Maltodextrin in the Secondary

[FredTheNuke]

I apologize if this is a repeat question (it was sort of answered when I searched but not completely).

Do folks add Maltodextrin to the Secondary about 2 months in after the saccharomyces cerevisiae is done and dormant/dead to give the Brett more food? In a perfect world a turbid or high temp mash would provide plenty of Brett food from unconverted starches. But as I understand adding Maltodextrin would perform the same function of giving the Brett more food to produce lacto. Or am I just nutz?

If anyone adds Maltodextrin routinely what is your method of discretely piercing the pellicle? Pre-mixing it with water would be possible but not preferred. Or do folks just add it during the boil or just after and achieve the same results?

 

[metic]

This isn't exactly an answer to your question, but you don't necessarily need to give brett more food since it can make a contribution without converting sugars. Also, brett doesn't really produce lactic acid as far as I know (it can produce acetic acid though). For lactic, you'll need to add bacteria like lacto and pedio, and these do benefit from residual sugars in the beer.

Since the yeast can't ferment the maltodextrin anyway, I don't see any problem adding it during the boil: it would still be there for the bacteria to ferment after two months. But if you want to add some to secondary, mixing it with some water and gently pouring it shouldn't be a problem.

 

[dantheman13]

I've used maltodextrin in my 100% extract sours. As Metic suggested, there's no need to put it into secondary because the Sacch won't ferment it out anyway. In my mind, that's just an unnecessary step/risk. It does take the Brett around a year (maybe a little less) to break that stuff down in my experience.