Farmhouse - mixed yeasts setup

[MrFancyPlants]

I have been pressure fermenting with several white oak staves in my 15.5G topedo keg. I have used several yeasts and have been pitching on the leftovers from previous batches. I started out with kveik, then S05 from a kit(wish I hadn’t done that), and also Belle Saison. Last Batch with the Belle, I got 0 Belle impact, and 0 orangy kveik notes.
I did, at some point, pitch some dregs in hopes for Brett to come to the party.

I wonder if I got some killer champagne yeast in there? Not sure if Brett made it or not.

Another reason the batches may have been less expressive than I hoped is the vast over pitches by running batch after batch without cleaning the keg of trub and hops.

I am going to clean the keg after my current batch transfers out. And I was thinking to lightly bake the white oak staves to see if I can resuscitate the kveik character.
I was going to use the staves to inoculate the next batch. Warm the oven to 170(lowest setting) turn the oven off and put the staves in once it cooled down to 130. Maybe cycle through that a few times if they don’t look dry.
Should I only rinse (and not heat/dry ) one of the staves to preserve any Brett that might have made it?

 

[HM-2]

I've only had orange thrown by Kveik strains at high temp and without pressure.
Belle isn't particularly "Saison-y" unless you stress it.

I suspect you'd get results with more yeast character if you dispensed the pressure fermentation, which literally supresses that character.

 

[MrFancyPlants]

I've only had orange thrown by Kveik strains at high temp and without pressure.
Belle isn't particularly "Saison-y" unless you stress it.

I suspect you'd get results with more yeast character if you dispensed the pressure fermentation, which literally supresses that character.

My latest batch is flowing and I think the Belle was a bad idea. I think the diastatic Belle nature has left very little body and a lot of bitterness. It has got some kick to it though.
In the past I had a fiery saison that I added Orval dregs that turned into a pineapple monster, that I was trying to recreate, but too many variables at play didn’t work out for the last batch.
I think maybe my 15.5 fermenter, I should restart with an English ale strain since I like ESB so much, then I can set a spare 5G corny with a blow off tube for funky batches.
I ditched my glass carboys when I moved recently.
Also, the Bret never took hold on the oak staves, I would taste it by now.

 

[HM-2]

Brett is a very slow burner. My last Bretted beer was a combination of Brux-like Troix and actual Brux for secondary and that spend 4 months in keg before the Brett had fully finished doing it's thing.

 

[MrFancyPlants]

You know my mixed fermentation might be turning a corner. It had been almost a year since I pitched Duchesse De Bourgogne dregs in there. I still wish I hadn’t added Belle, but it isn’t as thin and bitter after cold crashing. I transferred most of the batch to a 5G corny but still have a couple gallons left and 4 or five gallons of trub and old hops.
I was thinking, maybe I move a white oak stave or two from primary into a 3G corny. Top off the 5G. And then bust out the old auto siphon and try to eek some more liquid out of the trub/hops.
It would get oxidized on an old school transfer like that but might work with the wood as long as it didn’t clash with the bitterness in there.
I could boil up another box of Honey Nut Cheerios for a re-ferment? If I do, should I add enzyme and mash the Cheerios, or leave the starches in there for them to chew on?

Then I could clean my big fermenter and run some single yeast batches for a while and see how the mixed batch evolves in the 3G.

 

[MrFancyPlants]

I have some br8 I could always add in to a split to see if it brings more Brett to the party. As a dry yeast, my understanding is that it won’t add much to the game now that most of the simple sugars have been worked on. But, at some point iI’ll try a batch with only a stave as the inoculation.

 

[Shenanigans]

What Brett strain is in the Duchesse De Bourgogne?

 

[MrFancyPlants]

What Brett strain is in the Duchesse De Bourgogne?

I’m not sure, but mad fermentionist list it as bret and bacteria, but it being difficult to culture due to filtering. It is subtle, though I haven’t tried aging a bottle to see if the bret stands out over time.

 

[Shenanigans]

I have some br8 I could always add in to a split to see if it brings more Brett to the party. As a dry yeast, my understanding is that it won’t add much to the game now that most of the simple sugars have been worked on. But, at some point iI’ll try a batch with only a stave as the inoculation.

Ah I see now it's a Flanders Red so it must be something like the Roeselare Ale blend.
I have some of that already from a Rodenbach Grand Cru attempt.

 

[MrFancyPlants]

I have 2 Brett 5G cornys that I’ve been dumping (pressure transferring) any so-so beer or leftovers into, with a smoked white oak stave (I put one in the grill off to the side while I made ribs burgers chicken wings etc. and swap them in and out of the beer/grill) The 5G have Br-8 and “all the Bretts” inoculated, and Bell saison and a mix of ale yeasts. I am trying different temperatures for the secondary fermentation to see if I can get some pineapple out of the brett. When the funk gets about right then I throw it back in the kegerator to slow down the funktification.
Beers I’ve added in are kitchen sink beer with box of ‘Honey Nut Cheerios’, Hefeweizen that was ok, but got scorched due to a brew in bag mishap. ESB with a lb of dry hop that I switched up the recipe and was way too sweet. The Brett and Smokey stave are great for over-powering flaws. And it is nice to have a “house beer” that is different from any thing at the local tap house.
I just brewed 15G of 1.063 Pilsner/Citra smash with no boil hops, but nearly a pound of hop-stand at 165f. I hope it turns out great, but if not, I can always take it for a ride on the funky train.