Open fermentation & Why ?

[Anti-Hoppist]

Would be too little magical to be fun...

 

[mac_1103]

OTOH it might actually work...

 

[whattabrau]

I see. I have a friend with some some peach trees, maybe one day I could try to ask to let me "rest" my wort near his trees and see if some magic happens.

There are at least some claims that suitable yeast/bacteria for spontaneous fermentation hang around the building as much as the raw material, with raw material [obviously] being more applicable to wine than beer. I doubt that peach trees are guaranteed to be any better than no peach trees. However, since it's a good idea to have multiple spontaneous fermentation batches ongoing for blending purposes -- some of them end up tasting like battery acid and you need to take the acidity down a few orders of magnitude -- you might as well throw a "peach" brew in there.

 

[keggert]

Some of the things that are learned at the beginning stages is due to the various mistakes that will be made at the start. One of the biggest is not pitching enough yeast. How many times have you pitched yeast and didn't see active fermentation for 24+ hours. Those breweries who are doing open fermentation see active fermentation easily by hour 12. The brewery I visited that did open fermentation doesn't allow visitors in the fermentation room during the process, must keep everything clean!!

 

[Lefou]

So what about making 5 gallons of wort and leaving it in the backyard without pitching to see what happens?

I could never trust that method - or the two dogs who'd sniff it out in seconds.

 

[Lefou]

Brew life in 2015 B.D. (before dog) was much easier. I'd leave a 3 or 6 gallon glass fermenter in the kitchen. Not anymore.
I've always been fascinated with the idea of an open fermentation experiment, but with a 60lb Husky in the house who has a kelpie-Husky "mini me" following him around it would be a potential disaster waiting to happen. A potential poisoning from hopped wort isn't something we want.

 

[user 338926]

If you have one minute here's a great time lapse. There's actually rather a lot to glean from this video If you think about what you're seeing.

 

[user 338926]

Lindemans Framboise Lambic is made that way. The only word I can use to describe it is, transcendent. But you might want to mow the neighbor's grass a few extra times to earn some expendable cash in order to buy a case.

 

[odie]

here is my attempt at open fermentation...hefe in an open keg. I placed a paint strainer over it with a rubber band to keep any bugs out...

 

[odie]

well...it was a mess. I removed the mesh bag to seal the keg...crap dried everywhere. I cleaned it as best I could and was able to get the lid to seal. Took it outside and washed and scrubbed best I could after that. Will just leave it alone now and see what it tastes like when it's done.

 

[Beekeeper]

well...it was a mess.

fermentation vessels would need to be 3 to 4 times the wort volume to keep the yeast within bounds.

Oops.

 

[tracer bullet]

I've always wondered for exactly how long open fermentation remained open? Until packaging, or perhaps more like... I'll pick a random number but let's say 4 days. When is the beer moved out of the open fermentation space and what's next for it?

 

[Bassman2003]

To the OP on contamination or bacteria - One thing to remember is that once the yeast get going they drop the pH into the 4s. This pretty much stops anything else from living that could harm the beer. pH 4.6 is the safety number to be below even for Botulism. That underlying behavior makes open fermentation work. As stated, it is more important to have a quick start to your fermentation as the pH will still be in the 5's before the yeast activity and the wort is 'open for business' so to speak.