Berliner-Weisse Krausen Issues

[TheMadKing]

I have a berliner-weisse in primary right now and after 48 hours at 68F I have no signs of krausen. I have never fermented a kettle soured beer before, is this normal?

Here's my recipe and process:

4.75lb pilsner
3.5 lb white wheat
4 oz rye

Mashed at 147 for 60 minutes.
Wort gravity after mashing was 1.035.

I used a lacto starter that I made from 1.038 DME starter wort and a hand-full of base grain in a mason jar with no headspace, and I left it in my warm garage for 3 days. The starter pH was 3.2 and tasted cleanly sour when I pitched.

I purged with CO2 and used my carb stone to bubble CO2 through the wort before pitching, covered in saran wrap and left the kettle in my garage for 18 hours (when the pH dropped to 3.49).

I then brought the wort to a boil for 60 minutes (to boil off volume only, because I forgot the mash with less water initially).

Added .75 oz of hallertau and whirlpooled for 20 minutes before chilling to 65 and pitching 1 rehydrated sachet of US-05

I can see yeast activity like bubbling and swirling but no krausen.

 

[burninator]

I often make goses and berliners that never really krausen, even though fermentation goes wild. My understanding is that the acidification process breaks down proteins in your wort that would contribute to krausen. You may also see that the finished beer has no head retention.

 

[Schlenkerla]

I often make goses and berliners that never really krausen, even though fermentation goes wild. My understanding is that the acidification process breaks down proteins in your wort that would contribute to krausen. You may also see that the finished beer has no head retention.

I think the acid makes it not have foam retention. I recently made a citric acid coconut lime wheat ale that had no krausen (foam) after I hit it with oxygen.

One thing I read is to use DME or steep dextrine malt (carapils) to get some head retention when making a kettle sour. This is done in prep for the last boil or mid mid-boil.

Drinking my first sour right now! Yogurt Soured Berliner Weisse!!!