Brett L ferm temp and recipe questions

I bought a bunch of yeasts a month or two ago, and one of them was a a vial of Brett L (WLP 653) without putting any though into what I'm going to do with it. I tried to brew an all Brett B about 4 months ago with a vial of WLP650 and dregs, but the dregs as I latter found out had champagne yeast in them. 4 months in, this beer ended up smelling and tasting like new, clean leather sans any pleasant fruity esters (I added about an ounce of 88% lactic acid, and found that to have helped the taste a lot).

This time around, I want to do what I can to get the cherry pie flavor and slight tartness I keep hearing about Brett L. I will be making a starter today, and building it up for about 10 days, so brew day itself is two weekends away. This should give me time to read much of my newly purchased Wild Brews book. Currently, the beer I'm thinking of will look something like this:

5 Gal, All grain:
7# belgian pilsner
5# wheat malt
and maybe a few oz of Spec B and/or cara60
Low mash temp, ~150, for a dry beer


For hops, I want something to compliment and round out the cherry pie-ness of the Brett L. I'm thinking Simcoe and Nelson Sauvin, and all bitterness will come from late additions of these two.

Main concern: I have heard Brett L can also leave a strong smoky/spicy profile. What can I do to avoid this as the dominant character, and maximize the cherry profile (i.e. in terms of adjusting ferm temp, pH, mash temp, etc)?

Feel encouraged to comment on the the grains and hops too

Thanks!

Nice - I like the simplicity of the recipe.

I have had best results with Brettanomyces in general at higher temperatures. Like 70 or warmer. I have 20gallons of golden ale going right now that was split in four carboys and fermented each with a different WLP Brett strain. The last taste I had was almost two weeks ago, and the Brett L, when compared to Brett c, Brett b and Brett b 'Trois', had developed a hint of acidity. My fermentation profile for this beer was 72 starting and free rise to 78 F. Although I've been using Brett pretty consistently for about a year, I am relatively new to Brett L and have little to contribute here. Would love to see what others might offer.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f127/great-brettanomyces-experiment-401898/

berebrando said:

Nice - I like the simplicity of the recipe.

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Thanks, I didn't want to over complicate it and mask the Brett L contribution too much. Too many tweaks in a recipe makes it harder to learn from experience. I read your experiment before I posted this, and I'm really interested to see what the final beers are like. After rereading, I noticed something that has me thinking about my grain bill. Your tasting results were that Lambicus was more malt forward, so now I'm debating myself on using Marris Otter instead of Belgian Pils, or maybe throwing in some Victory or Aromatic.

I'll definitely be trying your fermentation profile. The leathery brett beer I fermented like I pitched at 65 and got up to as high as 72.

EaglePoint said:

I'll definitely be trying your fermentation profile. The leathery brett beer I fermented like I pitched at 65 and got up to as high as 72.

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Good info! Thanks for sharing.

If you want a cleaner beer, I'd stay away from any specialty malts and stick with the wheat and pils. I've had good luck with using a little oat malt to give brett beers some more body, since the yeast won't make any glycerol. I would also delay the brew long enough to step that vial up twice, if you only do a one-step starter, you're going to be underpitching.

As to the hops, think about what flavors you want in your beer. It seems to me you're going for a yeast driven beer, so the hops could take a back seat. I'm brewing a beer with some cantillon brett today, I'll use enough saaz or crystal to get 10 or 15 IBU, but I'm also planning on souring in secondary. I'll probably then dry hop it when it's ready, or at least a portion, with something fruity like mosaic or nelson.

Used brett L (wyeast) for my first all brett beer. Fermented quick, from 56 down to 16 in a few days at around 65-70*. Then it seemed to have gone dormant for nearly 8 weeks. All the swirling and temp jumps (70-75*) didn't seem to do squat. Still sat at 1.016.......until one day it was 1.014. After 8+ weeks the brett L seems to be going through a second fermentation- yeast/some Krausen building on top again. I have read that this is common- a second go around for the brett (could take couple weeks or couple months). I am looking for this to get down to 1.008- keeping temp over 70*.
My recipe was loosely styled after goose islands sofie. Belgian blonde (belg pale &pils, some acid malt, wheat & caravienne) with Amarillo hops (bittering addition). Currently have it sitting on 1 oz oak cubes that were soaked in Chardonnay and 1/2 oz orange peel. Gonna let the brett finish chewing for a month (hopefully settling out at 1.008) which would give me a total 3.5 months.
I've taken a few samples- after 2 weeks the aroma and taste were fruity (like fruit loops cereal) almost tropical , bubblegum. After month, this mellowed slightly (or just started melding with the rest of the beer), with some leathery, funk coming through ever so slightly. After 2 months, the fruit & funk have balanced out. Can't wait until this is finished