Brett in a Belgian Golden Strong Ale?

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Barkingshins

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Here's the situation...

I brewed a Belgian Golden Strong Ale a couple months back using nothing but Belgian Pilsner malt and 3 lbs of cane sugar. The brewday went well. I hit my target O.G. of 1.080 and pitched White Labs WLP570. With all of those simple sugars, primary fermentation took off like a rocket of course. Unfortunately, I neglected to ramp up the fermentation temp like I should have and it stalled at about 1.020... 12 pts or so short of what my target F.G. was. I decided to rack it to a corny and just let it sit for a month or so to see if it would dry out on it's own. No such luck. Today it is still sitting in a corny at ~1.020 and tastes great but is far sweeter than I was hoping.

My options as I see them are to just carb it and drink it as-is OR put together a new yeast starter and repitch. I'm leaning towards the latter option but this morning I thought that maybe it would be interesting to pitch some Brett (WLP650?) to really dry it out and add some funkiness. As this would be my first time using Brett in my homebrew, I thought maybe it would be wise to bounce the idea off of the forums here and see what ya'll had to say about it.

Does this sound like a reasonable idea? Would it be ok for me to pitch the Brett right into the corny or is there some reason why it would be best to rack it back to a carboy first? What sort of fermentation temp concerns should I be aware of with this?

Any help you can offer would be much appreciated.
 
I am just sticking my toe into brett brewing, but maybe a reply would get someone with more experience involved.

The one issue I see would be time. Brett apparently takes its time. If you just pitched a vile of WLP650 into the corny, it might be a while before you got the desired results.

You could probably help it along by pitching the brett along with a new starter of your original yeast, or a neutral ale yeast. Let the original yeast get it down to 1.008, then let the brett go to work on the last .004.

Or you could always just pitch the new yeast, and when it finishes, rack off a gallon and pitch the dregs from a bottle of Orval or Reyon Vert. That's how I am getting into this. If the beer tastes fine but just needs to dry out a bit and you can get it there with regular yeast, might as well have four gallons of good beer and a gallon of experimental beer.
 
I had exactly the same problem with a triple about a year ago. I was making a Brett Saisson at the time and figured what the heck, it can't make it any worse. So I pitched a starter of the WLP seasonal "trois" just to see what would happen.

The result was a nice sour triple. Think Petrus Oak Aged Pale Ale but with the malt character of a triple. It's actually one of my favorites and I hope I can make it again.

I'd say go for it.

BTW: It took a couple months but it brought my FG down from 1020 to around 1012 or so.
 
You can have the best of both worlds, if you wish. I took a batch of IPA, split the batch in half, and bottled half with brett. I ended up with two very different beers, both were very enjoyable for different reasons.
 
I had almost EXACTLY the same situation--my BGS stalled at 1.023 or so (can't recall), so dropped a vial (no starter) of brett Brux--eventually chewed it's way to 1.003 or so.
 
The result was a nice sour triple. Think Petrus Oak Aged Pale Ale but with the malt character of a triple. It's actually one of my favorites and I hope I can make it again.
I have read that a 100% brett fermentation will be different from a beer that you ferment with a primary strain and then finish with brett. The first supposedly gives you pineapple and mango flavors, the second is where you get the barnyard / horse blanket. When I was trying to think of an answer to the OP, I started to wonder if a beer where the brett started with simple sugars available to it would be more like a 100% brett beer or a beer with brett as a secondary strain. Any opinion? (No worries if you don't have an opinion, or if you don't spot a difference between the two styles of beer).
 
I haven't tried a 100% Brett batch yet but that's what I've read as well.

Of course, I've also read that Brett as a secondary doesn't cause a lot of sourness and I can attest that it can. It also produced the barnyard aroma and flavor you speak of. The combination of sour, barnyard, phenolic notes from the Belgian sacc and aromatic malts is hard to describe and harder to get enough of. Especially the aroma, I could literally sit and sniff a sample all day.

I'm currently sitting on a Double that stalled on me so I added a vial of Brett B that I had laying around. It's got another month or so to go but it's already developing similar aromas/flavors so I'm pretty confident I can repeat the process.

In both of these batches the Brett has been added after the Sacc has finished the simple sugars so there's only longer chains for the Brett to eat. If there are any mango/pineapple notes, they are overridden by sour, horsey notes. I guess what I'm saying is that Brett as secondary definitely causes horsey notes that taste/smell really nice.

I don't know anything about 100% Brett beers first hand so I can't tell you about them.

OP: You can add the Brett straight to the carboy or to your corny, it doesn't really matter. Temps don't matter much either. Just keep it at room temp.
 
Pitch brett and the flavor will change over the next year or more. Give it a go and see what it does.

Brett as a secondary yeast works slowly. It is a tough environment, no oxygen and lots of alcohol. It is this tough environment that stresses the yeast and results in the rustic flavors.

Brett likes high temps. 80s, maybe even 90s. I've done 100% Brett beers at these temps, but never as a secondary. Place your keg in a warm location and let it go.
 
I'm with Calder. To avoid craziness, flush vessels with co2 (o2=sour). Throw your Brett in there and let it do its thing. Warm. You're asking the Brett to do a lot (again, tough environment). You won't see much difference when the beer is young, but I year in, you'll get an awesome funk.

Good luck!
 
It takes less time than you think to get the funk to show up. Two to three month's (four tops) in the mid to high 70's is all it took/is taking for me. The flavor may still be developing but the changes are really small at this point.
 
you could def just toss the brett into the corny and give it a few months warm. it'll get rid of that sweetness but just be aware that some of the brett character comes from converting esters so you may lose some of your belgian character.
 
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