Saison Sour Mash Tech

[pinarphan]

After listening to the session from last Sunday I'm interested in trying a Saison (my first) with the sour mash tech. talked about.

I'm contemplating a basic saison recipe, mashing in at about 148-150, doing a no sparge mash, and leaving the whole mash overnight in the tun. My tun is a 15 gallon cooler that holds temp pretty dame well.

Thoughts?

 

[smizak]

I don't have the balls to let my whole mash sour, however, I just mashed a pound of pilsener on my stove. Going to pitch some whole kernels in it and see what happens in a couple days. If it's real nasty, I won't use it. But if it sours up and has a little funkiness, it's going in with the main mash when I brew later this week.

I'm also going to make a big starter of Wyeast 3724, then pitch a smidge of the wyeast 3711. That's what the Odanata guys do, and they get their Saisons to ferment really dry, even with no sugar.

 

[smizak]

Hey pinarphan, a FYI.

I've had my mini-mash stewing at 100F for about 24 hrs. now. It is almost unbelievably cleanly sour right now. None of the rotten "baby diaper" smell I keep reading about with lacto fermentation. It smells like yogurt mixed with malt. It looks like it fizzing lightly, I tasted some and it's super lemony and no funkiness whatsoever. I added a scant handful of uncrushed malt to the mash when it was around 120F and have kept a tight fitting lid on it while it's been in my temp control chamber. If it continues this way, I'll have no qualms about adding it to my saison.