Mixed-Fermentation Sour Beer Really Easy Fruit Sour

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Help needed....first time sour brewer. Was ready to keg and this is what I found. Is this good or real bad? Used this recipe and added raspberries 10 days ago.
 

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Guidry said:
Help needed....first time sour brewer. Was ready to keg and this is what I found. Is this good or real bad? Used this recipe and added raspberries 10 days ago.
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Looks to me like a pellicle. Did you pasteurize the fruit?
 
RPh_Guy said:
Looks to me like a pellicle. Did you pasteurize the fruit?
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No, I used frozen straight from the bag as was advised in the original post. I went ahead and kegged the beer, from under. Figured I could try it. So, from what I see online, it's common with sours. Think I'm ok?
 
Guidry said:
No, I used frozen straight from the bag as was advised in the original post. I went ahead and kegged the beer, from under. Figured I could try it. So, from what I see online, it's common with sours. Think I'm ok?
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The microbes you pitched do not form a pellicle. Therefore wild microbes were introduced somehow .... Most likely from the fruit, in my opinion, unless you had any other known lapse in sanitation.
 
RPh_Guy said:
The microbes you pitched do not form a pellicle. Therefore wild microbes were introduced somehow .... Most likely from the fruit, in my opinion, unless you had any other known lapse in sanitation.
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No known sanitation lapse but not saying it didn't happen.

Does this mean its ruined or should I just keep on and hope for the best. Dont want to waste time if it is going to be bad or even worse.

Thanks
 
It will very likely be fine. Just check for off-flavors before packaging. If you bottle, monitor periodically for over-carbonation.
 
20200716_182806.jpg

Holy crap! This was way too easy. Like I told my wife, this might kill me in a couple hours but the first taste is delicious! Raspberry sour following the OP guidelines. I may drink it all this weekend! I'm going to need a bigger keezer for different flavors.
 
stealthfixr said:
How does the souring taste as compared to a lambic or other “traditionally” soured beer (that takes too long)? Thin, one dimensional? Similar?
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Traditional sours have Brettanomyces (Brett) yeast, so you can't really compare them to a beer without Brett.

It's certainly possible to make fast sours with Brett:
https://***************.com/wiki/Sour_beer
In my experience, beers soured with these modern methods have way better flavor and more complexity vs kettle souring. My modern sours with Brett I would say are generally better than traditional sours, to my taste, but the flavor is a bit different.
 
how are we dealing with berries and filtration? i had some blackberry puree and dumped it in, and now there's just suspended bits of berry all in the beer, pieces floating on top, etc. etc. totally screwed. i let it ferment in the corny with a floating diptube thinking that'd be enough to be able to pull clear beer off of it. no dice. foamy beer with tiny berry bits and likely clogged posts, etc.

it tastes great, but its like all foam...and bits.
 
SanPancho said:
how are we dealing with berries and filtration? i had some blackberry puree and dumped it in, and now there's just suspended bits of berry all in the beer, pieces floating on top, etc. etc. totally screwed. i let it ferment in the corny with a floating diptube thinking that'd be enough to be able to pull clear beer off of it. no dice. foamy beer with tiny berry bits and likely clogged posts, etc.

it tastes great, but its like all foam...and bits.
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can you cold crash it down to 31-32F for a week or two then check it, if it cleared rack to another keg or let it sit another week. good luck.
cheers
 
I’ve cashed, but some of the bits are bound up with co2bubbles and won’t drop. Gonna have To open up keg, so I’m. Gonna wrap the floating dip tube with stainless steel scrubby and try to transfer into new keg.
 
Gnomebrewer said:
This has become a staple beer at my house. It's loved by non-beer drinkers, lager drinkers and craft beer drinkers. Kegs go faster than anything else I make. This is really simple, using the co-pitching method (sacch and lacto go into the ferment at the same time) which is easier than kettle souring. It gives a bit more complexity from the lacto and always seems to end up at about the right acidity level. The OG and mash temp give the right body and sweetness to work with the acidity, and allow the flavours from the fruit to shine through. There are some really good threads about co-pitching simple sours including Fast Souring - Modern Methods
Importantly, don't be worried about contaminating equipment. It WON'T happen. L. plantarum is so hop intolerant that it won't infect your other hopped beers.

INGREDIENTS:
2/3 Pilsner malt. 1/3 Wheat malt. Aim for an OG around 1.045.
No hops.

PROCESS:
Mash at 155F for an hour.
Collect wort and boil for 10 minutes.
Chill to pitching temps and pitch a packet of US05 per 5gal and 1g of Lallemand/Wildbrew Sour Pitch (Lactobacillus plantarum). That's half of what the instructions say to use for Sour Pitch, but is more than enough. I suspect pitching half a gram per 5 gal would get the job done.
Ferment at around 66 to 70F until primary is nearly finished then rack onto fruit. Try to rack just BEFORE reaching FG so the yeast are still active to scrub oxygen picked up during transfer. It normally takes about 4 to 5 days to this point.
Rack onto fruit (explained below) and leave for a further 2 weeks. Try to minimise oxygen/splashing during transfer as it seems to reduce the fresh fruit flavour.

FRUITING:
I mostly use packaged frozen fruits which work really well. There's no need to pasteurise or sanitise. Fruit should go into a grain bag (or paint strainer bag) into the secondary fermenter, then rack beer on top.
Raspberries: Use about 1.5 to 2lbs in 5 gal. Tip them straight into the grain bag.
Mango: Mush up thawed, chopped frozen mango. I bash it with my grain paddle. Use about 3lbs in 5gal.
Blueberries: As per mango.
Passionfruit pulp: Use about 3lbs per 5gal. Tip it straight into the grain bag. Others have reported good results with passionfruit puree.
These are the only fruits I've tried so far, and all have been great. Raspberries have definitely been the favourite.
There's lots of other good fruiting info on the Milk the Funk Wiki Soured Fruit Beer
but I find I use a lot less that what is suggested in this beer.
Cheers and enjoy!
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Brewed this weekend. Adding tart cherry concentrate next week. I also am using Imperial Suburban Brett instead of the sour pitch. Homebrew shop had it in the free bin since it was close dated. So far so good. Curious to see how this wild beast finishes!
 
Ken Buckley said:
Brewed this weekend. Adding tart cherry concentrate next week. I also am using Imperial Suburban Brett instead of the sour pitch. Homebrew shop had it in the free bin since it was close dated. So far so good. Curious to see how this wild beast finishes!
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What you're brewing there is going to be a completely different beer. Brett gives funk, not sourness (although it can contribute some tartness, as well as acetic acid if there's oxygen available). I'd suggest you get some hops in there - I don't know how a hopless Brett beer would go. Leave it for at least six weeks, possibly longer, until it reaches a stable gravity. You should end up with a nice, funky cherry wheat beer!
 
How many Swanson's Probiotics caps would you use when you co-pitch?
 
jbeerman said:
How many Swanson's Probiotics caps would you use when you co-pitch?
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I use lallemand sourpitch. Based on other brewer's experiences in this thread, probiotic capsules can fail to sour (probably dead bacteria from mis-handling). I'd recommend a small (250 to 500mL) starter using a couple of capsules, to check that they're alive. Goodbelly shots seem to be more consistent.
 
You don't need steeping grains. Just a mix of pils and wheat extracts. If you want to steep, make it a partial mash instead - steep (mash) your pils malt at about 152F for an hour.
 
Gnomebrewer said:
You don't need steeping grains. Just a mix of pils and wheat extracts. If you want to steep, make it a partial mash instead - steep (mash) your pils malt at about 152F for an hour.
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thanks! One more question - if I wanted to add lactose, when would I add? During boil or after fermentation has started? (sorry, fairly newly returned to brewing and never done a sour or used lactose!) thinking about Foundation Brewing’s Double Stone Jam, which is delicious.

EDITED: nevermind! :)
 
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I brewed this and split it into two batches and racked one over raspberries and the other over blueberries. My SG was 1.014 when I split the batch over the fruit and after a day or so, airlock activity picked back up and my SG was measured at ~1.025 per batch. After a week the SG settled out around 1.020 and it hasn't changed at all after 3 consecutive readings however I'm still getting some very very sparse airlock activity. The total time over fruit will be two weeks as of tomorrow (8/22/2020), is this airlock activity just due to CO2 coming out of solution since the SG is stable? For reference, the batches have sat at ~82 degrees F for two weeks. The taste is great BTW, I'm really excited to bottle this!
 
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I'd guess there's a problem with your gravity measurements - maybe due to the fruit not being fully mixed in (i.e. you just rack on top of fruit or add it gently to the fermenter). After two weeks on fruit, if the yeast was healthy and it was warm enough, it should be finished and ready to bottle.
 
Gnomebrewer said:
I'd guess there's a problem with your gravity measurements - maybe due to the fruit not being fully mixed in (i.e. you just rack on top of fruit or add it gently to the fermenter). After two weeks on fruit, if the yeast was healthy and it was warm enough, it should be finished and ready to bottle.
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I was also thinking my gravity readings were off but I used both a refractometer and a hydrometer each time I measured. The readings were stable over a week for each (1.010 for both hydrometer readings and 1.020 for the refractometer). I'm going to keep it in the fermenters for another week, could only make it better!
 
Docod44 said:
I was also thinking my gravity readings were off but I used both a refractometer and a hydrometer each time I measured. The readings were stable over a week for each (1.010 for both hydrometer readings and 1.020 for the refractometer). I'm going to keep it in the fermenters for another week, could only make it better!
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If you got 1.010 from hydrometer readings then it's likely done. Refractometers aren't accurate with alcohol in the solution.
 
marc1 said:
If you got 1.010 from hydrometer readings then it's likely done. Refractometers aren't accurate with alcohol in the solution.
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I figured the reading wouldn't be accurate, I just wanted to see if there was any change between the refractometer readings one week apart. The hydrometer at least told me the true FG.
 
bri11oh34d said:
thanks...calcium chloride in the boil as well? or in the mash? sorry, i think thats my last question! Hoping to get started on this in the next hour!
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Ask away - it's how we learn! I use the Calcium chloride across the mash water and sparge/boil, at a 'per gallon' rate. This is because, unlike table salt, it affects pH. It won't matter if it's all added to the mash or all added to the boil though.
 
So I brewed up a batch of this last Saturday. 10 gallon batch split between two different 7 gallon fermonsters (figured I would knock the dust off these plastic fermenters for my sour batches). I unfortunately do not have any buckets or anything to xfer them into for secondary. So yesterday I dumped in 7lbs of frozen fruits (blueberry, raspberry, blackberry and strawberry) into one of the 5 gallon batches. Prior to this fermentation had pretty much finished up. I was getting a bubble every now and again into my blowoff. I woke up this morning and checked on them to find that fermentation had taken back off in the new 5 gallon fruit bomb batch (for the wife). By not transferring to a secondary have I now created a problem? Will the finished batch be really dry?

I also have the second 5 gallon batch which I am wanting to do something with cucumber (trying to shoot for something like ten ton brewing cucumber crush - had it while in colorado and can not find it around here). I ordered a 12 oz bottle of this monin cucumber concentrated flavoring (no sugar added) Cucumber Concentrated Flavor

Has anyone used anything like this before? How much should I throw in there? I do have some fresh garden cucumbers which I could add to the batch but again I do not have a clean fermenter or bucket to transfer to a secondary in (will this be an issue)? Am I better off just xfering this to a keg and then dumping in the flavoring and letting it sit for a couple weeks to finish out?

/edit.. fruit addition on the left



Thanks for your time (and recipe)!
Neil
 

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should this already be pretty sour by the time i go to secondary on the fruit? brewed last monday with 2 swanson capsules (maybe not enough??) and did a quick taste test today and it just barely, ever so slightly has a hint of sourness...and i think even then, im only picking up on it because my taste buds are specifically looking for it...

I don't want to waste the raspberries though if i already have a drain pour on my hands. Would adding a few more swanson capsules along with a few pounds of raspberries make any difference?
 
It should be sour within a couple of days. Unfortunately the capsules seem to be a bit hit and miss - there a several cases where they haven't soured which seems to be due to dead capsules. Goodbelly shots seem to be a bit more reliable but with either the safest method is to make a starter. I haven't had any issues with sourpitch.
 
bri11oh34d said:
I don't want to waste the raspberries though if i already have a drain pour on my hands. Would adding a few more swanson capsules along with a few pounds of raspberries make any difference?
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No need to drain pour. Others have tried souring after fermentation with limited success, so maybe avoid that path, but you can still boil some hops to add a 'hop tea' and have a non-sour beer.
 
Gnomebrewer said:
No need to drain pour. Others have tried souring after fermentation with limited success, so maybe avoid that path, but you can still boil some hops to add a 'hop tea' and have a non-sour beer.
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Yea I could do that...investment is pretty low at this point without the raspberries, so why not try something, right? Should I leave out the raspberry addition?

i have plenty of hops lying around, including some cascade, williamette, and centennial cones that I just harvested, dehydrated and vacuum sealed about a month ago...can do the hop tea addition and still not add a penny to my costs...
 

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