First sour 7 months in

[menotu]

So shorty after i started brewing i decided to try a sour, figured a long term project would be fun. So i pieced together this kit at my LHBS http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/dawsons-kriek-extract-kit only difference was i used raspberries instead of cherries. Used this yeast Wyeast 3278 Lambic Blend.

I left it in primary for 1 month then racked over to secondary on top of the raspberries. So its now been in secondary for 6 months. Was aging in my basement around 66-68 degrees. Its got a decent sour taste but not much else going on. Im just wondering what i should do with it at this point, seems to be a lot of different ideas. Being my first not sure if i should start looking to bottle, repitch, add some dregs, age it out more, or maybe blend it with something else and keep playing.

Guess since this is my first looking for more experienced sour brewers thoughts and opinions.

 

[Calder]

If you like the flavor, there is no reason why you couldn't bottle it. It should be pretty much near terminal gravity to make it safe. I would recommend adding a bottling yeast, the low ph environment is hostile to sacc yeast and it is almost certain the initial sacc is dead.

But ........... there is more still going on in there. Raj Apte put together a chart that shows what is going on in a sour over 24 months, and it seems the Brett is still working for up to 18 months developing flavors, and the 2 years and pedio is working for 2 years and more continuing to sour the beer and make it more complex. If I remember correctly, the pedio doesn't maximize its population until about the 2 year timeline.

To get more complexity, there are basically two things you can do. The first is just to leave it alone for another 6 months. The other is to toss in some dregs from a commercial sour and then leave it alone for another 6 months.

 

[secondbase]

Pitching dregs at this point definitely won't hurt the beer. You may not get a lot of character from them, but you will get some. I would go ahead and pitch a few different dregs in and leave it alone for another six months. The commercial sour blends can take a while to gain the proper level of sourness and complexity. Get another sour going in the meantime so you have more to drink in the future!

 

[menotu]

thanks for the advice. One other question i had was is it normal to never have a pellicile form. Unless something happened while it was in primary fermentation i never saw anything.

 

[sweetcell]

One other question i had was is it normal to never have a pellicile form.

yes, don't worry about it. pellicle just means that there was oxygen present. no pellicle = no O2, which is a good thing (unless you like the taste of vinegar).