Wild yeast beer style

[damlamb]

So back at the end of Aug. 2015 I picked a whole pile of apples off of old trees on my in-laws farm. I took peels from apples in three different locations and put them in sterile jars with about 1 cup each of canned pasteurized apple juice. Shook the jars daily and at one week in all three were showing signs of fermentation. One of the jars ended up smelling and tasting really good and the other two tasted ok but smelled sulfury and wine like. I ended up mixing the the two smelly ones and keeping the good one separate. I'm now on my fourth generation repitch fermenting cider with the two wild cultures. I want to make a batch of beer and try the wild yeast out but I'm not sure what style to go with. I was thinking a simple blonde ale maybe. Any one else done this kind of thing or have any recipe suggestions? I wonder if the yeast will have trouble with maltose as it is "used" to simple apple juice and sugar fermentations.

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[NTexBrewer]

I would go with a saison grain bill.

Something like

86% Pilsner
7% Malted Wheat
7% Dark Munich (10L)

Mash low at 149 to get more fermentable sugars.

I would then split the batch and maybe ferment 1 or 2 gallons with your wild yeast and the rest with a Saison yeast. You get two different beers to compare and you can check the attenuation of the wild yeast compared to the saison yeast. If the test batch is good you have a good build up of yeast to make a full batch.

 

[damlamb]

I would go with a saison grain bill.

Something like

86% Pilsner
7% Malted Wheat
7% Dark Munich (10L)

Mash low at 149 to get more fermentable sugars.

I would then split the batch and maybe ferment 1 or 2 gallons with your wild yeast and the rest with a Saison yeast. You get two different beers to compare and you can check the attenuation of the wild yeast compared to the saison yeast. If the test batch is good you have a good build up of yeast to make a full batch.

I did just bottle my first saison. I threw the yeast cake away but I could probably culture up some from my bottles. I never considered saison but it does seem to be the perfect beer for wild yeast. I'll probably use 2 row instead of pilsner because I have it on hand. Thanks for the suggestion.

Any one else have experience making beer with yeast you captured? I just got my confirmation for "brew your own" magazine boot camp in November where I will be attending a yeast work shop put on by Chris White from white labs so I am uber excited for that. Only 188 sleeps to go lol.

 

[tbred]

I just brewed a beer with wild yeast from crab apples. The first batch I did was a small test batch all DME with 10 ibu of hops. I wanted to taste the yeast profile. The batch I brewed today with the slurry was a saison like beer. Maris otter, flaked wheat, and jaggery sugar. I am excited to see how it turns out.

 

[Thakaz]

You can help your culture adapt by mixing your next starter 50/50 apple juice to dme wort.

 

[Aristotelian]

There have been a few threads on wild yeast projects. I agree, saison or pale ale grain/hop bill would be good so that you don't have malt or hops overpowering the yeast. Once you get an idea of the yeast's character, then you can decide what direction to go next. Please update, I am definitely interested in how it turns out.

 

[damlamb]

Thanks everyone for the info. I have settled on a saison grain bill/hops as suggested. I will be splitting the batch into 5 separate 1 gallon jugs and doing the following;
Saison yeast
Wild yeast I
Wild yeast II
Wild yeast plus fruit addition (probably mango)
Saison yeast with same fruit addition.
Haven't nailed down a brew date yet but I will be sure to post results.