Black Currants? in a Session Sour

[HOoT_oWL]

Hey guys! my first post here, surprising as many times as I've utilized this forum.

SO -- I'm doing my first sour! I soured the wort using raw pilsner grains, and leaving for 19 hrs and then doing the boil, it was slightly soured and had no detectable off flavors (I used lots of CO2)

MY QUESTION IS: Does anyone have experience with using BLACK or RED CURRANTS ????

I have lots of frozen Black currants and some Red Currants from 2 yrs ago and thought it could be good in a sour, however I've heard of black currant-like flavors as being indicative of oxidation and generally undesirable.

ALSO -- any thoughts on oaking it and/or throwing in some Brett? I don't want it to be to crazy sour but I'm open to enhancing this beer! :fro:

 

[Quaker]

I have experience with currants. I've used red currants in a Berliner Weiss. In my opinion the flavor was ok, but the additional tartness from the red currants made it too tart for my tastes. I later used them in a sacch fermented wheat beer and I think it worked better there. They brought a refreshing tartness to the beer making it a bit Berliner like.

I've used black currants a few times now in mixed fermentation sours. My first time was about 1lb per gallon with extremely dominant earthy currant flavor. Part of that batch was blended 50/50 with another sour beer with black raspberries. The currant flavor ran over the raspberries. Now I've been using about 10oz per gallon. But I tend to just do 1 gallon batches of it which then is only 20-25% of a later blend with other fruits or base beers.

When I've lived overseas, I've always liked black currant juice, but I'm guessing it was sweetened some. In a dry sour beer, the earthy, funky flavor can be a bit strong.

If it's your first sour and you made a full 5 gallons, my recommendation is splitting it into 1 gallon jugs to experiment. Bottle some as is. Add Brett to one, fruits to others. Brett won't increase sourness.

Regarding oak, that depends on taste. If it's a thin beer, lacking mouthfeel or structure, then oak can help. Most of my mixed fermentation beers get about a quarter to a half ounce of oak during long aging. I currently have about 80 gallons from 4-24 months old divided up in 1, 2.5, and 5 gallon containers. In January I blended 9 gallons then split into 3x1gal jugs with black currants, black raspberries, and as is with 2x 3gal carboys with Zinfandel wine concentrate and elderberries. Those are ready to re-blend in some combination(s) for bottling. That's just an example of how I like to split things up to play.

 

[HOoT_oWL]

Thanks!! that is the kind of answer I was fishing for. You're obviously having some fun with Black currants! I plan to grow a lot in the next few years, maybe on a commercial scale now that they've been legalized.

Now to start collecting 1 galloners.

Hey I see you do a lot of blending -- I just kegged a 5 gallon Belgo Saison and a 5 gallon French Saison -- Both have subtle amounts of Coriander and Blood Orange. I was thinking of doing some blending with those as I see sour saisons quite a bit. Or maybe pulling a gallon of each off and throwing in some brett and/or Sacch's to sour it up a bit, post primary.

Got any thoughts on that?

 

[tiredofbuyingbeer]

I made a blackcurrant saison. I liked it at first. Upon reflection, I think the blackcurrants were too tart. You know that tart/sourness in orange juice that coats the back of your throat? Not the citrus sourness from citric acid, but the ascorbic acid sourness? It had a lot of that. I'm not that prone to heartburn, but sometimes it gave me that. It was not sour in the manner of lactic acid; hard to tell whether or not it would be complimentary.

I used one of those Vintner's Best tins. Fresh might taste better, but I bet it would still be tart.

 

[HOoT_oWL]

Thanks! I can imagine that having eaten TONS of Black currants fresh while growin them. They REALLY wake up your FACE region, if you know what I mean. :cross:

How much did you use for your saison? and how much would you say is the most per gallon with out over-powering?

As a newbie, I have had a tendency to overpower with additions of fruits... I have come to respect and appreciate subtly all the more.

 

[Quaker]

I like using saisons as blending stocks with sours. The fact they tend to be fairly dried out, avoids significant refermentation after blending. My early mixed ferment beers tended to get overly sour. The saison helps cut that. I've increased the hopping rate in more recent sours to reign in the LAB some.

Right now I'm enjoying a strawberry saison which was a blend of 1 gallon of aged sour beer with 2.5gallon fruited saison.

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1492282557.695316.jpg

Play away

 

[HOoT_oWL]

So I tasted the sour and it is very clean and only slightly sour, which is what I was kind of going for and played it safe. It was at 19 hrs when I boiled because I was worried it was going to get too sour for my taste. Upon reflection, I'd let it go another couple hrs if I do it again.

I plan to make a currant extract with Vodka and add it to taste.

My keg of the Blood Orange French Saison has an unpleasant phenolic presence
The Belgian Saison is awesome though -- I guess the French got a bacterial infection because they came from the same mash - just used different Yeasts

I've heard infected beers can be saved with Brett and age/time. But I'm unsure of how much I like funk

I'm thinking I'll take it out of the keg, throw in some brett yeasties and oak chips and call it good for 6 months or more? and let it chew thru those poor flavor producing compounds?

Do you guys have any experience doing this? and do you have any recommendations on Strains to eat up those phenolics and give a refreshing sourness/not--too-terribly funky?