Mixing Strains

[Nick4228]

Hi All,

I'm not new to making sour/tart/wild beers. I've got 3 going right now (sour rye stout, funky dark saison, american kriek), but traditionally I've used either 1 isolated strain like brett bruxellensis, brett lambicus, etc... or I've used a already mixed pitch like ECY-20, Roeselare, etc... For my next beer I was thinking I wanted to mix three isolated strains and was curious about a couple things. The plan is to make a "farmhouse" ale, using white labs 550 (Belgian Ale) as my primary strain, and then in the secondary I wanted to pitch brett brux, brett lambicus and lacto. So, if these are all going into my secondary... should I just buy a tube of each and throw all 3 in, or should I throw them all together and make a little starter or should I use half a tube of each, or another ratio, or something completely different? Any advice would be greatly appriciated!

Thanks!

 

[gandelf]

What is your starting gravity? Have you considered a sour mash?

 

[jnacey]

I've found that the commercial strains are somewhat weak compared to the bottled versions of commercial sours. Myself and others on here have had good results pitching something like Yeast Bay's wild strains and then tossing in the bottle dregs of other sours you drink.

Some of the Allagash beers would lend themselves nicely to this.

 

[ChugachBrewing]

Are you going for a specific flavor, "funk" or sour? The term 'sour' gets tossed around too much these days and often are intertwined with wild brewing.
Brett will primarily give you a funkier flavor, lacto and pedio can provide sourness. The different strains of brett will provide different levels and flavors, you should look them up prior to pitching.
The term farmhouse can be interpreted so many ways, its simply up to you and what you want in the finished beer.
It might be easier to replicate if you use a pre packaged mix - but I don't want to push you in that direction. Creativity is king.

 

[nicklepickles]

Im definitely intrested if anyone has done something similar to this. I have a saison planned, and was thking of starting with wlp 566, then pitching brett brux and brett lambicus in secondary, so pretty similar idea to the OP

 

[jnacey]

I did a traditional saison with the dupont strain and brett clausenii pitched at the same time for primary. Various dregs from other brett only beers were pitched from time to time. Bottled after six months and it came out nicely.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[nicklepickles]

I did a traditional saison with the dupont strain and brett clausenii pitched at the same time for primary. Various dregs from other brett only beers were pitched from time to time. Bottled after six months and it came out nicely.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

Ive seen this being done pretty commonly, which leads me to believe going ahead with my plan will be fine, doesnt seem like brett likes to fight with other strains of brett

 

[JoppaFarms]

No expert here, but I brewed over the weekend and pitched WLP565 (Belgian Saison I), Brett Lamb., and Lacto D. into primary. Second batch (partigyle) I brewed I put Wyeast 1056 (American Ale) and Brett C. I have oak cubes in the first one, none in the second but the second has very little trub. Idea is to keep the oak cubes since they're infected and wash the yeast from the second and perhaps make a mix of all of them in the end. We'll see how it comes in 6 months.

 

[metic]

If you're pitching brett and sacch simultaneously, you might want to think about your pitching rates, the strains you're using, and your desired flavour profile. I pitched some Wyeast Brett Brux (higher cell count than WLP) early in the fermentation of an Orval clone, and ended up with something with way too much barnyard/toilet for my taste (and tasted that way from very early on). I've had better luck pitching much smaller amounts of the same strain.

 

[metic]

Hi All,

I'm not new to making sour/tart/wild beers. I've got 3 going right now (sour rye stout, funky dark saison, american kriek), but traditionally I've used either 1 isolated strain like brett bruxellensis, brett lambicus, etc... or I've used a already mixed pitch like ECY-20, Roeselare, etc... For my next beer I was thinking I wanted to mix three isolated strains and was curious about a couple things. The plan is to make a "farmhouse" ale, using white labs 550 (Belgian Ale) as my primary strain, and then in the secondary I wanted to pitch brett brux, brett lambicus and lacto. So, if these are all going into my secondary... should I just buy a tube of each and throw all 3 in, or should I throw them all together and make a little starter or should I use half a tube of each, or another ratio, or something completely different? Any advice would be greatly appriciated!

Thanks!

Another thing to think about: in my experience, both bretts will make a contribution if you just pitch the vial directly into your secondary. They don't need much in the way of sugars to work on. But if you just pitch a vial of lacto directly into secondary, you won't get much of a contribution from it in terms of sourness. It does need sugars, and most of these will have already been eaten: plus cell numbers will be low, and it will be competing with the brett for what is left. So you might want to think about making a starter for the lacto (e.g. apple juice, no oxygen) and pitching it early if you want some sourness from it.

 

[allouez86]

Interesting timing on this thread as I'm about to embark on something very similar. I'm about to do a beer brewed primarily with only brett and lacto. I've got a good size starter of Brux then two smaller starters of Lam and Claus. I'm planning on pitching them all right away without any saccharomyces. I'll also be pitching a pack of lacto from white labs. Planning on brewing in two days. Curious to hear from others who have done something similar.

 

[metic]

I've done a few brett/lacto only fermentations (I started a thread here). A few things I've noticed so far:

- Brett together with lacto is fairly atteunuative (more so than brett alone---I think I've seen evidence of this in Chad Yakobson's research too), so you need to think about this when designing your final beer. They can easily end up tasting a bit thin---OK in a highly carbonated berliner weisse, less so in a sour brown ale. You can accommodate this in your recipe though, e.g. I added golden naked oats to one beer and that left some body.

- I've found that it works really well if you want a straight-forwardly sour and refreshing beer, but not if you want something more complex (so again, great for a berliner-weisse). They are still nice beers, especially when its hot out, but nothing I've made has matched my mixed culture sours.

Edit: I should say, too, that I only used one Brett strain (trois). Perhaps using a number of cultures will add to the complexity.

 

[jnacey]

I've done a few brett/lacto only fermentations (I started a thread here). A few things I've noticed so far:

- Brett together with lacto is fairly atteunuative (more so than brett alone---I think I've seen evidence of this in Chad Yakobson's research too), so you need to think about this when designing your final beer. They can easily end up tasting a bit thin---OK in a highly carbonated berliner weisse, less so in a sour brown ale. You can accommodate this in your recipe though, e.g. I added golden naked oats to one beer and that left some body.

- I've found that it works really well if you want a straight-forwardly sour and refreshing beer, but not if you want something more complex (so again, great for a berliner-weisse). They are still nice beers, especially when its hot out, but nothing I've made has matched my mixed culture sours.

Edit: I should say, too, that I only used one Brett strain (trois). Perhaps using a number of cultures will add to the complexity.

metric, was the turnaround time on these beers similar to a brett only or more in line with a full brett/pedio/lacto fermentation?

 

[metic]

Closer to brett only, a month or two. The attenuation was quicker if anything, but it takes a while for the flavours to meld.

 

[Nick4228]

Thank you all for your relpys! I'm thinking (and would love some feedback) that, being a 1.048 wort, I'll pitch a decent sized lacto starter and just the vial of wlp550 (Belgian Ale) into my primary, then add a vial of brett brux and a vial of brett lambicus into my secondary a week or so later. Thoughts?

 

[MileHighBrewer]

Can you get Jolly Pumpkin where you live? You could probably pitch just those and wait a bit longer, or pitch them along with a commercial brett strain. JP uses WLP550 as their primary strain, so you are going right in line with what they do.