I've got the bug...

...for a good bugged beer that is.

Thanks to Beeriffic who sent me a bottle of his Berliner Weisse as part of the 999 swap, I have a hankering to brew up a sour session beer.

• I have the day off.
• It's raining outside.
• The chores are done.
• I have two empty carboys.

What I don't have are any commercial bugs. So I'll leave it to my "wild side" to come up with an experiment.

Berliner Weisse Recipe

6 gallon batch.
3.75 Pilsner
2.25 Wheat Malt
.75 Oz Tettnang (Added to mash)
OG = 1.030
IBU = ~3

Mash for 2 hours at 149 (will drop to 144 over the two hours but that's okay).

• Siphon 6 gallons into the brew kettle. Drop in chiller and get down to ~90 degrees. (Wouldn't take too long since I'm cooling from mash temp and not boil temp).
• Siphon off 1.5 gallons into a separate carboy.
• Take remaining 4.5 gallons and bring to boil for 15 minutes.
• Chill this larger portion to pitching temps and pitch on Kolsch yeast cake.
• Take smaller portion and add 1/2# of raw grains, cover loosely and let sour over 4-5 days.
  
• At day 5 (or whatever) rack the soured beer into the main portion and allow to sour-ferment for 3 weeks.

Rack to keg...let sit for 1-2 weeks.
Chill and sample.

I'll probably bottle off a large portion of this from the keg and return to room temp so the bottles can continue to condition and the bugs can finish their work.

Can't stop me now. Mash started 20 minutes ago.

You'll have to wait longer than six weeks, dude. More like 6 months.

I'm so proud that you've crossed over to the funky side.

flyangler18 said:

You'll have to wait longer than six weeks, dude.

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5 weeks total isn't long enough to at least sample?

BierMuncher said:

5 weeks total isn't long enough to at least sample?

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You might have a nice delicate sour at that stage - could be nice.

flyangler18 said:

You might have a nice delicate sour at that stage - could be nice.

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Cool. I figure by bottling 2/3rds of the batch and returning to room temp, they can dry out more and gain some additional carbonation.

Well, the deed is done. Actually it's been done for several hours...I just got back from a 3 hour ride.

Talk about an easy brew day. I decided to go completely no-boil on this batch. Bring on the little buggers.

Got 6 gallons of wort cooling down to around 100 degrees and have the BB ready to take in about 2 gallons.


103 degrees should be warm enough to agitate the little buggers and get them going.


2 gallons ought to do it.


Measure out a half pound of raw grains for inoculation.


Drop them in....


Phase one complete.


Cool the remainder of the wort down to pitching temp...


Siphon off some Kolsch yeast from a batch of my "Hop Stream Rye APA". I want a quick and active fermentation to avoid any stressing and off flavors.


Shake the bejeezus out of the chiller to get good, frothy aeration...


Rack main wort into carboy...

These two were meant for each other....but not for about a week.


Once the main batch ferments and the small batch starts stinking like zombie-ass, they'll be joined to start a new relationship.

Now...it's on to some HB's to get this Friday night rolling.

I'm doing the same thing soon...well, not the same exactly, cuz I'll be using lacto D culture, but, yeah...B-weisse, baby!

Oh, and I think it's complete bullsh(t that mods get to post as many photos in their posts as they want, but the rest of us get flagged if we have 5 smilies. ...damn...

Evan! said:

Oh, and I think it's complete bullsh(t that mods get to post as many photos in their posts as they want, but the rest of us get flagged if we have 5 smilies. ...damn...

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You've been hanging around the wrong places.

We're (all) up to 10 smileys now. :cross:

24 hours later.

Definitely some sudsing action in the smaller batch. I purged the BB with CO2 this morning.

I wish I liked sour beers. Brewing one must feel like getting away with something naughty.

BrewBrain said:

I wish I liked sour beers. Brewing one must feel like getting away with something naughty.

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I admit it was not on my list of brewing to-dos.

But Beeriffic sent me a great Berliner Weisse and it was not what I expected. Very light...slight citrusy tartness. Almost like someone splashed some lemonade into a light summer ale. Very light in alcohol. Very refreshing. The sourness was faint and sublime. Like bittering hops are to a well brewed beer.

BierMuncher said:

Cool. I figure by bottling 2/3rds of the batch and returning to room temp, they can dry out more and gain some additional carbonation.

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Will bottle bombs not be a concern?

Well I ran home for lunch today to check out the 72 hour mark.

The Krausen on that 1.028 Weisse is about 3 inches thick and very pudding-like. Really bubbling away still. My guess is that the no boil left enough “bugs” in that fermenting batch to add some slight souring fermentation on top of the work the Kolsch is doing.

The bugged batch still has just a slight froth on top. I went ahead and moved that one to another spot in the brewshop and parked the space heater next to it on a low setting with a probe dipped in. I’ll try and get that thing up around 90 for a few days and see if we can amp up the souring. It is beginning to get some real sourdough aroma to it.

See, I wanted to send you a https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f72/drunk-owl-mango-55227/ last year with the RyePA swap BUT you didn't like that kind. I should have sent it anyway. Hindsight is always 20/20

Well the space heater did the trick. This afternoon at lunch the mini batch of inoculated wort was holding at 88-90 degrees. All of the grains I tossed in had floated to the top and there was a definite “fizzing” going on. I got a definite whiff of CO2 (burned nostrils) so we definitely have some bacterial fermentation going on. Not quite at the “funky” stage yet but getting there. I’m thinking by Thursday PM (that’s 6 full days) I’ll re-evaluate and decide whether it’s time to mix it with the kolsch fermenting batch.

I think I didn't let my wild culture go long enough. I pitched Wyeast 5335 into one and wild lacto culture into the other fermenter, and waited 48 hours to add the sacc. The 5335 smelled like a garbage can but the wild culture one just smelled fruity and a little floral on the airlock. They have been sitting in my garage which is between 75*F and 90*F this time of year, when I get to the two month mark I plan to rack and bring them inside for a bit. I will wait to bottle the lacto culture one for awhile in case I got some Brett from the grains, I would hate to have bottle bombs.

I brewed a berliner weiss on Saturday, it was a triple decoction no boil. I pitched a 1L starter of WL Lacto and left it over night at 98F and pitched about 2-3g of US05.

It is sitting at 1.010 right now, and is starting to get a bit of tartness. I imagine by the time this finishes out, it will have a refreshing twang. The taste is still extremely bready and a little worty, so hopefully the sourness will brighten things up.

Evan! said:

Oh, and I think it's complete bullsh(t that mods get to post as many photos in their posts as they want, but the rest of us get flagged if we have 5 smilies. ...damn...

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YEAH!!! F the POLICE!

nah j-k great post
i have been makeing lots of aurther style stout
just useing acid malt but have been wanting to make some of my own
sour mash instead, mabe with some of my homemade co-op barly malt

Day 5 with the last 3 days at ~96 degrees. Nice sourdough smell. No barfy aroma at all.






Decided to draw a sample for a hydro reading.


Tastes like someone set out a glass of unsweetened lemonade on ice...let the ice melt and get to room temperature. Tart, but weak.

Oh yeah - that looks delish. :rockin:

Looks like a pellicle. Doesn't smell like "satan's taint" yet?

jkpq45 said:

Looks like a pellicle. Doesn't smell like "satan's taint" yet?

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Lacto won't.

I'm hoping for something other than lacto in BM's brew.

If it is just lacto, it'll just start to smell like sourdough, right?

jkpq45 said:

I'm hoping for something other than lacto in BM's brew.

If it is just lacto, it'll just start to smell like sourdough, right?

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A Berliner Weisse gets its sourness from Lacto- so you'll just get the clean sourness without any funkiness.

6 Days and ready to mingle the brews. The soured batch still smells like a sourdough bakery. Nothing offensive here. Just clean smelling, yeasty sourness.

She's been holding at around 95-98 for the last four days. now we'll rack her to the main batch and let it sit for ????? ?

I think she looks completely ready. Hydro was at just below 1.000.


Looks downright dusty in there.


Time to meet your life partner...

Hey Munch--

Did you leave the "dust" behind in your sour brew, or did everything that would pass through the siphon go into the main batch?

Are you going to keep that BB for sour brews in the future, or is it oxyclean/starsan FTW?

jkpq45 said:

Hey Munch--

Did you leave the "dust" behind in your sour brew, or did everything that would pass through the siphon go into the main batch?

Are you going to keep that BB for sour brews in the future, or is it oxyclean/starsan FTW?

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I wrapped a double layer of a paint strainer around the end of the racking cane to keep out the solids. I thought about harvesting the lacto cream left behind, but it was so thoroughly mixed with the grains, it wasn't worth it.

The BB is soaking now in a heavy solution of Oxyclean and will then get an overnight soak in a moderate bleach/water solution.

I ended up with a 6.5 gallon carboy nearly full. That's one thing to consider is that with a no boil, you have to dial your efficiency way down since you can't concentrate your wort through boiling and end up with a higher dilution.

I'm hoping you passed the bug on...I've been very intrigued by Berlinerweiss and I can't find it anywhere to try it. So I think I'm just going to have to make one.

If you try the wild grain thing definitely go with BierMuncher's method. It takes a nice, LONG time for the lacto to develop. It's harder to infect your brew than you think... even when you are trying!

your review of Beeriffic's berliner weisse got me drooling, so I clicked this link and have been wide-eyed and gap-jawed for the past five minutes.

My girlfriend just said "Babe, you just drooled on yourself." Looking at my shirt, sure enough, I did. I guess I better make a batch of this.

Did you aerate the part of this that you infected?

smellysell said:

Did you aerate the part of this that you infected?

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He didn't boil. there is no real need to aerate.

Ryan_PA said:

He didn't boil. there is no real need to aerate.

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Right. Actually the opposite is true to a small degree. Eliminating O2 for the fermenter will help to keep the infection clean of unwanteds. Once I racked the inoculated batch to the fermenter, I urged it with CO2.

Lactobacillus are anaerobic so I didn't aerate my batch. Since I didn't aerate, I pitched plenty of yeast after the lacto had a nice krausen going, about 1M cells/mL/*P (Jamil's calc gives .75M cells/mL/*P).

Hey BM,

A) Happy B-Day.

B) Looking for an update when you're ready on this one... cheers!

fastricky said:

Hey BM,

A) Happy B-Day.

B) Looking for an update when you're ready on this one... cheers!

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Thanks.

Turned out quite nice. I initially kegged it and chilled it about 4 weeks into it's life. Nice mellow sourness. The reason I chilled it was to send off a few bottles to the "Boneyard Brew Off" competition in Illinois a few weeks ago.
Even at its early stage...it placed third in a combined "German Wheat & German Sour" category.

I've since taken the keg out of the chiller to make room for some July 4th kegs and to let it continue to ferment out.

cool experiment BM, thanks for sharing. i may just have to try this out someday...

It's been a couple months since the last update. How is it now?