Omega OYL-605 Lacto Blend Experiences

[D-Train]

Has anyone used this? I could find very little in a search.

I brewed a Berliner 4 days ago, pitched the pouch direct, and set the temp to 90F. Last night, after 4 days of no visible activity, I pulled a sample and there doesn't seem to be anything going on from the lacto. IBU's were kept to a minimum - half ounce mash out decoction for 15 minutes, typical no-boil berliner.

 

[youreanimpulse]

This is not from my own experience, but I've seen folks on Milk the Funk who use this reporting activity at lower temps. Maybe try letting it fall to 80?

 

[D-Train]

i lost patience with the Omega blend and pitched WYeast 5335 last night (at +5 days). It'll be survival of the fittest at this point. I have a Schell's Noble Star bottle that I may add the dregs from, and a big Brett C starter ready to go.

 

[chefchris]

I was going to use it a few weeks back in 6 gallons of an 18 gallon batch of Flanders Red. The starter was this weird murky brown and did not smell/taste good. So I used brevis instead. A few days later it completely turned around and tasted fine.

Then I tried to tart up a saison a little with it, a couple days later and nothing. So again I went with brevis. I want to keep trying it because every one seems really happy with it.

 

[lshaner]

A couple things about our Lacto Blend. We have not tested its IBU sensitivity, though we are setting up to do so. It's possible that it's exquisitely sensitive. Where the blend excels is in kettle souring before the addition of any hops. Without any hops, it has never failed us. The procedure we follow is to pitch the contents of the pouch into 1 liter of unhopped 1.030-1.040 wort 24 hours in advance of brew day. No stirring necessary. If you can find a warmish place (75-80F), that is ideal for propagation. After boiling and chilling your wort to 90F, pitch the starter. At this point you don't even need to make any efforts to control temperature. We regularly see pH drops to 3.3 to 3.4 in 24 hours. We've had several commercial customers get the same results. The only times I've ever heard of it failing was when people tried souring in the presence of hops and/or did not pitch an adequate amount. In summary, souring occurs much more quickly when you pitch a high cell count and do not include any hops. The next issue of Brew Your Own is going to have a side by side comparison of the commercially available lacto strains and I've already heard from the authors that ours soured more quickly across a broader temperature range than any other company's lacto.

 

[tagz]

Great info! Thanks.

 

[TAK]

In recent days, I've got the idea to use this for kettle souring and will probably give it a go.

If I kettle sour boiled, unhopped wort in a CO2 purged keg, is there any harm in letting it sit for a while, perhaps up to 5-7 days?

As I sample for pH drop, when it's tart, I won't necessarily have the flexibility to boil and finish the brew on any given day. I realize that with more time, the pH would continue to drop, but I favor a strongly sour beer, so I'm not too worried about that. Would cold crashing be on okay way to halt the souring while waiting for the next weekend?

 

[D-Train]

Thanks lshaner, perhaps the use of hops and low pitch rate via no starter set me up for a suboptimal result. In any case great info.

 

[lshaner]

In recent days, I've got the idea to use this for kettle souring and will probably give it a go.

If I kettle sour boiled, unhopped wort in a CO2 purged keg, is there any harm in letting it sit for a while, perhaps up to 5-7 days?

As I sample for pH drop, when it's tart, I won't necessarily have the flexibility to boil and finish the brew on any given day. I realize that with more time, the pH would continue to drop, but I favor a strongly sour beer, so I'm not too worried about that. Would cold crashing be on okay way to halt the souring while waiting for the next weekend?

Sounds like a good plan if your sanitation is good. And yes, cold crashing would halt acid production.

 

[TAK]

Is this blend all homofermative?

Since it's niche is kettle souring, I assume it doesn't produce ethanol.

 

[lshaner]

Is this blend all homofermative?

Since it's niche is kettle souring, I assume it doesn't produce ethanol.

There is brevis in the blend and it is heterofermentative. In the time it takes to kettle sour, however, the drop in gravity is extremely slight. I'm talking OG of 1.040 to a gravity of 1.039 in 48 hours, while the pH drops from 5.2 to 3.2.

 

[TAK]

There is brevis in the blend and it is heterofermentative. In the time it takes to kettle sour, however, the drop in gravity is extremely slight. I'm talking OG of 1.040 to a gravity of 1.039 in 48 hours, while the pH drops from 5.2 to 3.2.

Good to know. So, if I'm waiting a few days before re-boiling, it probably would be prudent to chill once I reach the desired acidity. Unfortunately I don't have a pH meter, just some cheap pH strips. So, I'll be relying heavily on sensory for this, and without much experience. I know the sugar content will skew my perception of the acidity.

Any input on how gravity effects the rate of acidification?

I have some candi syrup in my recipe, but I figured I'd add that after kettle souring, to keep the gravity around 1.050 for the kettle souring phase.

 

[chefchris]

Brevis has actually eaten quite a bit of sugar when I kettle sour in my experience. Some times it can do 50% of the fermentation in 3 or 4 days.

 

[TAK]

Ishaner - Do you think temp plays a role in favoring heterofermative activity vs. homofermative activity in the blend?

Sounds like the plantarum works well on the low end of the temp range. Does, on the other hand, brevis play a larger role if one chooses to hold it at the higher end?

 

[lshaner]

Starting gravity does seem to affect the rate of acidification. Higher gravity brews have soured a little slower than low gravity beers like Berliners. "Slower" is a relative term, however. With a 1.050 wort, we hit 3.5 in 24 hours. With a 1.035 Berliner, usually around 3.3 in 24 hours.

I have plans to do an experiment where I just track the gravity drop from all commercially available lacto. I have never had Wyeast's brevis chew more than a few points in the time it takes me to get good souring. I suspect that people reporting significant gravity drops in short time periods have gotten yeast introduced into the wort somehow. Before jumping all over me, this is not a judgment on your sanitation. It's entirely possible that there was yeast in the pitch you got from the manufacturer. No one is perfect. I will streak out and grow up all the lacto for the experiment from isolated colonies and also plate the soured wort for yeast to ensure that the experiment is sound and any gravity drop can only be attributed to lacto.

I have no evidence that temperature effects homo vs hetero fermentation activity. Whether we sour at 70 or 95, we barely see a drop in gravity. The brevis does indeed work better at the higher end of the spectrum, but the plantarum works fairly well there too. At least up to around 100F.

 

[TAK]

Thanks. I appreciate the good info your dishing out on this blend. I've got mine ordered, and I can't wait to use it. I heard a great discussion from a guest on The Sour Hour that got me stoked to try this out.

My plan is to...
1) Pitch the pack into 1L of 1.030 DME starter wort (unhopped) inside a 5 gal keg, well purged with CO2, and placed in a warm area of the house. I'll let that go for about 24 hrs, then...
2) Mash and collect apx. 5 gal, adjust, if needed, to make sure my gravity is 1.050 or possibly less. Boil (unhopped) for about 15 min, cool to about 90F, and then drain that into the same keg. Re-purge diligently with CO2, and keep in the same warm area.
3) Let that go for about 48 hours, checking for acidity. Boil (with hops now) ASAP after reaching a strong pH drop, or cold crash until I can boil. I'll be adding some extra fermentables (candi syrup, and possibly some DME) to the boil after the acidification.
4) Pitch some ECY04 that I just got.

I'll give some feedback with the results.


EDIT: It's episode 4 of The Sour Hour, with guest Khris Johnson of Florida's Green Bench Brewing Company; really good description of his kettle souring process at about 15 minutes into the episode.

 

[TAK]

Would pressure play a role in performance?

Since I plan to "kettle" sour in a keg, I got to wondering this. I've got a 1L starter in the keg now under very low pressure, just enough to prevent ingress of air with the keg disconnected from gas. I'm wondering, when I rack the full batch of wort into the keg, if a little head pressure would be fine, or if I should keep it a zero pressure, open system.

 

[chefchris]

Would pressure play a role in performance?

Since I plan to "kettle" sour in a keg, I got to wondering this. I've got a 1L starter in the keg now under very low pressure, just enough to prevent ingress of air with the keg disconnected from gas. I'm wondering, when I rack the full batch of wort into the keg, if a little head pressure would be fine, or if I should keep it a zero pressure, open system.

When I did it in a keg I didn't hook up a airlock and just tried to use the pressure release valve every now and then. Big mistake. It took 2 full days of venting a keg before I could get the lid open. I took the lid off a little too soon first thing one morning and I lost a couple gallons to our spare room. I've never seen beer spray out like that.

So if I do it again I will hook up a gas out QD with tubing going into a jar, just like a blow off tube.

 

[TAK]

When I did it in a keg I didn't hook up a airlock and just tried to use the pressure release valve every now and then. Big mistake. It took 2 full days of venting a keg before I could get the lid open. I took the lid off a little too soon first thing one morning and I lost a couple gallons to our spare room. I've never seen beer spray out like that.

So if I do it again I will hook up a gas out QD with tubing going into a jar, just like a blow off tube.

Good to know. Should I just expect gas build up, or will there be some krausen, too?

I was going to push it pretty full, since I'll be loosing volume after reboiling. Is it necessary, do you think, to leave a fair amount of headspace in my kettle-souring keg?

 

[chefchris]

Good to know. Should I just expect gas build up, or will there be some krausen, too?

I was going to push it pretty full, since I'll be loosing volume after reboiling. Is it necessary, do you think, to leave a fair amount of headspace in my kettle-souring keg?

Do you have any Fermcap-S? It will definitely produce gas and a krausen. I've sour worted 5 or 6 times now and only once in the keg. While it worked fine I probably won't do it again because of the volume and I simply don't think it's needed. I went back to using a regular fermenter. You can purge it with CO2 and even if you don't there's enough CO2 kicked out during fermentation that you don't really need to worry about oxygen.

 

[TAK]

Maybe I'll pick up some Fermcap.

chefchris - It sounds like you get a lot of heterofermative activity that Ishaner doesn't report with this blend. If I only get the 1 or 2 points of gravity change that was mentioned above, then maybe I won't see much or any blowoff.

Ishaner - Do you see much krausen during kettle souring?

 

[jujitsudave]

I just used this blen for a sour wort process. I used a 5 gallon PET carboy, purged with co2, fit with air lock, and kept at 85F with a fermwrap. I built a 1L starter (1.040) and pitched that. 72 hr and was only down to pH 3.4.

If it helps here is an email that I received from the owner Omega about this blend:

"If there is somewhere relatively warm (72-80F) you can keep your 1L starter, 24 hours is plenty for the starter. We never stir our lacto starters. The pH drop you experience will depend on the temperature at which you pitch. The critical thing to know with our blend is that temperatures over 100F are detrimental (unlike other types of lacto). Your best bet is to pitch around 90 or 95F and then forget about it. In other words, you don't need to control temperature because it sours so quickly at that temperature. Following this procedure, we have had Berliner Weisses sour to pH 3.3 in 24 hours. One time we tried to "kettle tart" a saison and purposely pitched at 70F to avoid it getting too sour (we were aiming for pH 3.8 or 3.9). Even trying to slow it down by pitching at 70F, the pH was at 3.6 in 17 hours. Let me know if you have any questions."

Hope that helps

 

[TAK]

So, it sounds like hitting that 90F pitch plays a big role. Good to know.

 

[lshaner]

Maybe I'll pick up some Fermcap.

chefchris - It sounds like you get a lot of heterofermative activity that Ishaner doesn't report with this blend. If I only get the 1 or 2 points of gravity change that was mentioned above, then maybe I won't see much or any blowoff.

Ishaner - Do you see much krausen during kettle souring?

We don't see any krausen at all when we use this blend. Just gets increasingly cloudy from lacto growth.

 

[mbbransc]

A couple things about our Lacto Blend. We have not tested its IBU sensitivity, though we are setting up to do so. It's possible that it's exquisitely sensitive. Where the blend excels is in kettle souring before the addition of any hops. Without any hops, it has never failed us. The procedure we follow is to pitch the contents of the pouch into 1 liter of unhopped 1.030-1.040 wort 24 hours in advance of brew day. No stirring necessary. If you can find a warmish place (75-80F), that is ideal for propagation. After boiling and chilling your wort to 90F, pitch the starter. At this point you don't even need to make any efforts to control temperature. We regularly see pH drops to 3.3 to 3.4 in 24 hours. We've had several commercial customers get the same results. The only times I've ever heard of it failing was when people tried souring in the presence of hops and/or did not pitch an adequate amount. In summary, souring occurs much more quickly when you pitch a high cell count and do not include any hops. The next issue of Brew Your Own is going to have a side by side comparison of the commercially available lacto strains and I've already heard from the authors that ours soured more quickly across a broader temperature range than any other company's lacto.

This issue is now available electronically. I am thinking about trying a 'quick kettle kriek'.

 

[TAK]

It's been about 3 weeks since my kettle souring, so I figured I'd report back the results.

I boiled for 15 minutes before kettle souring. I learned my lesson here. After taking my first sample for pH, it had a very stong smell to it, which I believe was intense DMS. Next time, I'll probably boil a full 60 min before kettle souring. In any case, this appears to have disappeared after reboiling and fermenting.

Anyway, after boiling the first time, I cooled to 90F and racked it into my keg where I already had the lacto blend going in some starter wort. I bubbled CO2 through the liquid post for a fair amount of time, then closed it up with a blowoff tube on the gas post.

I took my first sample after about 20 hours (a rough guess without my notes in front of me). I only have cheap pH test strips that read in increments of 0.4, but best I could tell it was down to probably 3.7 already at that point.

24 hours later, 2 days now, it only inched down to maybe 3.6, but again, that's based off of the cheap test strips. It was assertively but pleasantly tart. I let it go another 24 hours.

When I checked again after the third day, there was a steady gas-off taking place through the blowoff tube, which wasn't happening before. So, it seems the heterofermative strain really kicked in between 48 - 72 hours. The pH hadn't seemed to change much, so the 3rd day probably wasn't necessary. Gravity dropped about 5 points, if I recall right. I bet a lot of that was during the period after 2 days. Next time, I'll stop between 24 - 48 hours.

I then reboiled for 60 with hops, and it's been 3 weeks now fermenting with ECY04 and it's tasting really great. I'll be getting this blend again for sure.

 

[TMannion87]

Just thought I would chime in and share my experience with this strain. Per the package directions, I made a one liter starter before my brew day. Mashed as normal, and pitched the starter around 90. Let it sour for 72 hours in a carboy in my fermentation chamber around 80 or so. After 72 hours, the pH was down to 3.1, as verified by my meter. Transferred back the boil kettle, boiled for 15 mins. Cooled and pitched WLP090 to finish it off. I'm super happy with the results, I recently entered it into a local competition and scored a 41/50. Not too bad for my first Berliner Weisse! I will be using this strain again for sure. Hope this helps anyone interested in this particular yeast.

 

[ddrrseio]

lshaner,
what starter size or stages of starters would you recommend for kettle souring 13gal of wort (for an eventual 10gal batch)?

 

[lshaner]

lshaner,
what starter size or stages of starters would you recommend for kettle souring 13gal of wort (for an eventual 10gal batch)?

ddrrseio -- a single step, 1 liter starter is still plenty for souring 13 gallons. Just be sure you pitch at around 90-95F into unhopped wort. It's becoming more and more apparent that this blend is extremely hop sensitive.

 

[ddrrseio]

thank you!

i prepared a 1.75L starter last night. are there any dangers in overpitching lacto as there are in overpitching sacc?

 

[lshaner]

thank you!

i prepared a 1.75L starter last night. are there any dangers in overpitching lacto as there are in overpitching sacc?

We haven't done a whole lot of experimentation with pitching rates at this point. You're not overpitching with a 1.75L starter though so no worries.

 

[dantheman13]

For whatever it is worth, over on MTF the Omega Lacto blend has pretty much been declared the best commercial Lacto blend you can get. It produces higher acidity in a shorter amount of time with some people saying it has a "more complex" sour profile than other strains (perhaps due to the blend). The amount of positive feedback versus the amount of negative feedback (of which I think I have maybe only seen once) is out-standing.

 

[mbbransc]

And the Omega blend is easy to work with. Uses plantarum lacto which sours well around 90* and continues through room temp. Kegging a Berliner today that used the blend; 3.2 pH in 40 hrs (kettle souring). Used 88% lactic to get it to 4.5 before pitching.

 

[SpeedYellow]

The Omega lacto is a bit pricey - my LHBS sells it for $11 (!). A good alternative is the Good Belly priobiotic juice, which also contains L. Plantarum. Folks (me included) have had good luck with the Goodbelly and it's pretty cheap - I paid $4.50 at my local organic foods store for a quart, so there's even plenty leftover for drinking.

 

[madscientistbrewNq]

I know this thread is dead but I wanted to give a BIG thumbs up to omega. I won't get into why my mash pH was 5.8 (something I'm researching further) but dropped to 3.5 in 14 hrs. Pitched lacto blend (1 L starter, approx 36 hrs old) at 93 degrees and blanketed with CO2 after boiling for 15 minutes to ensure the only yeast in the wort was from omega.

Now onto a 90 minute boil to drive off any DMS due to using pilsner.

Thanks again for a great product. Definitely will use again for a mango habanero cuban gose...

 

[MagicMatt]

I know this thread is dead but I wanted to give a BIG thumbs up to omega. I won't get into why my mash pH was 5.8 (something I'm researching further) but dropped to 3.5 in 14 hrs. Pitched lacto blend (1 L starter, approx 36 hrs old) at 93 degrees and blanketed with CO2 after boiling for 15 minutes to ensure the only yeast in the wort was from omega.

Now onto a 90 minute boil to drive off any DMS due to using pilsner.

Thanks again for a great product. Definitely will use again for a mango habanero cuban gose...

What did your starter look like? I pitched my OYL-605 into 1L of 1.040 wort (105g DME) this morning, about 14 hours ago, and I'm not seeing any signs of lacto presence.

I do have a thin layer of some cloudy white substance settling to the bottom. I gave it a gentle swirl for a couple of seconds to re-suspend a bit of it (shouldn't lacto activity be on the surface?), but I'm worried the pack of lacto could be bad. Is this possible?

I'm brewing tomorrow so I'm trying to figure out if I need to run to the LHBS and get something else in the morning.

 

[Calaeb]

What did your starter look like? I pitched my OYL-605 into 1L of 1.040 wort (105g DME) this morning, about 14 hours ago, and I'm not seeing any signs of lacto presence.

I do have a thin layer of some cloudy white substance settling to the bottom. I gave it a gentle swirl for a couple of seconds to re-suspend a bit of it (shouldn't lacto activity be on the surface?), but I'm worried the pack of lacto could be bad. Is this possible?

I'm brewing tomorrow so I'm trying to figure out if I need to run to the LHBS and get something else in the morning.

I had the same experience with mine. Granted I accidentally stuck it in the freezer part of my mini fridge, I tried to step it up 3 times and never saw any kind of growth or anything (didn't know what to expect) So I gave up, and there it sat in my garage for a week, ended up blowing out the milk jug it was in and spilling wort everywhere. It did smell nice at the point but was too little too late, I abandoned my berliner idea.

 

[crane]

What did your starter look like? I pitched my OYL-605 into 1L of 1.040 wort (105g DME) this morning, about 14 hours ago, and I'm not seeing any signs of lacto presence.

I do have a thin layer of some cloudy white substance settling to the bottom. I gave it a gentle swirl for a couple of seconds to re-suspend a bit of it (shouldn't lacto activity be on the surface?), but I'm worried the pack of lacto could be bad. Is this possible?

I'm brewing tomorrow so I'm trying to figure out if I need to run to the LHBS and get something else in the morning.

When I did a starter with this I never saw any activity, just a fine white layer settled out at the bottom of the flask. I pitched the entire 1L starter into 6 gallons of wort and it dropped to 3.2 after 3 days.

From what I understand lacto is much smaller than yeast and doesn't floculate well. Additionally it doesn't give off CO2 (or very little) so you shouldn't expect to see much activity or "presence" of lacto in a starter.

I think your starter is fine and you should go ahead and pitch it.

 

[MagicMatt]

Thanks for the reassurance guys. I'll report back with results. Brewing is commencing shortly.

 

[KeyWestBrewing]

Your starter really won't look like anything is going on but the lacto is doing its thing. If its a fresh pack a day or two should be good but if its older or your using part of a previous batch then give it 3-4.