Pellicle Photo Collection

[simcoe4life]

Have you ever aged anything like this and tasted it? I've never been able to tell which bacteria produces what "style" of pellicle.

If I don't pitch bugs and I use a wyeast critter blend in primary the pellicle will start out chunky without a marked pattern;

if a clean batch becomes infected due to bacteria in my racking tube I get a star pattern with the center of the star in the center of the wort's surface area;

if I pitch bugs on a wyeast critter farm I get huge bubbles for a few days and the pellicle eventually forms into a thick white scab with craters.

I should post pictures but I'm lazy.

 

[Hoosier]

Jessup, it looks like a fairly standard Brett Pellicle.

 

[jessup]

Does anyone know what kind of bacteria this is? Brett? Pedio? If the jungle juice at a party doesn't run out we usually have a lot of this on the remaining stuff.

here's my most recent, pic taken 48 hrs after pitching brett C 1L starter and expired wyeast lambic blend smack pack. there were also 18 skinned unsanitized kiwis so i don't know if this is brett related or not

^that growth could be from any number of things due to the lambic blend and the fresh unsanitized fruit. this is one of the reasons i wanted to start this thread, though, to try and figure out what we have growing in our sours and if it's normal.

I should post pictures but I'm lazy.

please post them so we can learn from your hard work, patience and experiences! <mr miyagi voice: "smart man learn from own mistakes, genius learn from others.">

 

[jessup]

here are some photos from my 2 barrels.
frankencherry

blueberry brett

 

[philw86]

I went to keg my attempted malty baltic porter and found this guy had grown up over Christmas and New Years. Anyone able to identify? Maybe it is time to toss that bucket...

...or use it as a sour batch to blend new ones with...hmm.

 

[pipapat]

here are some photos from my 2 barrels.
frankencherry

blueberry brett

how much evaporation are you getting on the 3 and 5 gallon barrels?

 

[kopher]

Berliner Weisse

Same BW + dried cherries and oak

Posting actual pics doesn't seem to be working for me...

 

[Houblon]

Sarter batch using dregs from a laundry list of beers> Cantilon Iris 2005, 3 Fonteinen Kriek, Fantome de noel, Orval and Guezes over the past 2+ yrs. Probably 20+ different beers in total along with a WY Lambic blend.







That was aged for 1yr before adding to `Festivus Kriek 09>

 

[Jaymo]

This is my version of Oldsock's Deviant Cable Car recipe. I pitched a vial of ECY Bugfarm4 into the primary on this one.

Sorry for the poor photo quality. I took it with a crappy cell phone.

 

[Clonefarmer]

Oud Bruin with Roselare blend.

Here is the same beer. Pic taken today:

 

[drez77]

Here is the same beer. Pic taken today:

Joe, Has that Oud Bruin got anymore sour?

 

[Clonefarmer]

Joe, Has that Oud Bruin got anymore sour?

Tastes good, but still not very sour. It's become more complex and the individual flavors are becoming less apparent though. Looks like it'll need to be blended. How's yours coming along?

 

[passedpawn]

Excellent thread guys!

MODS: this should be stickied in the lambic/wild forum. Very, very useful.

 

[jessup]

Tastes good, but still not very sour. It's become more complex and the individual flavors are becoming less apparent though. Looks like it'll need to be blended.

hmm, yours looks kinda crunchy like my eldest sour. i hadn't touched this for a long time, then i racked off the cherries and it seemed to be less sour which is the opposite of what i've read. after racking the O2 exposure must've kicked the acetic up and did wonders. maybe you need a tiny more O2 exchange? the photo below is a 3 gal carboy of what's left from my 3/09 batch after bottling 2 gal a year ago. i'm thinking of bottling it and am wondering if this is what a "finished" sour looks like??? this batch is almost 2 years old and was spiked with brett B & L as well as plenty of dregs. just snagged a sample and it's delicious gravity is steady. faint strawberry-ish aroma (even though it was aged on cherries), sweet upfront, then very tart on the tongue and finish. this batch was not barrel aged.
is this what a finished sour looks like?

how much evaporation are you getting on the 3 and 5 gallon barrels?

quite a bit. let's say about a pint a month as a real rough estimate. there are huge temperature fluctuations in my apartment so summer=quart/mo and winter is less. i top off sometimes with random sours and then i might not touch them for months. the only thing that's consistent is the patience behind them

 

[Clonefarmer]

hmm, yours looks kinda crunchy like my eldest sour. i hadn't touched this for a long time, then i racked off the cherries and it seemed to be less sour which is the opposite of what i've read. after racking the O2 exposure must've kicked the acetic up and did wonders. maybe you need a tiny more O2 exchange? the photo below is a 3 gal carboy of what's left from my 3/09 batch after bottling 2 gal a year ago. i'm thinking of bottling it and am wondering if this is what a "finished" sour looks like??? this batch is almost 2 years old and was spiked with brett B & L as well as plenty of dregs. just snagged a sample and it's delicious gravity is steady. faint strawberry-ish aroma (even though it was aged on cherries), sweet upfront, then very tart on the tongue and finish. this batch was not barrel aged.
is this what a finished sour looks like?

It's hard to say by looking at it if it's done. Mine has gone through phases that looked similar. I would trust your palette.

Three years seems like a good end point. I'm around the 1.5 year mark and it's just starting to really come into it's own.

I think I should have used a dowel in the stopper instead of an air lock. On the plus side it could be blended with a younger more sour beer .

 

[BenjaminBier]

Little bit of no-boil, full sour mash, after sparging and 12 hours in the primary.

 

[COLObrewer]

Oooooo, pretty.

 

[godofcheese]

This is my berlinder weiss that is almost 5 months in. Started out with a very heavy lactobacillus top, then some yeast and then another lacto. Now the brett is kicking in nicely.

 

[BenjaminBier]

This is my berlinder weiss that is almost 5 months in. Started out with a very heavy lactobacillus top, then some yeast and then another lacto. Now the brett is kicking in nicely.

this is a great photo. what's making the bier so nicely reddish? and the flakies around the opening? dry hopping bits?

 

[godofcheese]

this is a great photo. what's making the bier so nicely reddish? and the flakies around the opening? dry hopping bits?

No clue on the color. The samples I pull are very light looking. The specs are the hops that got slung everywhere during the sacc fermentation. It was quite vigorous for a day or two. I don't rack it to a secondary or anything. I didn't last year either and it turned out fine.

You know, that color might be from half the better bottle being covered in a trash sack. It is sitting in my garage here in Texas so the lacto has been going nuts off and on due to the temps.

 

[barrooze]

On Black Friday, I brewed an old ale with Wyeast 9097 (it has an english ale yeast strain and a Brett strain). Secondaried with oak cubes, and tertiaried for bulk aging. There was nothing for quite some time, but when I checked on it this week, I finally saw the starting of a pellicle! Just thought I'd share it with you guys!

 

[Barc]

Nice. Mine with 9097 still doesn't have a pellicle but no worries. If I shine a flashlight on the surface, I can still see tiny CO2 bubbles popping at the surface!

 

[barrooze]

Delete!

 

[barrooze]

Nice. Mine with 9097 still doesn't have a pellicle but no worries. If I shine a flashlight on the surface, I can still see tiny CO2 bubbles popping at the surface!

When did you brew it? It's been over two months since I put mine in the primary. When primary was done, I racked onto oak cubes for about ten days, then racked off of the cubes for bulk aging. It's been about 4.5 weeks since I racked to tertiary and I'm just now seeing the pellicle. I did the tertiary only because I did want some oxidation as the style allows it and I wanted some oxygen for the Brett to work on.

What type of fermenter do you have it in?

 

[Barc]

When did you brew it? It's been over two months since I put mine in the primary. When primary was done, I racked onto oak cubes for about ten days, then racked off of the cubes for bulk aging. It's been about 4.5 weeks since I racked to tertiary and I'm just now seeing the pellicle. I did the tertiary only because I did want some oxidation as the style allows it and I wanted some oxygen for the Brett to work on.

What type of fermenter do you have it in?

I brewed it right around 11/11. I moved it to secondary quite a while ago. Brett doesn't need oxygen as far as I know. It just puts up a protective coating (the pellicle) in the presence of O2. It might help to put some O2 in solution for it to use but I would think it might risk oxidation.

 

[Hoosier]

Brett likes micro oxygenation over an extended secondary. Thats why the barrel is perfect for them. I use the Raj Apte method using an aged oak dowel in my experimental funks. Google "raj apte flanders" and it will pull up his site. Great info!

 

[Hoosier]

Here is the link

http://www2.parc.com/emdl/members/apte/flemishredale.shtml

 

[jpoder]

Here are my pics. It was very thin/flaky (and without any bubbles) until I put a pound of amber candi sugar (diluted in about a quart of water) back in December. Now it looks spectacular!

See my thread about this brew HERE

 

[phuzle]

I made a beer and fermented with WL sour mix. There is a strange brown layer on it, but nothing too interesting. I made a saison and wanted to add some of the brett and bugs from the first beer, so after a 10 day hot fermentation with saison yeast, I stuck a bit of the trub from beer one into the racked saison. I noticed the pellicle after (I think) 5 days, and started taking photos after that. These photos are from that day through today in case anyone wants to see the growth.

 

[jpoder]

looks awesome! especially the last one. How long was it from first photo to last?