Partigyle Problem...

[AlDogWV]

A few weeks ago my brewing buddy and I attempted our first BIAB "partigyle." We initially made a barleywine in one of our 15 gallon kettles and had a second kettle set up and ready to mash at 152. Once we drained the wort for the barleywine, we then took that same bag of spent grains and dipped them into the waiting second kettle. We then mashed that same grist in the second kettle for 45 minutes, hoping to get every last bit of worthwhile wort. This all worked perfectly on brew day, but we did have to add 1.5 lbs of DME to the second kettle after the mash of reused grains to get up to 1.039.

The barleywine is currently coming along nicely in secondary and tastes as expected. The small beer came along nicely, except is does NOT taste as expected. By nicely, I mean it tastes excellent even to others. And by NOT as expected, I mean is tastes SOUR, ha. But it's a really great tasting sour that was totally unintended. I know I'm not necessarily above it, but I have never had an infection like this in my beer after a hundred plus batches, so i guess my question is what could have caused that??? Was there something with mashing the grains a second time that would've caused it? Any help or opinions are welcome! Thanks!

 

[jdauria]

I am no expert on partigyle, but I wonder if it has to do with tannins? They usually can make the beer taste astringent which can you give that vinegary puckering taste, and if you over sparge the grain by letting the gravity drop to low you can get tannins. Also, did you adjust your second patch mash pH? It may be have been way to low.

 

[AlDogWV]

I am no expert on partigyle, but I wonder if it has to do with tannins? They usually can make the beer taste astringent which can you give that vinegary puckering taste, and if you over sparge the grain by letting the gravity drop to low you can get tannins. Also, did you adjust your second patch mash pH? It may be have been way to low.

Maybe it is tannins, but it's a slight sour and I don't think it's astringent. But maybe I don't know what astringent means. I think of red wine tannins x 1,000 = astrigency. Not sure, though.

 

[doug293cz]

How long was it between the beginning of the first mash and the beginning of the second boil? If it was more than about 12 hours, you might have gotten some kettle souring. Or, you could have just gotten unlucky with the small beer - it happens.

Brew on

 

[AlDogWV]

How long was it between the beginning of the first mash and the beginning of the second boil? If it was more than about 12 hours, you might have gotten some kettle souring. Or, you could have just gotten unlucky with the small beer - it happens.

Brew on

I, too, was thinking this. We drained the wort for the first batch, letting it hang for maybe 30 minutes and then gave it a good squeeze before mashing it in the second batch. So with that, the mash, and then waiting on the heat for the boil, maybe two hours?

So, possibly tannins or kettle souring were definitely two things I had as possibilities. I'm just not sure if the conditions for either were ideal or even possible. Or maybe I didn't clean well enough somewhere and got an infection. Thanks for chiming in! I'd still like to hear more opinions, too.

 

[AkTom]

I’ve done similar even if not quite big beers a couple of times. I haven’t had any sourishness. I think it’s a fluke.
Cheers

 

[HarkinBanks]

What yeast was used? How was it fermented? How fresh was the DME? Was it previously opened? Many things can cause souring.....

For partigyle brews there is really no need to mash for a longer period of time after the initial mash unless you are adding additional grains. Partigyle is an additional running (or additional batch sparge). I typically add some specialty grains to my larger beers and hold it at 170 degrees for about 15 mins before running it off. Then I brew a small batch offshoot beer around 3.5 gallons. Like an IPA into an ordinary bitter.

If I had to guess, your equipment may have caused the souring.

 

[AlDogWV]

I’ve done similar even if not quite big beers a couple of times. I haven’t had any sourishness. I think it’s a fluke.
Cheers

Yeah, I'm thinking it could be as well.

 

[AlDogWV]

What yeast was used? How was it fermented? How fresh was the DME? Was it previously opened? Many things can cause souring.....

For partigyle brews there is really no need to mash for a longer period of time after the initial mash unless you are adding additional grains. Partigyle is an additional running (or additional batch sparge). I typically add some specialty grains to my larger beers and hold it at 170 degrees for about 15 mins before running it off. Then I brew a small batch offshoot beer around 3.5 gallons. Like an IPA into an ordinary bitter.

If I had to guess, your equipment may have caused the souring.

Thames Valley Ale yeast, primaried in a sanitized carboy at 66 degrees for about 15 days, then moved to keg - noticed the slight sour taste after about 8 days in primary. The DME was purchased the same week at the LHBS and hadn't been opened.

I also know that in a traditional partigyle that the second beer doesn't need to be "mashed" very long, but in BIAB I really didn't know exactly how to, or if it was even possible to pull off. So I mashed the grains again at a normal time and temp. I thought that could have been the culprit.

And you could be right - my equipment could be the cause - maybe i wasn't' clean enough this time around.

 

[HarkinBanks]

If you used a sanitized glass carboy, then I don't think it is the equipment. I would guess you managed to create a souring process with the mash, drain, letting it hang at a lower temp, then raising it back up in the second vessel for the second mash.

I tried split brewing a few times by mashing in at night for 60 mins with heat, then leaving it overnight with no heat, and then boiling it the next morning. Each time the beer soured.

 

[AlDogWV]

If you used a sanitized glass carboy, then I don't think it is the equipment. I would guess you managed to create a souring process with the mash, drain, letting it hang at a lower temp, then raising it back up in the second vessel for the second mash.

I tried split brewing a few times by mashing in at night for 60 mins with heat, then leaving it overnight with no heat, and then boiling it the next morning. Each time the beer soured.

Well, THIS is the biggest reason I've posted this dilemma! If, and it's a big if, somehow the process I used caused the mash to sour I could start trying to repeat it. Maybe create some additional small sour recipes from big beers I do. Because I'm really serious when I say that the sour taste this beer currently has is actually very good.

 

[doug293cz]

I, too, was thinking this. We drained the wort for the first batch, letting it hang for maybe 30 minutes and then gave it a good squeeze before mashing it in the second batch. So with that, the mash, and then waiting on the heat for the boil, maybe two hours?

So, possibly tannins or kettle souring were definitely two things I had as possibilities. I'm just not sure if the conditions for either were ideal or even possible. Or maybe I didn't clean well enough somewhere and got an infection. Thanks for chiming in! I'd still like to hear more opinions, too.

2 hours shouldn't be enough for kettle souring. I've read that typical kettle souring times are 24 - 72 hours. Astringency might be the issue if your water is at all alkaline. Do you have a water report?

Edit: @HarkinBanks has some anecdotal experience that times shorter than 24 hours can lead to souring. Wonder if that could be a different organism than lactobacillus.
Brew on

 

[HarkinBanks]

2 hours shouldn't be enough for kettle souring. I've read that typical kettle souring times are 24 - 72 hours. Astringency might be the issue if your water is at all alkaline. Do you have a water report?

Edit: @HarkinBanks has some anecdotal experience that times shorter than 24 hours can lead to souring. Wonder if that could be a different organism than lactobacillus.
Brew on

There are a few threads on the various forums with similar results to mine trying to mash one day and boil the next - leads to a sour beer. I'm really no expert when it comes to the chemistry of mashing so hopefully someone with more knowledge can chime in.

To the OP, this may be a nice excuse to repeat your mash process!

 

[AlDogWV]

2 hours shouldn't be enough for kettle souring. I've read that typical kettle souring times are 24 - 72 hours. Astringency might be the issue if your water is at all alkaline. Do you have a water report?

Edit: @HarkinBanks has some anecdotal experience that times shorter than 24 hours can lead to souring. Wonder if that could be a different organism than lactobacillus.
Brew on

I didn't think it'd be long enough either, but does astringency taste like lacto? This is why I thought maybe it had something to do with the process I completed.

As far as a water report, here's my area's report, but I'm not sure what to look for on it or if this is even the type of report I need. Any help is greatly appreciated.

http://www.creswellwater.net/CCR2017.pdf

EDIT: I do filter my brew water for chlorine with an activated charcoal filter, mainly for chlorine. The only other online info I can find on my water system is this:

What is the hardness of the water?
The hardness of the water is between 11-12 grains or 200 parts per million (ppm)
Does our water contain fluoride?
Your water contains a natural trace of fluoride of .24 ppm.

 

[doug293cz]

I didn't think it'd be long enough either, but does astringency taste like lacto? This is why I thought maybe it had something to do with the process I completed.

As far as a water report, here's my area's report, but I'm not sure what to look for on it or if this is even the type of report I need. Any help is greatly appreciated.

http://www.creswellwater.net/CCR2017.pdf

EDIT: I do filter my brew water for chlorine with an activated charcoal filter, mainly for chlorine. The only other online info I can find on my water system is this:

What is the hardness of the water?
The hardness of the water is between 11-12 grains or 200 parts per million (ppm)
Does our water contain fluoride?
Your water contains a natural trace of fluoride of .24 ppm.

I don't think astringency tastes like lacto. It's more of a mouth puckering feeling, rather than acidic or sour. But then, I am not an off-taste expert (I don't have a very sensitive palate.) Astringency due to tannin extraction can occur if the pH of the wort in your grain mass gets up above about 6. This can happen during sparging, or partigyling, if the alkalinity of the added water is sufficient to raise the pH above ~6. Your water hardness implies your alkalinity is moderate, so astringency is a potential issue. An easy way to avoid the possibility of astringency is to acidify the sparge/partigyle water to a pH of about 5.6.

The linked water report does not give the information pertinent to brewing. You want a report that gives:

Alkalinity
Calcium
Magnesium
Iron
Sodium
Potassium
Sulfate
Chloride (not Chlorine)
Carbonate
Bicarbonate
Nitrate
Phosphorus (total)
​

You can get a suitable report from Ward Labs. With the above information, you can use a water chemistry program to adjust your estimated mash pH, and set the level of "flavor ions" in your beer. Adjusting the mash pH and sparge water pH are the best way to avoid astringency.

Brew on