Something Evil in my Flanders

[Funky Frank]

Hi all! I have several small pseudo-soleras going (2 lambic styles, a Flanders Red style, and an Oud Bruin style). The red is the newest one (so not even a “solera” yet) and is still in a keg, where I experiment before going barrel or plastic. It is 1 year old with little O2 contact and has an evil funk and tongue rotting acetic acidity! However, if you can make it past that, it could almost pass for cherry wine (no cherries added). It was started with cakes of Rosellare, Sour Batch Kids, and Flemish Ale.


My guess is that I will ultimately scrap this and start over but.... I used my normal sanitation methods. I make clean beers in the same equipment right next to my sours without problems. I know it still might be human error on sanitation. I removed the blow off tube and pressurized the keg and 1 week later pressure was still there. I’m assuming the keg was not “leaking” O2.


I pulled 3/4 of the volume and added a highly fermentable ipa of about 60ibu. I will be pulling the ipa off in a few weeks (maybe it will make an ok sour ipa with a little blending?) and then I intend to fill with a 0ibu “normal” flanders red wort and test in 6mo.


I’m kinda just playing. Any other ideas on what went wrong? Any comments or ideas on how to fix?

 

[RPh_Guy]

Acetic acid only forms in the presence of oxygen, so there was definitely too much oxygen in there somehow.

It's not something that can be fixed, but you can maybe use it for blending. Or you can make malt vinegar or use it as a sauce for ribs or something.

Sanitation is a non-issue with these types of beers. Wild microbes are welcomed.

Even professional breweries end up dumping long-term sour batches and getting rid of barrels. These microbes are unpredictable.
Consider reducing the amount of yeast cake you are pitching. That may help reduce the phenolic funk.

Welcome to HBT! Cheers.

 

[Funky Frank]

Thanks! Happy to be here....I’d say hoppy but this is obviously the wrong forum for that.

I’ll switch to a carboy with a venting bung filled to the neck and I’ll cut my pitch in half (800ml to 400ml). If I can get that cherry flavor back with only half the bale of hay and little acetic, I’ll nurse the rest of my bugs back from the hop bath I just gave them.

 

[RPh_Guy]

FYI, silicone bungs are very oxygen-permeable.

That said, I use them for sours... but I don't disturb the pellicle, and I don't ever transfer it, and I wouldn't use it in a batch that already has too much oxygen exposure.

Good luck!

 

[RPh_Guy]

I’m still jealous that his accidental beer way-outshines my intentional sours...lol

May I ask what is lacking from your sour beers?

The red is the newest one (so not even a “solera” yet) and is still in a keg, where I experiment before going barrel or plastic. It is 1 year old

I would highly recommend using plastic or barrel for the primary. Micro-oxygenation does wonders for Brett flavor expression.

Fermonsters are great for this. They seal really well, you can see inside, they're smooth so cleaning is easy, inexpensive, and there's a spigot option.

Cheers

 

[Funky Frank]

Nothing really lacking in my sours (Considering my whole sour program). My beers score well in competitions and I have won a few awards ... it’s just a nice ego check to know that an accident scores better than the sours that I plan for, nurture, and dream about...lol. My Berliner is my best scoring beer and my one iteration of Lambic-Style was my worst scoring beer. Essentially, the “cleaner” they are the better they score right now but I want to master the funk! I have one of my Lambics off the solera that 2 of my snobbier friends are raving over so I’m excited to enter it.

As for the keg...that’s an artifact from when I first got into sours when I was eh scared. I was a wine guy first so I felt like a home wrecker the first time I brought Brett home...lol. My soleras are in plastic and wood but maybe I should be running my “experiments” in plastic so I can better understand the flavors different Brett strains provide early.

 

[Kenmoron]

I'm curious what sort of competitions you are entering your sours in. Small, local competitions usually won't produce "good" scores even when entering an exceptional example. Unfortunately, there is a lack of (funky) experienced judges and you may often get someone who has never had a Flanders or Lambic judging your beer. I would recommend entering larger, national competitions only and saving more of your precious, time-consuming beers for yourself or others who can appreciate them...or making friends with some BJCP judges willing to give you feedback (homebrew clubs).

I had to judge wild/specialty beers in my second ever competition. At that point in time I didn't have as much wild/funky experience and it was very hard to score based on BJCP descriptors alone. Almost every beer in that flight scored between 28-35. I have since tried many commercial examples now and feel more confident in my abilities. That being said, there are plenty of judges who really have only focused on "clean" beers who may be sitting down to judge your beer.

 

[mashpaddled]

When I've run into what you describe it is because there was excessive oxygen exposure and usually exposure during aging--especially in the times I have tried aging sour beer in kegs.

The problem with using kegs for long term sour aging is that those vessels are not designed to remain airtight without pressure. When there is no pressure forcing steel on both sides of a gasket to maintain pressure over time the gasket can dry a little and create an open flow of oxygen. That is especially true for corny kegs where there are five openings (two on each post plus the main opening). Sanke kegs aren't as bad but usually people use carboy caps on it and the seal might be imperfect.

Not sure there is a great remedy for the existing beer unfortunately. You can try refermenting it with a clean beer to clean up some of the off flavors but no guarantee that works. This beer may be a dumper. I don't personally think it is a great solution with good odds to send good beer into bad beer. Usually you just end up with more bad beer.