quasi-quick sour?

[millsbrew]

I have exhausted the search function trying to look this up. I had read, or thought I did, about a method of quick souring, that did not boil the bacteria. Instead, you simply pitch the lacto at 110F hold for 2-3 days, let it cool to 70F, and pitch sacc/brett. This method would still require aging, but instead of the typical ~1 year, it was done closer to 6-8 months. Is this a thing?

Thanks.

 

[burninator]

Sure. I do table sours and berliner-types in less time than that. In fact, I often just pitch my sour culture and yeast together. With a simple enough grist, and especially with lower gravity, 8-10 weeks is well within reason.

The addition of pediococcus is one of the biggest complications in sour beer. It can produce off flavors that take months for brett and other organisms to clean up and convert into more pleasant flavors.

 

[millsbrew]

Thanks. Do you see any issues with my plan for a "stronger" sour? Pitch mixed culture into 6 gallon batch, ferment 2 weeks. Make 1 gallon un-hopped lacto batch, let sour to 3.2. Transfer both into 5g secondary for long term aging?

 

[snowveil]

Thanks. Do you see any issues with my plan for a "stronger" sour? Pitch mixed culture into 6 gallon batch, ferment 2 weeks. Make 1 gallon un-hopped lacto batch, let sour to 3.2. Transfer both into 5g secondary for long term aging?

When you talk about a "mixed culture" fermentation, are you talking brett/sacch/lacto/pedio? Just brett/sacch/lacto?

I've only done a few quick-sours, one with a more traditional sour mash using unmilled grain, and more recently a kettle sour with Lactobacillus Plantarum. The kettle sour turned out sour very quickly...2 days, then a boil and hit it with sacch. Honestly the turn around time of this method was just as fast as a clean beer. I can't say there's a ton of complexity, just a great fruity/citrusy/pineappley acidity, and a ton of flavor for a sub 4% abv beer.

As burninator mentioned, Pediococcus is what will require more long term aging. That's not to say a brett/sacc/lacto ferment might not benefit from 6 months +, but you probably won't need it. Brett as a primary fermenter should ferment out pretty quickly. From my understanding, Pedio+Brett play off of each other and create off flavors (and textures!) that clean each other up in the long term.

My question, then, is why make two separate batches to blend together prior to aging? A healthy mixed culture ferment should sour your beer just fine. If, after extensive aging, it's not sour enough...I'd blend a strictly lacto-soured to taste prior to packaging.

Just my 2 cents, based on what I've read

 

[millsbrew]

I want the un-hopped 1 gallon batch more sour. then add it to the lightly hopped main batch that presumably won't sour as much due to the 5-10 IBU's. Trying to get some balance of flavor with hops vs. sour.

 

[snowveil]

I think there's a few things to keep in mind.

Different cultures will have different IBU tolerances. While some bacteria strains may not produce acid even as low as 5 IBU, some others will burn through a 30 IBU beer with no problem. Unless you've used the culture before, you can't really expect 5-10 IBU will necessarily be a problem.

The other is...Hop flavor will diminish over time. If you're looking to let this beer age for 6+ months, a lot of the hop flavor and aroma may drop out anyway. Here's where dry hopping before packaging or blending with fresh beer might be a good bet.

 

[m00ps]

IME, you dont need to go as long as 6months to get a prominent sour character. It depends on your recipe (IBUs mostly) and what microbes you are using. I've had the best success with using a mix of various bugs (brett, pedio, lacto, etc). My usual process is to pitch my sacch strain and 10-14 days later, rack it into a 5gal or 5.5gal carboy (glass for minimizing O2 & minimal headspace) and let it do its thing. Usually, at 2 months it is puckeringly sour. I give it at least another month to develop more and ensure its at FG. Keeping it a bit warmer should also help speed things up.

i've also tried an experiment to make a quick turnaround, slightly sour gose without having to do kettle souring. I dont have a pure lacto culture and my equipment isnt really set up for it. I used like 20% acidulated malt and add 88% lactic acid to the fermentor. I added 1oz at a time and at about 2.5oz, it was very nice. Light, pleasing sourness. Using a tart saison yeast also helped i think

 

[jmaessen]

I've had good luck with this technique, including my only competition win for a Berliner Weiße (the big thing to notice there is that I use ascorbic acid rather than sulfite to scrub chlorophenols, since even small sulfite volumes really slow down the lacto). I generally pitch the lacto hot and let it run until cool, then pitch the yeast.

Note that you don't want to run all the way down to target pH when you do this; I've found I end up way too sour as the lactobacillus remains active after pitching. Also, for a clean Berliner I strongly recommend the WLP029 Kölsch strain – produces a wonderful flavor. For crazier stuff the sky is of course the limit. I found I needed to pitch Brett a bit earlier than Sacc if I was doing an all-Brett fermentation just due to a slightly slower start (and thus slightly more souring after pitching).