Sour problem

[dcblue08]

Hey, This is my first post. I am making my first sour. The mash went well and I pitched the lacto and waited 6 days. Very sour outcome. No off tasted. SG dropped from 1.036 to 10.010. It must have fermented with wild sugars. Any suggestions, thoughts?

 

[Funky Frank]

Welcome!

Fast Souring - Modern Methods

If there isn’t any mold growing and it tastes fine, bottle it and drink up. The above method is really good for controlling a sour. If you have brewed other stuff in the same area of your house, you likely have feral yeast living there from other batches.

 

[hotbeer]

When did you sour it? After the mash, after the boil or in the fermenter?

Wild sugars?

 

[dcblue08]

After the mash in the fermenter.

 

[hotbeer]

So you did boil the mash and then added the lactobacillus after putting it in the fermenter. I'm trying to get this straight because there are different ways to sour a beer at different times in the beer making process. Also, I assume we are to understand you have not pitched yeast yet.

So if the 10.010 SG is actually 1.010, then bottle and keg it as is normal if the SG has been stable over a few days and your beer is clean enough for you.

It would seem that something got in there and fermented it out if you didn't pitch yeast. If you like the taste, consider yourself lucky. Most victims of wild yeast infections don't like the outcome from what I've read.

"Wild sugars?" was also a question for you. Did you mean wild yeast in your OP?

 

[dcblue08]

I meant wild yeast. It tastes great. The recipe calls for a secondary with pineapple and coconut. I will just move forward with the next step and feel lucky it was not spoiled.

 

[hotbeer]

I might would go ahead and pitch the yeast you got with the kit when you add the pineapple and coconut if that is also going to raise the SG again.

I'm not big on moving to a secondary. I'd just keep it in the primary unless you are going for a really long time in the fermenter of say 2 months or more.