Question: White Labs Belgian Sour Mix I

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rbridges01

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Hey Wild Brewers -

I typically use a belgium yeast for primary fermintation and then add the brett to the scondary. I'm using White labs Belgian sour mix and it has :

Brettanomyces, Saccharomyces, and the bacterial strains Lactobacillus and Pediococcus.

Since it already has Saccharomyces should I bother ferminting with my Belgian yeast? I've never done a 100% Brett beer before and want to make sure it ferments out ok. Thoughts?

Peace Out
 
I'm curious about this too. I'm doing my first sour beer, and I used Notty for primary fermentatino and I'm planning on using the Sour Mix for secondary. I have read that many people use the Sour Mix for primary fermentation though.
 
Usually they say to ferment with a neutral ale yeast then throw in the bugs when trying to replicate lambic at home. I think the reasoning is you don't have as much risk of the batch getting runaway sour because most of it has already fermented out.
 
I think you would be OK pitching the blend in the cooled wort. The Saccharomyces yeast will work faster than the other organisms and ferment most of the sugars. The other yeast and bacteria will work slower but continue eating the more complex sugars resulting in a funky sour beer.
However some texts have recommended fermenting with a neutral ale yeast first to get a more restrained and better controlled sour.

I have a Flander's Red where I directly pitched Wyeast Roselare Blend. It is still fermenting so i can't comment on the results.

Craig
 
Hey Wild Brewers -

I typically use a belgium yeast for primary fermintation and then add the brett to the scondary. I'm using White labs Belgian sour mix and it has :

Brettanomyces, Saccharomyces, and the bacterial strains Lactobacillus and Pediococcus.

Since it already has Saccharomyces should I bother ferminting with my Belgian yeast? I've never done a 100% Brett beer before and want to make sure it ferments out ok. Thoughts?

Peace Out

just the blend will be just fine, you can also pour in the dregs from a bottle of cantillon or any other non pasteurized, unfiltered lambic for additional critters.


and also, the lambic blend contains sacch, pedio, lacto, as well as brett, so it will not be a 100% brett beer, it will be a lambic style beer
 
imho a starter isnt necessary. you are gonna let it sit for over a year, which will give the bugs plenty of time to do their thing.
 
A couple quick questions for anyone who has used this blend:

1) How long should the secondary fermentation continue for before bottling? I performed primary with WLP 001. I pitched this blend 10 days after primary, and it's been about three weeks.

2) If I do decided to bottle after only three weeks of secondary fermentation, will fermentation continue inside the bottle?

3) I just received my oxygenation kit in the mail, a little too late. I was thinking of infusing the fermenter with some oxygen before bottling. Would this help, harm, or not effect fermentation at all?

Thanks in advance.
 
A couple quick questions for anyone who has used this blend:

1) How long should the secondary fermentation continue for before bottling? I performed primary with WLP 001. I pitched this blend 10 days after primary, and it's been about three weeks.

2) If I do decided to bottle after only three weeks of secondary fermentation, will fermentation continue inside the bottle?

3) I just received my oxygenation kit in the mail, a little too late. I was thinking of infusing the fermenter with some oxygen before bottling. Would this help, harm, or not effect fermentation at all?

Thanks in advance.

You should allow fermentation to continue until terminal gravity has been reached and you are happy with the flavor. Three weeks is definitely not long enough. All sours I have brewed have been older than one year. Leave it a lone and do not bottle it right now.
 
A couple quick questions for anyone who has used this blend:

1) How long should the secondary fermentation continue for before bottling? I performed primary with WLP 001. I pitched this blend 10 days after primary, and it's been about three weeks.

2) If I do decided to bottle after only three weeks of secondary fermentation, will fermentation continue inside the bottle?

3) I just received my oxygenation kit in the mail, a little too late. I was thinking of infusing the fermenter with some oxygen before bottling. Would this help, harm, or not effect fermentation at all?

Thanks in advance.


Don't do ANY of those things, at all. You're in for MANY months to years long ride here. There is no other way around that. No shortcuts. If you do things to early you will regret it.

Leave the beer alone, keep the airlock topped off, don't even think about sampling for 6 months.
 
3) I just received my oxygenation kit in the mail, a little too late. I was thinking of infusing the fermenter with some oxygen before bottling. Would this help, harm, or not effect fermentation at all?

It would harm!

The only time to use oxygen is while propagating yeast in a starter and beforre pitching primary yeast into fermentor.

You should avoid any oxygen in mixed fermentations as it will lead to generation of acetic acid.
 
Listen to the people above. I pitched this about two months ago on a Weiss and its barley at a pH of 4.6 and I've kept it at 65-72 for those two months. Keep the air lock filled and put it somewhere that's completely out of the way.
 
Making a starter for one of the sour blends will throw off the balance of the blend. The blends are designed to contain an under pitch of Sacch, so that it will under attenuate and leave more fermentables for the bugs to much on over time. Putting it in a starter may raise the Lacto population a little bit while the Sacc is reproducing, but it will eventually be dominated by the Sacch. A lot of the things we have to do to help our little wild buddies be happy go completely against all of the lessons that were hammered into our skulls as newbie brewers. It's part of what makes sours so interesting and fun!
 
A couple quick questions for anyone who has used this blend:

1) How long should the secondary fermentation continue for before bottling? I performed primary with WLP 001. I pitched this blend 10 days after primary, and it's been about three weeks.

2) If I do decided to bottle after only three weeks of secondary fermentation, will fermentation continue inside the bottle?

3) I just received my oxygenation kit in the mail, a little too late. I was thinking of infusing the fermenter with some oxygen before bottling. Would this help, harm, or not effect fermentation at all?

Thanks in advance.
1) if you're in a rush: take a gravity reading at 6 months. take another at 8. if it's stable, you can bottle. however, all this sampling will introduce oxygen and may start to oxidize your beer. better plan: wait a year, then bottle.

2) yes, and the bottle will almost certainly explode as pressure builds up in the bottle.

3) it would harm the beer. oxygen after primary fermentation is a bad idea.
 
Unfortunately this won't be a beer that you'll be drinking this year. When it comes to sour beers brewed with bacteria and brett, there's really no point in tasting before 6 months. Many people, myself included, may wait anywhere from 12-16 months before sampling some of their sours. That's just the pace that they work at. But if you have the patience to wait that long you won't regret it. As mentioned above, there aren't really any good shortcuts with these types of beers.
 
Update to this thread for me. My batch has hit 1.004 but the pH is not below 4.5 according to a pH strip. It has sat at 68F since October in my house and nothing has changed except a few gravity points. I took a sample today and it is crystal clear but I've lost all respect for this mix blend and I'll be using grain for making a sour beer in the future. I have a pretty good pelicle on top and I haven't disturbed it by taking many samples besides every two or three months just waiting for it to get sour. I'm now sitting on 4.5 gallons of a 3% crystal clear beer wondering what I should do with it.
 
Update to this thread for me. My batch has hit 1.004 but the pH is not below 4.5 according to a pH strip. It has sat at 68F since October in my house and nothing has changed except a few gravity points. I took a sample today and it is crystal clear but I've lost all respect for this mix blend and I'll be using grain for making a sour beer in the future. I have a pretty good pelicle on top and I haven't disturbed it by taking many samples besides every two or three months just waiting for it to get sour. I'm now sitting on 4.5 gallons of a 3% crystal clear beer wondering what I should do with it.

You can always add a little Lactose boiled in water for 15 minutes. This will give more complex sugars for the Lactobacillus to work on. I've had this complaint on 2 of my sours... They are tart, but not really sour. Adding the Lactose will increase the time it will need to get the sourness.

I have done all my sours with the WL Belgian Mix and they have soured fairly well until these last two. I think that the cooler temperature that we had this past year.
 
You can always add a little Lactose boiled in water for 15 minutes. This will give more complex sugars for the Lactobacillus to work on. I've had this complaint on 2 of my sours... They are tart, but not really sour. Adding the Lactose will increase the time it will need to get the sourness.

I have done all my sours with the WL Belgian Mix and they have soured fairly well until these last two. I think that the cooler temperature that we had this past year.

Interesting. I had a couple locals tell me the kept it around 100F and nothing happened. One guy said he pitches at 120F and lets it go for a week and he hasn't had a problem. He usually makes some good Berliner's too.
 
Interesting. I had a couple locals tell me the kept it around 100F and nothing happened. One guy said he pitches at 120F and lets it go for a week and he hasn't had a problem. He usually makes some good Berliner's too.

I've heard that as well. Since I primary with an Ale Yeast for 30 days prior to infecting (after racking off the yeast cake), I have generally pitched at about 80*F or so. I keep them in a closet that has very minor temperature fluctuations, but last year was cooler for some unknown reason (they sat at about 74*F for most of the year). I've never made a Berliner, but imagine I will at some point down the line.
 
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