The Gruit Beer Thread

[premington]

I've been following this thread on and off since day 1, and I want to say I may be inspired to finally brew a gruit (I had always followed the assumption people didn't brew gruits* because hops were just better). I may find that I have been corrected.




How is the head retention on your brews? I've heard/read that soap leaves a residue that kills head.




I used a tsp or two in a 5 gallon batch of beer a while back and it came out tasting perfumey. However, the lavender blonde I tried in Colorado Springs was good enough to inspire my failed batch. From I can recall, it smelled fragrantly floral and the taste was very similar. It was the perfect amount of lavender. Just noticeable.

Hey... That's fantastic to read! I'd definitely recommend you try a gruit.

But gruits take more time and effort, since so little information is available on additions and concentrations. It requires more research and trial teas and brews. And there's a chance on your first batch, it won't come out the way you intended, and experience and further fermentations will refine your recipe to be something truly unique and all your own!

Hops are so much easier. Everything is in this one, well-documented plant. Your bittering, aroma, and flavoring are all there. With a gruit, you have to figure out the bittering, aroma, and flavoring. It's a real challenge!

Give it a try, and let us all know what you're doing. That way, we all learn from each other.

Thanks for the info on lavender. A friend of mine used it in his gruit and found it quite powerful. He's made his recipe a few more times and adjusted his additions, and I think now he's happy with his lavender quantity. I'm curious to try it. I've never tasted lavender before. To me, the smell is heavenly!!! I absolutely swoon over the smell of lavender.

 

[premington]

Denard Brewing has some excellent information on herbs and their use in gruit and mead. This is a nice read that shares information about the herbs they've brewed with. Definitely a nice reference for us home brewers.

https://denardbrewing.com/blog/post/gruit-mead/

 

[Miraculix]

@premington
Yes, that might be the problem. I have acces to chlorine dioxide in a water solution, this is one of the most powerfull desinfectants known and it basically falls apart to tablesalt (smaaaall amount, not noticeable) and water after 30 minutes, so no rinsing necessary.... just have to make sure it does not kill the yeast . I will try to rinse all my stuff with that next time. Maybe this helps, do not have to pay a thing as I got it alrerady flying around.

@Whatsgoodmiley

As premington already said, gruit is kind of a gamble or a matter of a scientific, eager for reasearch thing, based on the personal point of view. It is veeery interesting from my perspective, but as it was stated before in this thread, do not try to compare it to any hop based beer you already know. It is an own style of beer and therefore it brings it's own kind of flavours. That is the beauty of it! No expectations means at least double the fun

... as always in life!


Btw. I just drank my first pint of my recently bottled neipa and I decided it tastes like pure grapefruit juice. Well.... no. Not my thing. It is ok but somehow I miss a bit of malt. It is basically a hopfruit overdose. Naaa..... not my thing.

 

[Miraculix]

Fellow gruiters! How are your gruits doing?

 

[Whatsgoodmiley]

Fellow gruiters! How are your gruits doing?

Non-existent. I'd like to try to brew a gruit but would like to start with a recipe that I know is solid. Would anyone mind sharing their favorite recipes?

 

[Miraculix]

Non-existent. I'd like to try to brew a gruit but would like to start with a recipe that I know is solid. Would anyone mind sharing their favorite recipes?

I am afraid that there is no such thing as a solid gruit recipe that us publicly available. I can dig out the recipe for my last gruit but I haven't tried it yet (still bottle conditioning). If you really wanna get into it you might want to take a look into "how to make mead like a viking" or "ancient and herbal healing beers".

 

[premington]

Fellow gruiters! How are your gruits doing?

Checked mine yesterday. It's finally cleared pretty well; the yeast flocculated efficiently. It has a small haze, but it's very clean. Taste is different than even a week ago. Spicy notes have toned down, and it has a silky mouthfeel. Color is dark brown, like a cup of light-black coffee. There isn't much nose to it. Strangely, it has a mild uria smell (pee). Very strange. I have no idea where it's coming from, but it's not in the flavor at all. It's subtle. The rest of the scent is mild spice and beer like.

The beer is flat and at room temp, so I can't rely on the flavor much at this point. But the flavor is nothing like the smell. It has spicy notes and a hint of malt and grain. It's green and doesn't have as heavy a body as it did before flocculation.

So my gut's telling me to bottle it. I'm thinking of doing that next weekend. I think I might not fine it. I'm afraid Ringwood Ale yeast may have dropped out a bit too much yeast for fining not to effect carbonation.

That's what's happening with my gruit. Super curious to see how it tastes after carbonation and bottle conditioning.

 

[Miraculix]

I think the urea smell might be related to yarrow. For my nose it can get in the direction of those artificial lemonish toilet stone things with a mix of pee. Sounds now super disgusting, but it really is only a hint of it and when it's chilled and bottled it settles with lemonadeish type of flavour, which is nice.

Yes please don't fine, I am totally against fining in general

A beer contains yeast and yeast is very nutritious. Yes can be hazy and that is perfectly fine, no need to change that, that is the nature of beer.

We have just developed this super strange view on things in particular that we think we have to "improve" things by forcing it to look unnatural... Some beers are clear some are hazy and that is perfectly fine.

If your guts say bottle it and you don't taste any esters which would need to be cleaned up, go for it!

 

[premington]

I think the urea smell might be related to yarrow. For my nose it can get in the direction of those artificial lemonish toilet stone things with a mix of pee. Sounds now super disgusting, but it really is only a hint of it and when it's chilled and bottled it settles with lemonadeish type of flavour, which is nice.

Yes please don't fine, I am totally against fining in general

A beer contains yeast and yeast is very nutritious. Yes can be hazy and that is perfectly fine, no need to change that, that is the nature of beer.

We have just developed this super strange view on things in particular that we think we have to "improve" things by forcing it to look unnatural... Some beers are clear some are hazy and that is perfectly fine.

If your guts say bottle it and you don't taste any esters which would need to be cleaned up, go for it!

Yes... No estery flavors that I can perceive. It seems healthy and clean. The flavor is there, but I've learned the act of carbonating and conditioning has a pronounced effect on the flavor of the beer. Uncarbonated, the beer is lacking. Carbonation and bottle conditioning can make a beer blossom with flavors, depth, and mouthfeel.

I agree about fining/haze. Usually I hit it with gelatin, not because I feel I have to, but because a bright, clear beer has a nice presentation that many people enjoy. I don't fine darker beers, like stouts though, and I won't fine this one. But, for me, I don't care about haze, even on blonde beers. Also, this beer is an experiment. I'm prepared to be the only one drinking it, if need be. Hopefully it'll come out surprisingly well, and I'll be able to share it with others.

Yarrow... I didn't know that. Thank you for sharing that. I was wondering which of the herbs was causing the weak scent. It's not off putting, but it is strange. My brother in law took a sample of it and noticed it too, without me telling him. He didn't hesitate to drink it, and said exactly what I did... the smell is not in the taste.

We tasted no off flavors. I did notice a very interesting aftertaste. About three to five minutes after tasting the sample out of the fermenter, I tasted an orange peel taste. It was actually quite pleasant.

I'll let you know how it goes after bottling. The 16th my nephew is coming over and we're gonna brew up a wee heavy. The gruit will have been in the bottles all of eight days at that point. A little early, I suppose, but we'll crack a few and give it a try. I'll report back with my/our impressions.

 

[dmtaylor]

The following recipe has been brewed several times and scored 39 in competitions. Personally I do not care for mugwort so I leave that out these days but otherwise a solid recipe IMHO.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/16EL1o63MJ41MpJSTLY898vqfU-HQz5prPA/view?usp=sharing

 

[dmtaylor]

I agree, yarrow can be sensed as urine. Don't use that much anymore. Use 1/3 as much or something like that for improved subtlety.

 

[premington]

I agree, yarrow can be sensed as urine. Don't use that much anymore. Use 1/3 as much or something like that for improved subtlety.

Noted... Thanks for confirming this. I'll reduce the amount of yarrow in future recipes. Nice to walk away from this brew having learned about concentrations. Figuring out gruit additive concentrations is a challenge. I never expected to have a urine component. It never presented itself until the yeast flocculated and fell out of suspension. Now the flavor and smell is maturing. Scent is lacking.

A floral note would be a nice addition. I have lavender I could use, I suppose, a few days before bottling. I'm wondering if it'll wipe out that weak urine smell. Any thoughts on this?

The other questions are, if I use lavender, how much and in what way? I don't think tossing it on the beer dry would be a good idea, so I would assume I'd have to draw off some beer, boil with the lavender or bring the temp up over 170 F and pasteurize it by holding it at that temp for 30 minutes.

 

[dmtaylor]

I have not used lavender but I would keep the amount very small, like only 2 or 3 grams per gallon. I'd soak in a shot of vodka overnight then add the flavored vodka to the batch.

You could also try the same with rose petals. Or chamomile I think would be very nice and is available as herbal tea so you should be able to find it easily. Same amounts and same method should be very effective.

In general I think it is always best to aim low and see what you get. You can always add more if you need more, but you cannot easily subtract ingredients after you already add too much.

 

[Miraculix]

Yes, I agree. Would have also suggested the vodka method or a regular lavender tea. Just boiling one or two liters of water, throwing in the lavender, keep boiling for a bit and then let it cool down. Afterwards add the amount of tea according to taste. Little by little.... Maybe with a test pint and then scale it up for the whole batch.

But in general, I did not have this problem with my pure yarrow beers, but do not remember the taste before bottle conditioning. After botteling they tasted lemonish, like a nice lemonade. No urine flavour left. Might have something to do with the fact that they turned slightly sour (which suited the beer very well btw.). Just for curiosity, I would leave your batch as it is and see how it develops with bottle conditioning.

 

[premington]

Yes, I agree. Would have also suggested the vodka method or a regular lavender tea. Just boiling one or two liters of water, throwing in the lavender, keep boiling for a bit and then let it cool down. Afterwards add the amount of tea according to taste. Little by little.... Maybe with a test pint and then scale it up for the whole batch.

But in general, I did not have this problem with my pure yarrow beers, but do not remember the taste before bottle conditioning. After botteling they tasted lemonish, like a nice lemonade. No urine flavour left. Might have something to do with the fact that they turned slightly sour (which suited the beer very well btw.). Just for curiosity, I would leave your batch as it is and see how it develops with bottle conditioning.

Thanks for the input and suggestions, guys.

I'm inclined to agree with you, Miraculix, although I do like dmtaylor's vodka suggestion as well. Being an experiment, I'm inclined to leave this alone and just see what I get. I have a solid 5+ gallons of the stuff, so I just hope it's at least enjoyable to drink! Hate to bottle ~50 bottles and discover, after conditioning, it tastes poor. Guess that's the chance each of us takes with any experimental batch.

Miraculix: Your comment is interesting. I was just talking with my brewing friend here at work. He makes sours and commented that a urine smell is common for sours. "Are you sure you don't have any bacterial infection going on?" He said it might turn into a citrusy/lemony flavor, if it is. I recall the orange peel aftertaste minutes after sampling the batch. But I taste no immediate citrus/lemon flavor when I take a sip.

But I do want to get this out of the fermenter. The muslin bag of goodies (sweet gale, yarrow, and juniper berries--1 oz. each) is still hanging in the beer. Since I have a closed fermenter, I'm curious to see what it looks like in there. If I see rings of white stuff and a slurry of God-knows-what throughout the beer, then I know I have a sour or a pitchable batch. As I said, tasting it, it tastes fine. I get no off flavors and it looks nice in the glass (clear and healthy). My fermenter has a sampling spigot, so I can draw a sample off the bottom of the vessel.

 

[Miraculix]

That sounds very good in general! Why not split the batch and add some of the lavender vodka or lavender tea directly to, let's say fifteen bottles when botteling?! Best of both worlds!

... Btw. All my sours also started only with a slight lemon flavor

They also did get more sour over time in the bottle, even the ones that were not sour after bottle conditioning... Comes time comes acid

 

[Miraculix]

You can also vary the amount of lavender used in those bottles to see how much works best after conditioning. Lets say five bottles with half the amount, five with the full guessed amount and five with 1.5 times the guessed amount. As your batch is already an experiment, why not make it even more interesting?

 

[Miraculix]

And maybe do the same with chamomile?

Uhhh and pleeeeaaaaase buy yourself some Meadowsweet before doing this and try this one as well. I always drive by a lot of those flowering Meadowsweets on my way to work and they smell just awesome. You can even smell them from the bicycle.

This batch can be a huge thing regarding knowledge gathering and sharing!

 

[Miraculix]

Ok update on my little gruit o brewed.

Just tried my first trinity, yarrow, sweet gale and wild rosemary.

It is flat and sour. No idea why it is flat. Just a hint of sparkling and a lot of acid. It is drinkable, if you are into sours, like a strong cloudy herbal lemonade. Not bad, quite interesting to be honest. But would be wayyyy better with some bubbles.

It did ferment for three weeks and was still cloudy when bottled so yeast should have been plenty there and also still alive. Strange, maybe the infection killed the yeast. I am not sure if I can taste the Dextrose that I used to bottle condition it.

At least it doesn't smell or taste like pee

But tbh I put this in the fail box. It is too sour and it has no bubbles. Drinkable though, but still a long way to go to call it nice.

I think lower fermentation temperatures would have helped. Looks like cloudy, dark apple juice. Tastes a bit like Apple vinegar with herbs, as I said, not unpleasant but also not great.

There is a lot to learn!

 

[premington]

And I, too, have a lil' ole gruit brew update.

Just finished bottling 5 gallons of the stuff. Got 48 beautiful bottles out of the batch.

Very interesting update. Took a sample before bottling and the pee smell is completely gone! WTF?! I sampled it four days ago, and it was there then. Amazing how quickly things can change as beer (or gruit, in this case) ages. I took the top of the fermenter off, and it looks beautiful. No infection. Taste is super clean, and it's very clear. I can taste the malt and grain and a smooth, mild alcohol presence. It's really, really different than anything I've ever tasted. I can't say I'm amazed by the taste, but I also can't say there are any bad flavors at all. It's just *different*. It has an earthy quality with notes of spice and a definite malty sweetness. The bitterness is well balanced with the rest of the body. The aftertaste is clean and pleasant.

As I think I've said, my experience shows after carbonation and conditioning, a beer's flavor blossoms. I'm hoping that holds true here, in a good way. I'm really curious to see how this comes out after it's conditioned and as it continues to age.

The gruit had some mild carbonation. I used a brewing calculator, which calculated 4.8 oz. of dextrose. I just hope the existing mild carbonation doesn't result in overcarbonation and bottle bombs.

Took about six hours total. That's terrible bottling efficiency. That's 7.5 minutes a bottle. Most of my time was cleaning and sanitizing everything, including ~80 new and previously used bottles.

Now we wait.

I plan on cracking one next weekend. I'll be brewing up a Scotch ale with my nephew, now that the fermenter's freed up. We'll give the gruit a try while we're brewing the Scotch ale.

I'll report back on how it is.

 

[premington]

Ok update on my little gruit o brewed.

Just tried my first trinity, yarrow, sweet gale and wild rosemary.

It is flat and sour. No idea why it is flat. Just a hint of sparkling and a lot of acid. It is drinkable, if you are into sours, like a strong cloudy herbal lemonade. Not bad, quite interesting to be honest. But would be wayyyy better with some bubbles.

It did ferment for three weeks and was still cloudy when bottled so yeast should have been plenty there and also still alive. Strange, maybe the infection killed the yeast. I am not sure if I can taste the Dextrose that I used to bottle condition it.

At least it doesn't smell or taste like pee

But tbh I put this in the fail box. It is too sour and it has no bubbles. Drinkable though, but still a long way to go to call it nice.

I think lower fermentation temperatures would have helped. Looks like cloudy, dark apple juice. Tastes a bit like Apple vinegar with herbs, as I said, not unpleasant but also not great.

There is a lot to learn!

Thanks for the update. That's interesting... I wonder why it didn't carbonate? What yeast did you use? Is it a high flocculator?

I'm sorry you deem it a failure. Is there any chance, if you let it sit, it might mature nicely?

I've heard many people who sour beers find six months or a year down the road, it turns into quite a nice beverage. One fellow I heard on a BeerSmith podcast made a cherry sour and thought it was a loss. He pushed the carboy back out of the way, and a year later gave it a try and said it was amazing!

Guess I'm looking at the silver lining and hoping there's still hope for your gruit. At the very least, you'll walk away from this brew having learned things you'll take to the next.

 

[premington]

That sounds very good in general! Why not split the batch and add some of the lavender vodka or lavender tea directly to, let's say fifteen bottles when botteling?! Best of both worlds!

... Btw. All my sours also started only with a slight lemon flavor

They also did get more sour over time in the bottle, even the ones that were not sour after bottle conditioning... Comes time comes acid

I wish I had more time to devote to this, because you bring up an excellent idea I would love to do! Splitting up the batches and toying with different lavender concentrations is an excellent idea. I just didn't have the time to do that this time around.

Today's plans were to bottle the gruit AND a chocolate coffee stout I've had aging for the last four months. I never got to the stout. I'll do that tomorrow.

I'm down to 10 homebrews left. Gotta keep that pipeline going and replenish supplies. After this weekend, gotta get the fermenter filled with something new.

God... This hobby is addicting!

 

[Miraculix]

I think it was safale 04 or 05... but I never ever had problems like that with the yeast. I did not store it long enough in the fermenter to force setteling of every little yeast cell and it was cloudy when botteling. I also definetly took some sludge from the bottom of the fermenter into the bottle by accident, so the yeast must be inactive for some other reasons. Maybe the high acidic environment killed it or at least slowed it down significantly. There was carbonation but only a tiny bit. Or maybe all the bacteria ate the sugar first and turned it into vinegar? I do not know.

At the end, the batch was tiny. 3 or for bottles, so who cares I will try to keep one or two bottles for some months and see what happens to them afterwards

On the other hand, good news on the Saison side, my "saison" (used ale yeast, not saison yeast), turned out to be pretty awesome! Did use a hint of ginger and coriander in it and a lot of munich malt and it really is very very amazing. Best beer I have made so far. Closely followed by my stout. Speaking of which, aging is very beneficial for stouts, as my stout was mediochre first, but after aging one month it became marvelous. I hope yours will be as nice as that... or even better as it had more time to age

 

[premington]

I think it was safale 04 or 05... but I never ever had problems like that with the yeast. I did not store it long enough in the fermenter to force setteling of every little yeast cell and it was cloudy when botteling. I also definetly took some sludge from the bottom of the fermenter into the bottle by accident, so the yeast must be inactive for some other reasons. Maybe the high acidic environment killed it or at least slowed it down significantly. There was carbonation but only a tiny bit. Or maybe all the bacteria ate the sugar first and turned it into vinegar? I do not know.

At the end, the batch was tiny. 3 or for bottles, so who cares I will try to keep one or two bottles for some months and see what happens to them afterwards

On the other hand, good news on the Saison side, my "saison" (used ale yeast, not saison yeast), turned out to be pretty awesome! Did use a hint of ginger and coriander in it and a lot of munich malt and it really is very very amazing. Best beer I have made so far. Closely followed by my stout. Speaking of which, aging is very beneficial for stouts, as my stout was mediochre first, but after aging one month it became marvelous. I hope yours will be as nice as that... or even better as it had more time to age

Ha! I guess I forgot that the batch was so tiny. Not much of a loss, if you decide to dump it. With so few bottles, I'd probably do as you suggested; hold onto them for a while and try one in three to six months. Might be interesting to see how it matures. You might learn something further from that batch, given time.

Sounds like you should have ample yeast in suspension to activate fermentation. I'd also be wondering why it's so flat. I have no experience to draw from in how yeast are affected by the presence of active bacteria. I suppose it's possible the bacteria could kill off the yeast. Perhaps someone else here knows.

I'm wondering if there's a way to kill off the bacteria and then repitch the yeast strain.

My home smells like a brewery now. I'm trying to decide if it's a bad smell. Bottled up all the stout. Between the gruit and this stout, I now have about 83 bottles of homebrew waiting to carb and condition.

 

[Miraculix]

This is Exactly how it should be, a lot of good beer

I hope my new landlord will be OK with brewing and occupying the kitchen from time to time for that. It us a house share... But I think h likes beer and I am German so I can argue that I cannot suppress my genetic urge to brew good beer and share it with my housemates

I did some research and it looks like pretty much every gruit seems to turn sour at one point if not artificially preserved in one way or another.

Maybe it is just like that and we have to accept it. Maybe gruit is just a beer which can be enjoyed young and not sour or aged and sour.

I will keep investigating and trying, but looks like that to me.

 

[premington]

This is Exactly how it should be, a lot of good beer

I hope my new landlord will be OK with brewing and occupying the kitchen from time to time for that. It us a house share... But I think h likes beer and I am German so I can argue that I cannot suppress my genetic urge to brew good beer and share it with my housemates

I did some research and it looks like pretty much every gruit seems to turn sour at one point if not artificially preserved in one way or another.

Maybe it is just like that and we have to accept it. Maybe gruit is just a beer which can be enjoyed young and not sour or aged and sour.

I will keep investigating and trying, but looks like that to me.

If it were me, your brewing is a positive that would make me *want* to have you rent and share space in my home! But I'm biased. I'd surely want to help brew up some batches, and we'd probably be aligning our brewing schedules around one another.

I think you're probably right about your assessment of gruit. I've read that gruit does not age well, in terms of remaining stable. I think that's a primary reason why hops were used, to ensure spoilage doesn't occur. For my batch, I'm a little concerned. Unless I can find people to share two cases with, it'll take me some time to get through all these bottles. I only drink on the weekends, and only two or three beers at a time.

If it comes out well, I have people to share it with. If it tastes odd, we'll have to see how long it lasts. I'll report back here how this matures. If it starts to sour, in time, you'll read about it here.

 

[Miraculix]

I think that lambic might also be the way to gruit? Never had a lambic but as far as I read about it, they are not very bitter. I also like the wild approach to it, suits the gruit idea.

But what I never understood was why lambic had to age in big containers instead of aging in the bottle. Would make life easier and one would not need to add new yeast for carbonation as the yeast present would still be active.

 

[dmtaylor]

I think that lambic might also be the way to gruit? Never had a lambic but as far as I read about it, they are not very bitter. I also like the wild approach to it, suits the gruit idea.

But what I never understood was why lambic had to age in big containers instead of aging in the bottle. Would make life easier and one would not need to add new yeast for carbonation as the yeast present would still be active.

Good comments here.

I believe ALL unhopped or very low hopped beers of old were sour, at least after a few months of age. This includes gruit, as well as lambic, as well as any other old styles with little or no hops that you can think of. Hops were revolutionary in their preservative qualities and changed beer forever because now beer could be aged for years without going sour. I believe that's the real reason hops became so popular hundreds of years ago (not thousands, only hundreds). Plus they are extremely easy to grow and have very pleasant bitterness and flavors.

I believe lambic is generally aged in large vessels for long periods for several reasons:

1) Kaboom. If you bottle in too much a hurry, bottles will explode, as the various bugs in the lambic continue to work over long periods and generate CO2 and other gases along the way.

2) Consistency, blending, and frugality. These three things go hand in hand. If you want all your lambic to have about the same level of tartness and flavors from bottle to bottle or from barrel to barrel, what better way than to keep it all together and/or blend different barrels just prior to packaging. If one barrel gets real nasty or turns to vinegar or otherwise needs to be blended in smaller amounts than others, it can still be useful and not go to waste. Nobody enjoys dumping a bad batch, and by dividing batches, this can be a way to avoid waste. If doing this results in a need to add a little more yeast at the end for carbonation, no big deal, there's yeast everywhere, it's very cheap or even free (at least in the days of old).

And all of the same arguments for lambic can also be applied to gruits or other ales of old.

 

[Miraculix]

Thanks dmtaylor, that makes sense. I am. Used to think like "yeast eats sugar, sugar gone, no more gas". But it works a bit different on the wild side. I might get one lambic going, let's say a ten to twenty Liter balloon. Actually it will be not a real lambic, it will be a mix of malt, honey and apple juice plus yarrow, sweet gale and wild rosemary or maybe mugwort instead of the wild rosemary. I will treat it as a lambic, wild fermentation and at least half a year aging.
I maybe add some wild plums or wild apple skin for yeast, but let's see. Question is, how strong shall it be. I guess a higher. Percentage might be an advantage. Maybe around nine or ten?

 

[dmtaylor]

Higher alcohol level should keep the tartness at bay. You could aim for 7 or 8% ABV or higher if you are interested in delayed tartness, but I have no idea how well it would actually work until you approach like the 8-10% mark, then it should work pretty well.

 

[Miraculix]

Yes, then we start to get into the wine region. Or mead region. I have read "how to brew mead like a viking" and this book takes pretty much a lambic approach, but with the focus on a higher percentage, just like you recommended, above 10%.

Surely there is also material for lower percentages inside, but the main idea goes into this direction. I guess I will try everything. Let's also see how it ages.

AAAAANNNNDDDD..... another update from my gruit experiments. Today I am sampling my Meadosweet, Ground Ivy, Mugwort Gruit. Well, I must admit, it tastes good! Sour, of course, but not as sour as the one from yesterday. One can also taste the difference regarding the herbs. I think I can taste the Meadosweet. Really nice. I can really recommend Meadosweet flowers, they have a nice aroma and go well with malt and groundivy. This one has potential. Although, it is also quite flat.

It would be good to know what exactly happens when beers sour. Is it aerobic? is it anarobic? Is sugar converted? Is Alcohol converted? Which temperatures promote this sourness? Does the sourness "even out" with aging? What are the products? Vinegar? lactic acid? or ?????

I pretty much have the feeling that there is something complex going on and that it would be very beneficial to understand this process more.

 

[dmtaylor]

Depending on sanitation and what you pitch and so forth, there are lots of different critters that will have different effects. I'm not a microbiology expert but I can tell you what I know off the top of my head:

Sachharomyces cerevisia is your standard ale yeast, which for the most part produces alcohol anaerobically as its end product, along with some hydrogen sulfide, diacetyl, etc.

Brettanomyces is a more primitive, funkier yeast that tends to come from old oak casks, and can lead to leathery, "barnyard", and pineapple sort of flavors, as well as peppery phenols. Unlike Sacch. c., Brett will eat friggin everything and acts very very slowly over the course of many months or years. When present in a large quantity, it forms a distinctive powdery gray skin or "pellicle" on top of the brew.

Lactobacillus is a common bacteria that generates lactic acid, which lends a distinctive tartness like yogurt or sour cream, because of course, it is the primary bacteria in those things. It does the same thing to beer. When present in large quantities, it can have the appearance of tiny off-white pebbles floating on the surface of the beer. I am not sure but I believe it is aerobic, and I believe it eats sugar, but somewhat more slowly than yeast does.

Acetobacter is a bacteria that generates vinegar. It is strictly aerobic and needs lots of oxygen. It converts any and all alcohol from beer, wine, mead, cider, you name it, into vinegar, and if given enough time, there will be zero alcohol left. Anything we brew will turn to vinegar over time if it is exposed to open air (as opposed to CO2) since there is so much of this bacteria in the air everywhere. Acetobacter when present will always form a sort of gelatinous pancake on top of the brew, which is also known to kombucha lovers as a SCOBY or symbiotic colony of bacteria & yeast. The yeast eats sugar to make the alcohol, and the acetobacter eats the alcohol and makes vinegar. Catch it at the right time (like with kombucha) and you can have a balance of both in your beverage. But like I said, if you just let it go, there won't be any alcohol left after a while.

There are other things like Pediococcus and other organisms that do some weird and undesirable stuff, but above are the main ones that to some degree might (or might not) be desirable in beverages that we brew and ferment.

In general, yeasts are happiest at about room temperature or a little cooler. Bacteria on the other hand love some warmth around 100 F but will still work reasonably fast at room temperature. Yeast can continue to work at cold temperatures close to freezing, but bacteria don't like cold and while they may not die, they become almost completely inactive in refrigeration. Freezing will kill either one.

Now...... regarding tartness in gruits.......... I have a theory that the herbs themselves lend a certain tartness that has nothing to do with any of these organisms. I believe yarrow especially has a certain tartness it gives, which will be present all the way through fermentation beginning on Day 1, and might become more obvious with age but it's always there. Other herbs may or may not act in similar ways. Meanwhile, the fact also remains that without the preservative effects of hops, any gruit will almost certainly become "contaminated" and thus sour much more with age. If you don't want a sour gruit, then you either need to drink it young, add a little bit of hops, or determine which herbs are causing tartness and limit their use, or all of the above.

So much more to learn and discover, eh?! I know I'm enjoying myself. I've made at least 3 or 4 gruits over the years and found them to be just about the most interesting beverages I have ever made. I'll be making some more probably next year (I already have several more "normal" beers lined up in the near future).

Cheers!

 

[Albionwood]

There is some good information here, and I want to add to it. First, sourness is not at all inevitable. It is caused by (as correctly noted above) either Brettanomyces or any of several completely different kinds of bacteria. (Actually Brett by itself does not cause sourness, though it does lower the pH, making the beer "tart" but not really sour.) Saccharomyces will not cause sourness. So if your brewing process and sanitation procedures are up to the task, you can easily brew any beer - including a gruit - that will not go sour. (I brewed a gruit last year that finished too sweet and stayed that way for about 9 months, until I deliberately soured it with a mixed culture of Brett, Lacto, and Pedio). Whenever your beer goes sour, it is because one of the acid-producing organisms got into it.

Brett does work slowly, much more slowly than Sacc. Lacto on the other hand works very rapidly - much faster than Sacc. It only takes a few hours to make yogurt, for example, and kettle-souring a batch of wort is also a matter of hours. Even complex carbohydrates can be fermented by Lacto in pretty short order; kimchee for example is about 90% fermented out in about 10 days. Lactobacillus is omnipresent - it's probably on every speck of dust, at least around here - so anything that doesn't get sanitized will get soured by it. Lacto is oxygen-tolerant but can work anaerobically. Some strains are alcohol-tolerant, some not.

Acetobacter is also ubiquitous and as noted above, can turn every molecule of alcohol to acetic acid - but only if it has enough oxygen. Acetic is a strong acid and has a very distinctive taste. If you get vinegary beer, you have two problems with your technique: lack of sanitation AND introduced oxygen.

Pediococcus is definitely a weirdo, it can cause ropiness and solventy off-flavors, but can also create interesting tartness if you get lucky. (Pediococcus is a genus, and there are many species, with very different attributes.) I know people who use it in mixed cultures with Brett, to good effect. It shows up sometimes in my cider, to bad effect. It's very alcohol-tolerant. It requires oxygen, but not much.

As for temperature, most of the ones we are working with here are mesothermic, so they thrive at temperatures around 100F. Brett is extremely robust though, and will work slowly at temps in the 50s or even 40s. (As with Sacc, you get different flavors at different temperatures.) Lacto also continues to "work" at fridge temps, just really slowly. Freezing will NOT kill either bacteria or yeast - they will go dormant, but some of them will survive and reactivate when thawed. (In fact there are some bacteria that can work at sub-freezing temps, but that's another story...)

So, if you don't want your gruits going sour, change your process. Add all the herbs in the boil, since anything added after the wort drops below about 120F is likely to introduce the souring organisms. Be extra-careful about sanitation, taking great care to avoid letting anything contact the cooled wort (or finished beer) that has not been thoroughly sanitized. Also take great care to avoid aerating the beer at bottling.

Personally, I add hops as a gruit ingredient (as was done in some areas of medieval Europe - hops didn't replace gruit all at once). I've been told that 15 IBU is generally sufficient to suppress Lactobacillus.

 

[Miraculix]

Dmtaylor and Albionwood, thank you both very much for those detailed descriptions. I really appreciate that.

I really did not sanitise my equipment during brewing, except for rinsing and soaping stuff. For hopped beer it was always sufficient, but lacking the preservative hops it looks like it was not enough any more. I also tend to just let the Wort cool over night in the pot with the lid on top and bring it into the fermenter next day... Much time for the little bugs to get inside.

Looks like my biggest enemy are the lactos as the vinegar producing ones need oxygen.

It is good to hear that gruit can be done at home without getting sour. Next time I will sanitise my stuff properly and buy new air locks (don't trust that rubber any more).

And in parallel I might brew some lambic gruit

... Although, it might be to warm in the UK atm for a lambic.

 

[premington]

Dmtaylor and Albionwood, thank you both very much for those detailed descriptions. I really appreciate that.

I really did not sanitise my equipment during brewing, except for rinsing and soaping stuff. For hopped beer it was always sufficient, but lacking the preservative hops it looks like it was not enough any more. I also tend to just let the Wort cool over night in the pot with the lid on top and bring it into the fermenter next day... Much time for the little bugs to get inside.

Looks like my biggest enemy are the lactos as the vinegar producing ones need oxygen.

It is good to hear that gruit can be done at home without getting sour. Next time I will sanitise my stuff properly and buy new air locks (don't trust that rubber any more).

And in parallel I might brew some lambic gruit

... Although, it might be to warm in the UK atm for a lambic.

Excellent posts here... I'm learning a lot. I'm not really into sours much, so I know little about the process, which makes this part of the thread so interesting. I've tasted sour beers and, while I sorta' enjoyed the taste, I don't think it's anything I'd want more than a six pack laying around. And that six pack might last months.

Miraculix: While you may want to adopt more sanitary practices when making gruit, it sounds as though your prior batches souring has opened up a new area of fermentation possibilities for you. You could practice a more controlled fermentation by using more sanitary measures and pitch the exact bacteria you want to infect your brew. That way, you're in more control of the fermentation process rather than having unknown bacteria do the work.

Wish I could offer up something to this discussion, but it's kinda' outta my wheelhouse. So I'll read and learn through each of your posts.

 

[Miraculix]

Yes, I agree. But I somehow really like the idea of wild fermentation. I think if I would go the intentionally sour route, I would go there on the wild side.

I did think about all of the mentioned organisms a bit and tried to boil it down to a practical format for me. I think I got the essentials sorted now.

Well first of all, sanitation is more important to gruit than to hopped beers. So I will up my cleansing game.

Second, looks like the bacterias like higher temperatures in general, whereas yeast prefers lower temperatures. This means that by optimising the temperature to the yeasts favourite range, bacterias are slowed down while the yeast speeds up.

This helps with the third point, getting as much sugar converted to alcohol as quick as possible, as the lactos thrive on sugar, and they are the only ones that can work without oxygen.
Every one of those longer carbohydrates which cannot be digested by the yeast might fall victim to the lactos though... This would kill body and residual sweetness and bring lactic acid and tardness.

In other words, it is very important to keep those little guys out of the gruit (nearly impossible from my point of view), or to manage them in a way that suits the final product.

We will see how it goes!

If anyone thinks I missed something, please tell me!

 

[Miraculix]

Felt the need to clarify one thing. I think it is impossible to keep all the lactos amd vinegar bacterias out of the gruit, as we are not brewing under laboratory conditions. This means that the gruit will always have a small amount of them inside, although their amount might be fairly small.

In hopped beers this is no problem as the hop inhibits their growth.

In unhopped beers we have a ticking time bomb. When it goes off (sours the beer) depends on their number, their time they need to multiply and on the amount of food available. Bacterial growth is exponential, this is why a little amount can literally go a long way.

We want to keep this time bomb from exploding by slowing it down (lowering temp), restricting food (make the yeast eat all the sugar first) and most important, lowering the initial cell count as much as possible (sanitise the f out of everything).

However, there will be some complex sugars left which the yeast cannot digest and there will be at least a small amount of those nasty bugs inside of the gruit. Question is, can we keep the amount of them below the threshold of recognition by our taste buds before drinking the gruit?

As Albionwood stated above, it is possible, might be an interesting and demanding job though. I think it helps to know what the main factors are in this game.

 

[Miraculix]

My last two gruit batches were slightly too big for the fermenters, so I just combined the leftovers and watered them down a bit (from Og 1.063 to 1.05).

Had one of the resulting beers yesterday. It was, of course, sour, but not as sour as the originals. It was also decently carbed and had still a slight residual sweetness left. It was a nice sour gruit.

Maybe the others did not carb properly because of too much acid... Or the lactic bacterias ate all the sugar first, before the yeast could get it ... Don't know why but at the watered down version, this doesn't seem to be a problem at all.

 

[WaclawSha]

Hi! First of all, greetings from Belarus and sorry for my english.

The thread about the gruits is really great and interesting and I'd like to get help with one issue. I'm going to brew an ale with thyme and black currant leaves from my backyard. It will be not strictly a gruit because at this moment I'm plan to use a hops for bitterness (I guess that this is a compromise between the modern ale and traditional herbal aroma/flavor as first step to the gruits ).

The main issue at this moment is the quantity of thyme and currant leaves in 5 gal batch. I'd like to get noticebale aroma from them. My current plan is to add 1 oz of thyme and 2 oz of chopped currant leaves near the flameout. But I'm still worry that final aroma could be overhealming.

I'll be glad for any advices!

 

[dmtaylor]

Hi! First of all, greetings from Belarus and sorry for my english.

The thread about the gruits is really great and interesting and I'd like to get help with one issue. I'm going to brew an ale with thyme and black currant leaves from my backyard. It will be not strictly a gruit because at this moment I'm plan to use a hops for bitterness (I guess that this is a compromise between the modern ale and traditional herbal aroma/flavor as first step to the gruits ).

The main issue at this moment is the quantity of thyme and currant leaves in 5 gal batch. I'd like to get noticebale aroma from them. My current plan is to add 1 oz of thyme and 2 oz of chopped currant leaves near the flameout. But I'm still worry that final aroma could be overhealming.

I'll be glad for any advices!

Don't apologize for your English. You speak English very well!

I have used currant leaves in the past. They are very mild. I think 2 oz in 5 gallons is the right amount.

The thyme I think is very strong. I would limit that amount to just 0.25 oz.

I hope you enjoy it!