back a few months!

I am nearing bottling time on this. Brewed New Year's Day last year.
I haven't re-checked the gravity or pH, but have taken numerous small samples of each. The batch A, which to re-cap was pitched with WLP530, then later Brett, then later, roeselare, has finally dropped the currants, and is more sour than it had been when I last measure pH, by test of the tongue. Its good and could be bottled now no doubt. The batch B is not appreciable changed since last measured pH. Last night, I took about 15ml of each plus additional 10ml and blended the two and sampled all three beers. I think that I'm going to blend both in a bottling bucket, which is going to have to be my conical connected to a beer gun or bottling wand, and then mix in the priming sugar and bottle these all as a blended beer. Overall, I would say based on the tasting, that it is an awesome beer. I can't wait to taste this as a side by side, which I will definitely post pics and comments about.

TD

OK - so yours waited forever to drop the currants, too! Good deal - now I know that I'm not alone. I brewed three 5 gallon batches on 4/23 and the currants are still floating along. The sample I stole was amazing though! Even the one soured with Roeselare. Of course the ECY01 beat it, though...

Brewed in June and took my first sample today. Starting to sour but not quite what I was expecting. Think I'll dum some Cantillon dregs in soon. Also took a gravity reading that turned out to be 1.002... sound about right?

I brewed my Consecration on January 5, 2013. I tasted it most recently right before Christmas and it has far exceeded my expectations. Complex, sour, funky, vinous. I'm really pleased with it. Since I have the day off tomorrow, I think I'll bottle tonight. I have a couple of cases of Champagne bottles saved up that I'm going to crown cap (I've been doing that with sours for a while). Any last minute advice on carbonation or anything like that?

The_Nid_Hog said:

I brewed my Consecration on January 5, 2013. I tasted it most recently right before Christmas and it has far exceeded my expectations. Complex, sour, funky, vinous. I'm really pleased with it. Since I have the day off tomorrow, I think I'll bottle tonight. I have a couple of cases of Champagne bottles saved up that I'm going to crown cap (I've been doing that with sours for a while). Any last minute advice on carbonation or anything like that?

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All I can say is I envy your patience to let it sit for 2 years in a fermenter. I brewed in June and am getting anxious!

Heck my curants finally dropped after waiting for nine months! Tasting the yummy Ness is still a bit away though

ruger988 said:

All I can say is I envy your patience to let it sit for 2 years in a fermenter. I brewed in June and am getting anxious!

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Ah--you caught my typo! I shouldn't post while I'm watching TV. Just a year--it's from Jan 5, 2014.

hllywd said:

For my second batch I'm switching things up a little. Local shop only had out of date Wyeast Trappist HG when I brewed so I figured what the heck. With a 2L starter the batch went off like a rocket for the first 3 days. At about a week I racked onto the supplied currants, and added 1 each - ECY Bugfarm, and ECY Bugcountry which resulted in some moderate activity for a couple days. Last night at about a month I decided to go a little further off the ranch and added the oak cubes from a recent batch of Winexpert Stags Leap Merlot. No visible pelicle at this time but a sample revealed a decent tartness already using the ECY. The flavor is good. I'll check back a few months!

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Found this last night, smells awesome! Didn't disturb it for a sample...

hllywd said:

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Wow!! Details? I'v egot nothing like that going on!

which may mean that you are doing just fine! without oxygen in your carboy.

ruger988 said:

Wow!! Details? I'v egot nothing like that going on!

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Really nothing more than I already posted... Trappist HG to start, then Bugfarm, and Bugcountry. As of the first week of November it had some tartness and good flavor, but no hint of a pellicle. I did add the oak cubes from a batch of wine sometime not too much prior to that. I left my original batch on the included oak for a couple months, and think it could have been in much longer with no adverse affects. I didn't disturb it now, but if it tastes anything like it smells this one is going to be very good. I won't open it again till late summer or early fall (which would be about a year from brew day). I'll decide then whether I want to add the oak that came with the kit.

I finally bottled my Consecration last night. Five gallons in crown capped champagne bottles. I also bottled another five gallons that's a sort of Son of Consecration. When I racked my Consecration over onto the currants, I brewed another five gallons with an identical grain bill and it went in on the old yeast cake. I fed it some prunes instead of currants just to change things up a little. As you would expect, it's a little more aggressively sour than it's dad but it's still nicely balanced. The prunes really add a nice flavor, although they just about completely decomposed and were pretty messy. I'm looking forward to the first tasting once they've carbed.

I just tasted my clone kit that's been in secondary for around 8 months and it's tasting great! In the last couple of months it has really turned around and is tasting a lot more like Consecration. I'll be adding the oak soon.

For the oak addition - did anyone treat the oak before adding it? I was considering soaking it in some cabernet for more wine character, but I assumed most people were adding it dry.

dtwhite said:

I just tasted my clone kit that's been in secondary for around 8 months and it's tasting great! In the last couple of months it has really turned around and is tasting a lot more like Consecration. I'll be adding the oak soon.

For the oak addition - did anyone treat the oak before adding it? I was considering soaking it in some cabernet for more wine character, but I assumed most people were adding it dry.

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A good question. The wine would oxidize? But then again you'd think the wine in the barrels would be oxidized too.

Interested to hear if anyone has done this. I remember reading someone was going to try to vacuum seal the wine with the oak. And someone else said the beer has a vinous character anyways, presumably from the currants, and that wine wouldn't be necessary.

On a side note i just peeked at mine yesterday, and most of the currents have dropped already, it's only been two months. Interesting since it seems much shorter than what others have been reporting.

Well, it gets a lot of wine character from being aged in Cabernet barrels. We are adding a proportionately very small amount of those barrels (which are already used) so I was thinking the added soak would supplement that flavor.

dtwhite said:

I just tasted my clone kit that's been in secondary for around 8 months and it's tasting great! In the last couple of months it has really turned around and is tasting a lot more like Consecration. I'll be adding the oak soon.

For the oak addition - did anyone treat the oak before adding it? I was considering soaking it in some cabernet for more wine character, but I assumed most people were adding it dry.

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I used several stave segments, which are from new barrels, so I boiled in water for five minutes then dumped to simulate used barrel by removing much of that charred oak character hopefully. Next I put into a microwave proof glass jar and added some cabernet and cooked on high until just boing or starting to boil. I let it cool to room temp and then repeated this for five cycles. Someone posted here about how some folks do this to treat oak prior to using to flavor distilled projects. Something about the heat-cool cycles to open the wood to get the cab flavor to soak in. I also dumped in several oz of wine.

TD

Some of us add a 1/3 of a bottle of Cabernet wine per 5 gallon batch to this brew, also.

Good to know, thanks. I might go for dry cubes and also dump 1/4 to 1/3 of a bottle in there, since I feel like I am less likely to make a mistake doing that.

Ordered a consecration kit, should be brewing next week. Gonna pitch a portion of a ~3 month old roeselare cake from my flanders red. Pretty excited.

About my 12th homebrew, maybe my 5th or 6th all grain and my first sour. I just started brewing this kit a couple weeks ago. It's in the primary, everything's been going great, gravity readings were spot on and after 2 weeks was still at 1.020 (measured consistent over several days) so I let it sit thinking it was done, but hoping it might edge down in the 1.018-1.016 range.

Well life happened and I didn't get back to it for another week. I just took a few measurements this morning and I think it may have over-fermented (if that's a word) as it looks like it's down to about 1.010!

I threw it in the garage to cold crash/shut down the yeast and I'll take more measurements later today to make sure I was correct, but if it did ferment down that low, any suggestions for a midstream correction? Do I need to add more fermentables for the Brett and/or the Roselare? If so, recommendations? Any help is appreciated! I'm not super concerned about cloning Consecration, but I just want to make sure I end up with a good sour.

No worries! Sour beer can often ferment to near or even below 1.000. Some species of Brett are so-called "super attenuators ". Only thing to do now is wait some more. I think Vinnie Cilurzo claimed in an interview that he doesn't bottle until below 1.009.

Sounds like you probably nailed this one.