I attempted my first Gose, and I think I messed up somewhere. I used the sour wort technique: mash, collect wort, heat to 180F, cool to 100-120F, pitch lacto starter, wait 3 days with temp around 90F, 60 min boil for hops and spices, cool and pitch yeast.
Measuring the gravity post boil, I got around 1.024 when I was shooting for around 1.044. Unfortunately, I didn't measure the gravity pre-souring so I just wanted to get some opinions on where I went wrong.
My theories:
1. Just terrible efficiency. With a 50% wheat grain bill, I forgot to use rice hulls and had some stuck mash issues. A fly sparge turned into a batch sparge with me having to stir the mash every 10 min or so. I'm not sure this would account for that low of a gravity though.
2. Lacto starter was more than just lactobacillus or was a heterofermentative strain. Creating the starter, I just pitched a handful of whole grains into starter wort. I wasn't able to keep it heated constantly but raised the temp to around 100 every 12 hours or so for the first 3 days. Brewing was delayed so the starter sat for about 7 days. Developed a white film on top and smelled ok (apples, cider, etc)
After pitching the sour wort, nothing developed on top of the wort (krausen or bacteria). It did sour nicely. If the lacto starter was a heterofermentative strain, would a larger starter gravity have helped? Would keeping the starter at 100F constantly for 3 days have helped any? Or is everything fine and I shouldn't rely on gravity reading post sour?
Measuring the gravity post boil, I got around 1.024 when I was shooting for around 1.044. Unfortunately, I didn't measure the gravity pre-souring so I just wanted to get some opinions on where I went wrong.
My theories:
1. Just terrible efficiency. With a 50% wheat grain bill, I forgot to use rice hulls and had some stuck mash issues. A fly sparge turned into a batch sparge with me having to stir the mash every 10 min or so. I'm not sure this would account for that low of a gravity though.
2. Lacto starter was more than just lactobacillus or was a heterofermentative strain. Creating the starter, I just pitched a handful of whole grains into starter wort. I wasn't able to keep it heated constantly but raised the temp to around 100 every 12 hours or so for the first 3 days. Brewing was delayed so the starter sat for about 7 days. Developed a white film on top and smelled ok (apples, cider, etc)
After pitching the sour wort, nothing developed on top of the wort (krausen or bacteria). It did sour nicely. If the lacto starter was a heterofermentative strain, would a larger starter gravity have helped? Would keeping the starter at 100F constantly for 3 days have helped any? Or is everything fine and I shouldn't rely on gravity reading post sour?
