Accelerated Sour Beer Process

[ShareBrewing]

The plan: Brett or Brett/Sacc primary with a delayed addition of wort soured with Lacto. This would essentially be a pseudo-kettle sour technique.

In essence, a Brett-only or Brett/Sacc primary would be used for a portion of the wort (3/5 of available wort), while the other portion is allowed to sour with Lacto for a few days. The Lacto portion would then be added several days in primary fermentation.

This is i to a kettle sour technique because I go through my standard brew day but then pull of 2 or so gal of first runnings wort and put it in a sanitized carboy. Once down to ~115F I would pitch the Lacto and cover the vessel, as well as insulate it as much as possible to allow the most work to be done by the Lacto.

From that point the brew day would be the same. I would pitch my Sacc/Brett into the smaller portion of wort and then let it go about 3 to 4 days on its own. At which point I would heat the soured portion to kill the Lacto. I could add a touch more hops at this point and cool it down and add the soured wort to the main fermentation.

In my mind, one could produce a fairly funky sour within 2-3 months. Maybe this would be an illusion of complexity but it's worth finding out.

My concerns are that the Lacto-soured portion won't add enough sourness to the overall beer. And what would happen to the Brett or Sacc once the overall pH is suddenly dropped by the addition? Do you think this could produce a truly funky sour? Any thoughts or ideas? After all, this is a combo of the ideas for a kettle sour, late wort addition, and 100% Brett fermented ale.

 

[coypoo]

I just tried this a couple of weeks ago with a saison/brett beer. I pulled 2 gallons to kettle sour and the pH got down to 3.57 (I think the reading is skewed higher b/c I had CaCO3 in the starter that was therefore in the keg I was souring in, so when I pulled samples from the bottom Im assuming I got some chalk in my pH readings...)

Anyway, I added the 2 gallons back to the 3 gallons that got fermented with just sacc and after 5 days, the gravity was down to 1.005 and the pH was 3.63. It's carbed and on tap and I can taste a slight sourness, but it's not very tart in my opinion (Im still liking it though b/c it's a slightly tart saison).

I think it might be better to make 5 gallons of a really acidic beer (no hops, like 3 days souring, then don't boil and add the sacc and let the lacto continue to work for a month or two). Then to blend that with a beer you "funk" up however you choose. Hopefully the really really sour portion will be enough to "sour" the whole batch to the degree you want

 

[Dcpcooks]

You might consider making your wort, transfer 3 gallons to your primary fermentor and pitching your main yeast.
Let the additional 2 gallons cool to 110 ish and pitch your lacto. Wrap it with some reflective bubble wrap and let it sour until your happyif you can keep it warm for 24 hours the better. Bring it back to a boil. Chill and add it to the main fermentor to finish.

It's worked well for me

 

[ShareBrewing]

You've done this technique before? I've thought about it for a long time but life was often too busy.

What were your results and did you notice anything different in fermentation of the Sacc/Brett strain after the soured portion is added? Asked a local craft brewer and he said there really shouldn't be any consequences of the delayed (lower pH) wort addition. What you described was pretty much my plan, but i would let the Lacto work for 4-7 days before boiling off, want to that wort as sour as possible because the sour aspect will obviously be diluted once added to the other half of the beer. Any thoughts?

 

[ShareBrewing]

The lowest Lacto will work is 2.9-3.0 pH from sources I've read, so I guess the question is, will the soured portion get sour enough (pH-wise) and would the addition add a truly noticeable and tart flavor?

 

[specharka]

Why don't you try what Crooked Stave does to produce a majority of their sours?
Kettle sour with lacto, and pitch a 100% Brettanomyces culture to primary. Ferment out 6-8 weeks, allowing temperatures to reach 77F and maintain until attenuated. Produces a nice blend of punchy aromatics, very little barnyard funk, and since you're using Brett, the pH threshold for yeast activity is considerably lower.
Easy, (relatively) quick, simple and delicious.

 

[crane]

Why don't you try what Crooked Stave does to produce a majority of their sours?
Kettle sour with lacto, and pitch a 100% Brettanomyces culture to primary. Ferment out 6-8 weeks, allowing temperatures to reach 77F and maintain until attenuated. Produces a nice blend of punchy aromatics, very little barnyard funk, and since you're using Brett, the pH threshold for yeast activity is considerably lower.
Easy, (relatively) quick, simple and delicious.

I'm in agreement. I don't see how splitting the batch off is going to speed anything up as opposed to kettle souring the entire batch.

Also seems like more hassle than it's worth.

I'm also skeptical that you can kettle sour just half of the batch and end up with something that's more than just slightly tart after blending back into the unsoured half. on the other hand, this would be one way to prevent a beer from getting too sour if you are only trying to make a slightly tart beer.

 

[oli-aus]

I add acid beer to some of my saisons before bottling and you would be surprised at how much impact a small amount can have.
Did 10% of the total volume recently which gave me a tart saison. I'm not measuring ph so this is just going off of perceived but I've read the same opinion before on this guys blog: http://www.browneandbitter.com/p/projects.html?m=1

Check out the bier de coupage posts, he talks about blending in kettle sours in one of the articles.

 

[coypoo]

I've read some people say that sacc in acidic environments won't produce a normal amount of phenols and/or esters compared to a standard pH wort. So starting the sacc first to get some of the desired character then adding acidic wort (or blend in acidic beer) later may result in a diff flavor profile than a straight kettle soured then Sacc beer

 

[Dcpcooks]

You've done this technique before? I've thought about it for a long time but life was often too busy.

What were your results and did you notice anything different in fermentation of the Sacc/Brett strain after the soured portion is added? Asked a local craft brewer and he said there really shouldn't be any consequences of the delayed (lower pH) wort addition. What you described was pretty much my plan, but i would let the Lacto work for 4-7 days before boiling off, want to that wort as sour as possible because the sour aspect will obviously be diluted once added to the other half of the beer. Any thoughts?

Yes I've done it twice. I've also done a 100% lacto beer that was aged in a goose island barrel. I prefer the blended beer with Brett or sacc yeast. It offers a more complex flavor profile over just a straight lacto pitch.

I got the blended idea from off color brewing in chicago. Their Troublesome is a nice example of a lacto gose

 

[Aristotelian]

Seems like the OP process is essentially making a split batch with half kettle sour and half sacc/brett, then blending them back together. Interesting thought but I guess I would rather just go with a straight kettle sour if speed is the objective.

 

[ShareBrewing]

This thread is really meant to be an open space for others to post ideas and results for more expedient methods of souring a beer, not just a critique of my first idea. This is in the effort of foregoing the long mixed culture fermentation, which can be at least 1 year plus.

My idea of split fermentations and blending for acidity is a good technique for making lightly tart ales, which is the point. It would be good for styles like witbier, shandy, hefeweizen, etc. because you could control your final acidity levels more easily. This would certainly save time or effort in constantly having to monitor the pH of a full batch to only slightly drop. Instead just let a portion sour as much as possible, boil it (the smaller volume would also be easier to work with and cool down), and pitch to your main fermentor, which would also serve as a feeding and additional growth phase of your main yeast(s). Playing with the idea of a slightly tart witbier with hibiscus, pepper, and orange zest.


I'm truly interested and curious what the biochemical differences in flavor (compound) development would be using these quick sour techniques, followed by fermentations of Brett and/or Sacc - compared to what/when/how flavor compounds develop in long-aged mixed culture fermentations. Could one produce a complex pFlanders red in under 6-8 months? Or even 2-4 months?

For instance, the development of those truly funky Brett flavors is driven by the autolysis of the saccharomyces, as the Brett consumes proteins and phenols given off by the decaying yeast. This means one could probably achieve a much more funky beer with a kettle soured wort and then pitch Brett and a saccharomyces strain of choice.

 

[ShareBrewing]

The best possible results may come from Brett and Sacc fermentation following a kettle-sour regiment. The brewer's yeast provide a plethora of fermentation by-products that the Brett in turn convert to more farmhousey, funky, "classic Brett" flavors.

In Mike Tonsmeire's book "American Sours", he explains that "[esters and phenols] serve as substrates for further flavor development... 4-vinyl derivatives usually produced by primary fermentation with a Belgian Ale strain, which certain strains of Brettanomyces can convert into pungently funky 4-ethyl derivatives.

A classic example would be 4-vinyl guaiacol, recognized as clove in many Belgian ales and German wheats. Brett converts this to 4-ethyl guaiacol (smoky, phenolic, ash-like, clove).

It would be very interesting to do tests what strain combinations of Brett and Sacc strains go well together. I'm not even a huge fan of hefeweizens, but I have this bizarre urge to funkify a hefe or sour one.

Any thoughts?

 

[Dcpcooks]

I was at http://dovetailbrewery.com/philosophy/ yesterday. I got to tour the brewery and spend a little time with Bill. They are working on naturally inoculated lambic in a awesome coolship. They have a huge 100+ barrel room they filled a year or so ago. They plan on letting it sit for 3 years. Then blending in younger versions. Classic gueuze. Basically they said if your adding anything to a lambic your cheating the logic behind it all is that every step in the process a different microbe is playing a part in the process of flavor development. Each stage is producing a precursor for the next stage of fermentation. From what I smelled and saw they are going to be making amazing sour beers in the near future.

That said Tonsmeire is a great source for information and creativity. He is constantly looking for new ways to brew sour beers. I have a 20 month old solera that started as a 100% Brett c fermentation. I've been playing with adding new wort along the way. It is developing nicely. It's not a true lambic and not a true Brett beer as some sacc yeast has been added along the way. I've also been adding wort with 25-35 ibu's to keep the lacto in check.

I have three barrels with sacc and Brett combo fermentations going for about a year now and those are more traditional barnyard and funky Brett beers now.

While I think you can push the envelope and cut some time off the process it may be a case of " it's ready when it's ready" Brett works slow and it is that time, that allows for the development of the classic flavors.

As to your sour heffe I say you should go for it and see what you get. A beta gluc rest is something you should look at to develop the classic clove and or banana flavors in the wort.

Cheers

 

[ShareBrewing]

Update on a pseudo/partial kettle sour experiment. Brewed a wheat Blonde last weekend (1.050 OG, ~27 IBU) and split it up into several carboys for experimentation.

Some of the wort (3.5 gal) I put in a 6 gal carboy and pitched WLP400 Wit yeast. This yeast strain apparently produces a slight tartness and distinct spice in the beer.

After mashing and sparging, I collected unhopped wort in a 1 gal jug, and two 1/2 gal growlers. In these I pitched Omega OYL605 Lacto blend. I placed these by the floor heater duct in my room where it probably stayed in the 90's temp-wise (63F ambient temp otherwise). I let these sit for 4 days souring. The Wit yeast was performing well but it was quite hazy and producing a fairly creamy krausen. I've heard wits are great top cropping yeast - now I see why.

After the fourth day, I decided the Wit had progressed enough and the souring must be complete especially for such small volumes. After tasting, I'd say the pH had to be around 3.2-3.3. Maybe even closer to 3.1. I've brewed Berliner Weiss beers around 3.5 and these jugs were MUCH more sour. Very clean though. I heated, boiled, and cooled the gal jug and a growler (1.5 gal) and added it to the Wit beer.

MAN did it take off! Within 2 hours the krausen had grown to 2 inches and by morning (only 8 hours after sour wort addition), my airlock was literally PACKED with just yeast. Not trub or protein-hop gunk. YEAST. I had to attach a blow-off just in case. Frankly put, I've never seen this rapid of cell propagation from any batch of beer/cider/mead I've brewed.

Yes, I recognize the fact that I was adding a fair amount of fresh sugar to the main beer, but this was far different than just stepping up a beer/starter. It was an immediate effect. I noticed a much healthier fermentation afterward. Better flocculation, cell growth. The yeast seemed happier. Happy yeast = good beer. Maybe it was the drop in acidity that the yeast responded to? Maybe it was just the extra sugar being added?

From the airlock I now get great tart notes along with the nice fruity esters and spice from the yeast. Really happy to see how this is turning out.

Will keep you all posted. Looking forward to some ideas and techniques from others for speeding up tart/sour/wild beers.

 

[ShareBrewing]

Saving the other growler as a culture for that Lacto blend. It's a mix of L. Plantarum and L. Brevis so it's a very aggressive mix at any temp between 70F and 115F. The beautiful thing is, it works just as well at 70F as it does when you drive up the temp to 90F to 100F. That's the L. Plantarum at work. It brought a 14 gal Berliner weiss down from pH 5.20 to 3.5 in just 16 hours without a starter, as the temp slowly dropped overnight from 115F (at pitch) to 75F.

Got a vial of WLP648 Brett Brux Vrai and really want to try it in a "speed sour" with the OYL605. Brewing a big barleywine next month so I can parti gyle and get another session-moderate strength beer off it. That little guy might be the next experiment, possibly a full vol kettle sour and then add Brett and Sacc?

 

[Dcpcooks]

Thanks for the updates keep it going! Mug

 

[chumpsteak]

I just tried a similar experiment with making what I hoped would be a fast sour but somewhat funky brown ale. The plan was to make an American brown with low IBU and fast sour it for 2 days with L.Plantarum before dumping in the dregs from a blonde brett/sacc beer I've had going for over a month. Everything went as planned except after 24 hours the pH of the brown had only dropped from 4.5 to 4.2. I was a little concerned but decided that maybe the lacto was just taking its time getting going. I checked it the next morning and noticed a small layer of foam on top. I'm relatively new to sours so I didn't know for sure if L.Plantarum was homofermentive or not so wasn't sure what was going on. Checked on it after work 10 hours later and it was fermenting so hard it looked like it was boiling. This was after 48 hours and was more vigorous than any normal sacc fermentation I've ever seen. At this point I checked pH and it was only at about 4 so I gave up and pitched the brett lambicus and US05 dregs I had saved.

I got to thinking about it and realized that I probably should have cleaned the plastic carboy better that I used for this beer, because it was the same carboy that I had transfered the brett/sacc blonde out of that same day. There were also some JP dregs in that carboy that I added a couple weeks earlier, so maybe some of the JP dregs or Brett survived the carboy cleaning and somehow multiplied like nothing I've ever seen before and fermented this beer out super fast.

I also did a little more reading on L.Plantarum and found that it is extremely IBU sensitive and since this beer was probably around 15 to 20 IBU that most likely prevented the lacto from really taking hold and dropping the pH.

Anyway, I will give it a couple weeks at this point before doing anything and at that point I will be able to pick up any off flavors from any ferocious wild yeasts I may have picked up or maybe it will all be good. In any case I think my fast sour experiment failed and this beer is now going to be a long sour.

 

[ShareBrewing]

Lacto can ferment pretty figorously and produce a soap bubbly white head, after all it produces lactic acid and CO2 if it's homofermentative. But if your IBU level was at 15-20 when you pitched Lacto, it was certainly inhibited. I've read comments on here from an OMega yeast rep and they say even 2-3 IBU can greatly affect this Lacto blend.


Did you taste the "soured" wort when the pH was down to 4? If so, what was it like? Not sure that Brett could be propagated and produce that much acidity that fast, especially from the stark number of cells that might've been clinging to the plastic. The pH would naturally go down into 4.0-4.5 during fermentation but leftover Brett would take weeks or months to achieve such acitidy.

 

[chumpsteak]

I tasted it when I checked pH and it was still sweet and bitter, but not sour. I will check pH and gravity this weekend and taste if it's fermented out. Looks like it's donever now as kreusen has dropped it hasn't dropped clear yet, maybe Brett are active now.

 

[chumpsteak]

PH down to 4 and gravity is at 1.017 which is higher than the other half of the wort I split off and fermented with US05. It finished at 1.013. Taste is clean and a little dry considering the high gravity likely due to the low pH. No off flavors or anything so I will just let this one ride. Will the L.Plantarum continue to work and sour or do I need to pitch pedio or a different strain of lacto?

 

[ShareBrewing]

It's really up to you, it tastes fine it's good. But I don't think there's any way you could get a quick result at a tart, sour beer. You may be able to pitch Lacto immediately and hope it can survive the lower pH, alcoholic environment. Especially without a starter. The pedio I'm personally not certain of. Will need to do more research on that.

But your gravity is high enough that you know the Brett will work for awhile longer, and there might be something for the bacteria to eat for the long haul. But I've tried something similar with Belgian golden strong last year. Pitched WLP500 (Monastery Ale), Brett Brux, and Lacto Brevis. After a few months I tasted it and there was barely any acidity. Somehow the Lacto just didn't take hold or were beaten out by the yeast activity? Tried pitching an active 1L starter of fresh Lacto when the gravity was lent quite at finishing like yours, and still after a few months there's no sign of Lacto activity.

Take a shot at it if you want, but it may have mixed results.

 

[SanPancho]

lacto doesnt really multiply under 4.5 so if your beer had gotten sour at all, the lacto might not have been able to bulk up enough to be noticeable.

i cant recall for sure but i think pedio doesnt have this issue. check milkthefunk.com to make sure but i think you could still pitch pedio and get some souring even this late.

 

[SanPancho]

also, while everyone seems to be talking about speed, the other great thing about blending two worts is that you can let the lacto ride all the way down. and then blend it back into the regular wort to get an exact pH. the scale is logarithmic, 3.2 and 5.2 comes out somewhere in the mid to upper 3's. tart but not sour. its a good way to be able to get the acidity right without having to constantly check the lacto pitch and try to stop it when it hits the number you want.

 

[DEATHMASTER]

why not just go full kettle sour? It does the same job much faster and better.

 

[specharka]

It's really up to you, it tastes fine it's good. But I don't think there's any way you could get a quick result at a tart, sour beer. You may be able to pitch Lacto immediately and hope it can survive the lower pH, alcoholic environment. Especially without a starter. The pedio I'm personally not certain of. Will need to do more research on that.

But your gravity is high enough that you know the Brett will work for awhile longer, and there might be something for the bacteria to eat for the long haul. But I've tried something similar with Belgian golden strong last year. Pitched WLP500 (Monastery Ale), Brett Brux, and Lacto Brevis. After a few months I tasted it and there was barely any acidity. Somehow the Lacto just didn't take hold or were beaten out by the yeast activity? Tried pitching an active 1L starter of fresh Lacto when the gravity was lent quite at finishing like yours, and still after a few months there's no sign of Lacto activity.

Take a shot at it if you want, but it may have mixed results.

Lacto is both incredibly hop and alcohol intolerant as well as having a much higher critical temperature band for optimal fermentation character. The challenge with using lacto as a primary fermentation microbe is that Saccharomyces will act as an invasive yeast. It's especially difficult to purge Saccharomyces from fermenters without use of heat, i.e. kettle sours.

I recently brewed a Rare Barrel red ale using L brevis and Brettanomyces, and is currently fermenting around 77-79F, so I am eager to see if this technique yields any appreciable souring. Still chugging along strong after 14 days in primary, so I'm hopeful that it's not cross-contaminated with Saccharomyces. Might bump the temperature up a little bit to encourage it to finish.

 

[chumpsteak]

PH down to 4 and gravity is at 1.017 which is higher than the other half of the wort I split off and fermented with US05. It finished at 1.013. Taste is clean and a little dry considering the high gravity likely due to the low pH. No off flavors or anything so I will just let this one ride. Will the L.Plantarum continue to work and sour or do I need to pitch pedio or a different strain of lacto?

Checked on this beer again the other day and gravity was still 1.017 and pH was just over 4. The beer has no acidity and actually tasted a little like sweet wort. I've been curious the whole time what kind of yeast got in there and fermented this batch and why it stopped at 1.017 when the other 5 gallons fully attenuated to 1.010 as per usual with US05. I had a US05 cake that I had just pulled a gose off of so I dumped a little yeast into the carboy to see if this batch would finish fermenting. Within a couple hours it began bubbling away again and had continued for a couple of days now. The new US05 I added is definitely going to town which really makes me wonder why this beer stopped fermenting in the first place. The only thing I can figure is that there was residual yeast left in the carboy when I tried to lacto sour it and the small amount of yeast started fermenting but petered out due to the severe under pitching. The Brett that's in there might have eventually dried this beer out, but it sure didn't seem like much was happening. I'll give this a couple more days and check gravity and taste again and see how it's going. Once it ferments out I can figure out how I'm going to get it sour. I have a lambic going now that I need to transfer to glass, so maybe I'll just put this beer on that cake and turn it into a oud braun of sorts and go for the long pedio sour.

 

[DEATHMASTER]

"Lacto is both incredibly hop and alcohol intolerant".
Um no, lacto is incredibly intolerant of hop AA's. This is why most instructions for using lacto in the fermenter tell you to go no higher than 5 IBU

 

[ShareBrewing]

Specharka is actually correct. He simply gave a more generalized phrasing of the interaction between hop compounds and Lacto. It's been proven in quite a few studies and is stated by many sour beer experts like Chad Yakobson, Michael Dawson, Mike Tonsmeire, etc. Alpha acids (iso-humulone based compounds) responsible for bitterness and IBU's are not the only component in hops that give them their preservative qualities toward bacteria such as Enterobacter and Lactobacillus. Beta acids and various hop oils have shown to inhibit bacteria as well. This is why the Belgians have used aged hops for their sours for hundreds of years, even though 1/2 or more of the trans-isohumulone compounds have all aged away. There are some cis-isohumulone compounds that have a half-life of up to 5 years but these aren't the only thing contributing to bitterness and preservation.

This is why I never go over 1 or 2 IBUs and tend to avoid long 60 min boils and steep times. In the wise words of Michael Dawson, "it's best just to wave a picture of hops over the the kettle". For a 5 gal batch, I might add 0.25-0.5 oz of super low AA noble hops. Likewise, these hops would have a low BA content as well.

If doing a kettle sour or any "speed sour" it's best to use as little hops as possible!

 

[chumpsteak]

Made 10 gallonsfw of a golden sour base beer with no hops yesterday and did a full boil then pitched 5 capsules of Swanson L. Plantarum in each carboy at about 110 degrees. I made sure to thoroughly clean, soak with pbw, and starsan the crap out of the plastic carboys before adding the wort. It's been about 24 hours now and the good news is that there's no visible fermentation. The bad news is that the pH doesn't appear to be dropping yet. The carboys are in my ferm chamber set to 72, so maybe that's why it's slow. I'll give it another day before I start to panick I suppose.

 

[chumpsteak]

48 hours with no drop in pH. 2 possibilities, 1 is dead bacteria from old capsules. I just used them 3 weeks ago with good results though. Second is the possibility that I killed the bacteria by pitching too hot? In any case I just put 5 more capsules in each 5 gallons. Hope it does something. At least it's not showing any signs of fermenting yet.

 

[ShareBrewing]

Hope everything works out chumpsteak! Not sure why your Lacto wouldn't start up, unless you added them well above their temp threshold (over 115F), but that's probably not the case.

 

[ShareBrewing]

Planning on brewing a 9-10 gal batch of barleywine with an OG of around 1.100 or more this weekend. I'll parti gyle the mash to collect an extra 5 or so gal of wort for a quick sour. Hopefully will get a runoff of 1.050 - 1.060 for this.

The current plan is to use most of the full growler culture of 605 that's going, along with a 1L starter of WLP648 Brett Brux Vrai that's been going for about 5 days now. I'll cold crash the starter tonight and add fresh wort to build it up a second time tomorrow. That gives it a good 10 days or so for the starter to build up. Brett starters I've noticed take at least 2-3 days to even get going and form a small krausen, even with abundant O2.

The beer would be fully kettle soured and then undergo about 2-3 months in primary with the Brett and then I'll add fruit/wood/misc to secondary.

Question for debate: Do you think it'd be better to leave the "speed sour" in primary for the entire life of the beer (like a lambic) or transfer to secondary and add other ingredients? Would the yeast/Brett benefit from staying in primary longer? If so, do you think adding fruit (or other additional sugar) so late in primary that it will drive funky flavors or add to complexity?

 

[chumpsteak]

Hope everything works out chumpsteak! Not sure why your Lacto wouldn't start up, unless you added them well above their temp threshold (over 115F), but that's probably not the case.

Wort was at 4.65 pH this morning down from 5.10 last night, so it seems like its finally going. Not sure why first lacto pitch didnt start either, but I will definitely do a starter next time.

 

[ShareBrewing]

Have you ever tried keeping a culture of Lacto around? It'll ensure that you always have the proper number of sour critters to do the job quick and cleanly.

IMHO there are a few reasons this could really help any sour brewer.
1) Continuous supply of healthy Lacto
2) Consistency / Familiarity - one can observe and learn about a single microbe and it's behaviors and specific needs over several generations/batches. This will hopefully promote more consistent results between batches.
3) You save a lot of money! OYL-605 (my current culture) costs $12 a pouch + shipping! Paying that for every batch can really add up.

If you have a specific commercial Lacto strain you prefer, start a culture and see what happens. Or be adventurous and simply toss a handful of acidulated malt in some cooled start wort. Acid malt is treated with Lacto and carries active cultures. So you can start on ongoing culture for what, $2?

 

[crusader1612]

Made 10 gallonsfw of a golden sour base beer with no hops yesterday and did a full boil then pitched 5 capsules of Swanson L. Plantarum in each carboy at about 110 degrees. I made sure to thoroughly clean, soak with pbw, and starsan the crap out of the plastic carboys before adding the wort. It's been about 24 hours now and the good news is that there's no visible fermentation. The bad news is that the pH doesn't appear to be dropping yet. The carboys are in my ferm chamber set to 72, so maybe that's why it's slow. I'll give it another day before I start to panick I suppose.

I TYPICALLY PITCH PLANTARUM AT 110F AND lEAVE 36-48 HOURS AT 95F. ITS PRETTY SOUR BY THEN, A FLASH PASTEURISATION, PLUS ANY HOPS REQUIRED (DEPENDING ON THE RECIPE) THEN A PICH OF MY FAVORED YEAST AND YOU'RE DONE.

I'll actually be trying out something a little different this time.
I'll be brewing a normal beer with a small amount of hops at flameout. transferring warm to a fermenter, pitching my plantarum (rather than kettle souring) carrying out the same type of process warm, then around 36-48hours later I'll pitch my yeast.
No Pateurisation etc.
the other thing I'll be doing is actually trying to get a slightly faster sour beer. so I'll be pitching my House Saison Culutre which has TYB Saison/brett blend (2 Brett cultures) + WLP648 and I think it was 645 too (i cant remember that one)

I'll essentially be brewing a flanders red base - with faux kettle sour in the carboy, and the copitch of sacc+brett after 48 hours, then fermented out and aged for around 6 months (a month prior to NHC in NZ) and then dryhopped with Styrian Golding and kegged.

Looking forward to it.

 

[crane]

I TYPICALLY PITCH PLANTARUM AT 110F AND lEAVE 36-48 HOURS AT 95F. ITS PRETTY SOUR BY THEN, A FLASH PASTEURISATION, PLUS ANY HOPS REQUIRED (DEPENDING ON THE RECIPE) THEN A PICH OF MY FAVORED YEAST AND YOU'RE DONE.

I'll actually be trying out something a little different this time.
I'll be brewing a normal beer with a small amount of hops at flameout. transferring warm to a fermenter, pitching my plantarum (rather than kettle souring) carrying out the same type of process warm, then around 36-48hours later I'll pitch my yeast.
No Pateurisation etc.
the other thing I'll be doing is actually trying to get a slightly faster sour beer. so I'll be pitching my House Saison Culutre which has TYB Saison/brett blend (2 Brett cultures) + WLP648 and I think it was 645 too (i cant remember that one)

I'll essentially be brewing a flanders red base - with faux kettle sour in the carboy, and the copitch of sacc+brett after 48 hours, then fermented out and aged for around 6 months (a month prior to NHC in NZ) and then dryhopped with Styrian Golding and kegged.

Looking forward to it.

I did something similar last Saturday. Brewed a Flanders brown base. Pitched a mango goodbelly shot at 100f. Let it naturally cool on its own in the carboy after that. Next morning it was still in the mid 70s. After 36 hours the PH was down to 3.55 so I pitched my yeast blend. I figured it will still drop the PH as the yeast gets going. I've been underwhelmed by commercial blends' ability to create sourness on the first pitch. Several of them create a lot more acidity on the second pitch, so I thought I would jump start it this go around.

 

[crusader1612]

I did something similar last Saturday. Brewed a Flanders brown base. Pitched a mango goodbelly shot at 100f. Let it naturally cool on its own in the carboy after that. Next morning it was still in the mid 70s. After 36 hours the PH was down to 3.55 so I pitched my yeast blend. I figured it will still drop the PH as the yeast gets going. I've been underwhelmed by commercial blends' ability to create sourness on the first pitch. Several of them create a lot more acidity on the second pitch, so I thought I would jump start it this go around.

Nice work, keep us posted.

 

[chumpsteak]

I TYPICALLY PITCH PLANTARUM AT 110F AND lEAVE 36-48 HOURS AT 95F. ITS PRETTY SOUR BY THEN, A FLASH PASTEURISATION, PLUS ANY HOPS REQUIRED (DEPENDING ON THE RECIPE) THEN A PICH OF MY FAVORED YEAST AND YOU'RE DONE.

I'll actually be trying out something a little different this time.
I'll be brewing a normal beer with a small amount of hops at flameout. transferring warm to a fermenter, pitching my plantarum (rather than kettle souring) carrying out the same type of process warm, then around 36-48hours later I'll pitch my yeast.
No Pateurisation etc.
the other thing I'll be doing is actually trying to get a slightly faster sour beer. so I'll be pitching my House Saison Culutre which has TYB Saison/brett blend (2 Brett cultures) + WLP648 and I think it was 645 too (i cant remember that one)

I'll essentially be brewing a flanders red base - with faux kettle sour in the carboy, and the copitch of sacc+brett after 48 hours, then fermented out and aged for around 6 months (a month prior to NHC in NZ) and then dryhopped with Styrian Golding and kegged.

Looking forward to it.

This is basically exactly what I did and what I'm planning except that I couldn't maintain 95 degrees and my L.Plantarum never really took off. After 48 hours and a second lacto pitch it's down to 3.85 pH and will hopefully keep going. 96 hours now and I hope to pitch a sacc brett combo soon.

I did no hops in mine but I did do a 60 min boil in my regular kettle so I wonder if hop residue added some ibus that may have squashed the lacto.

 

[WI_Wino]

Have you ever tried keeping a culture of Lacto around? It'll ensure that you always have the proper number of sour critters to do the job quick and cleanly.

IMHO there are a few reasons this could really help any sour brewer.
1) Continuous supply of healthy Lacto
2) Consistency / Familiarity - one can observe and learn about a single microbe and it's behaviors and specific needs over several generations/batches. This will hopefully promote more consistent results between batches.
3) You save a lot of money! OYL-605 (my current culture) costs $12 a pouch + shipping! Paying that for every batch can really add up.

If you have a specific commercial Lacto strain you prefer, start a culture and see what happens. Or be adventurous and simply toss a handful of acidulated malt in some cooled start wort. Acid malt is treated with Lacto and carries active cultures. So you can start on ongoing culture for what, $2?

RiteBrew has the omega lacto for $8. A little cheaper. Totally worth it imo.