Saison fermentation question

[eastgummy]

Motueka and Nelson sauvin... super combo

 

[shacked]

Motueka and Nelson sauvin... super combo

I brewed with Hort 4337 last weekend. Seemed to be a bit like a combo of those two!

 

[eastgummy]

I brewed with Hort 4337 last weekend. Seemed to be a bit like a combo of those two!

Quote descriptions found online:
- Hort 4337: "pineapple and passionfruit as well as stone fruit (peach) and citrus (grapefruit)"
- Motueka: "Tropical fruit and citrus"
- Nelson Sauvin: "Smooth bittering, rich, fruity, gooseberry and white-wine flavors"

I can see why you say so! I'll buy a bag from the Hort 4337 next time I get hops. I'm really into NZ hops lately... they are awesome with belgian yeast

I got some Motueka and Nelson Sauvin some months ago and I've brewed with them:
- WildFlower's Table Beer clone -> made 3rd in the Brew Wilder mini competition
- Orval-inspired-thing with bastogne yeast + brett. brux. + wildflower's culture -> yeast explosion!
- Juicy-sour (NEIPA-ed kettle sour berlinerweisse) -> awesome refreshing

I still have some left I'll probably use for a ""session-Duvel"" while the Orval-inspired one matures.
-> recommended yeast: White Labs WLP570 Belgian Golden Ale yeast or Belle Saison

P.S. A friend of mine brought me a bottle of a triple hop Duvel special release from Belgium this christmas and it was ******* amazing -> 3 hops = Saaz + Styrian + Citra (dry hops)

 

[shacked]

Quote descriptions found online:
- Hort 4337: "pineapple and passionfruit as well as stone fruit (peach) and citrus (grapefruit)"
- Motueka: "Tropical fruit and citrus"
- Nelson Sauvin: "Smooth bittering, rich, fruity, gooseberry and white-wine flavors"

I can see why you say so! I'll buy a bag from the Hort 4337 next time I get hops. I'm really into NZ hops lately... they are awesome with belgian yeast

I got some Motueka and Nelson Sauvin some months ago and I've brewed with them:
- WildFlower's Table Beer clone -> made 3rd in the Brew Wilder mini competition
- Orval-inspired-thing with bastogne yeast + brett. brux. + wildflower's culture -> yeast explosion!
- Juicy-sour (NEIPA-ed kettle sour berlinerweisse) -> awesome refreshing

I still have some left I'll probably use for a ""session-Duvel"" while the Orval-inspired one matures.
-> recommended yeast: White Labs WLP570 Belgian Golden Ale yeast or Belle Saison

P.S. A friend of mine brought me a bottle of a triple hop Duvel special release from Belgium this christmas and it was ******* amazing -> 3 hops = Saaz + Styrian + Citra (dry hops)

I've found that a slightly lower intial fermentation temp with a later ramp will suppress some ester production and allow your hops to come through. Or just ferment as normal and go with dry hops

 

[eastgummy]

nice trick! thanks!
you're right, esters and fruity hops aren't a good couple
I fermented my orvalish thing at 17ºC with bastogne before adding the bugs and it's awesome. the part i like the most about belgian yeast is the spice-phenols

 

[Coalface]

bufff! that's opening the door to a new dimension! hehehe
Some yeasts produce a little tartness, but barely noticeable.

I always make kettle sours, that is:
1- Calculate your recipe for extra 15' of boil.
2- Do the mash and boil for 15' with no hops
3- chill to 35ºC
4- add ~5ml/10L of lactic acid 88% or until you get <4.5PH (wait some minutes to test the ph again and remember PH is logaritmic, be careful with your corrections) -> this prevents infections
5- add lactobacillus: i've used lallemand sour mix (mild flavor) and inner health IBS capsules (strong flavor). Pitch around 10Billion cells per 10L (1g of the sour mix or 1 capsule of the IBS thingy). Don't use dairy stuff, you might get other bacteria you don't want and you will add different flavors to your beer
6- sanitize the kettle lid, put it on, wrap it with cling wrap and keep it around 30-35ºC for 18-24h until you reach your desired PH target (3.4-3.8 depending on the style of beer). I put in my fermenter fridge with a heating mat (specific for homebrewing)
7- once souring is done, do your boil as usual

With this technique you can brew many styles: berliner weisse, gose, flanders red, "farmhouse ales / saisons", etc.
I would start with something simple if I were you. Something fast like a gose (salt and coriander) or beliner weisse, so you understand how it goes.
.

Eastgummy, When you say strong or mild flavour are you referring just to the level of the sourness or something else?

 

[eastgummy]

Eastgummy, When you say strong or mild flavour are you referring just to the level of the sourness or something else?

The level of sourness is something you can measure with pH strips or a pH meter. If you do a kettle sour, the longer you keep your kettle with the lactobacillus at 35° the more lactic acid it will generate, the lower the pH -> more sour.

I was talking about the flavour the lactobacillus releases which is something you can't measure (well, maybe in a proper laboratory).
In my simple engineer mind, yeast eats sugar, farts CO2, pisses alcohol and poops flavour (esters, phenols and other stuff); lacto eats sugar, pisses lactic acid and poops other flavours. I've only used those two: inner health IBS lactobacillus plantarum capsules and lallemand sour pitch and in my opinion I get more "lacto-flavour" with the first one.

But I might be wrong...

Lactobacillus plantarum produces a very intense and very characteristic flavour. It's good for some beers and not so much for other ones because it might be quite dominant at first. Give it two months and it will start to mellow. 4 months in and it will be subtle. That's why you want to drink your kettle soured berlinerweisse fresh and why my kettle sour Flanders red-ish was better 6 months later, well that and also Brett needs that amount of time for developing its flavour.

Lacto flavour is very easy to identify but not so much to describe. To me it's like a very intense natural honey with all the royal jelly and some lemon.

 

[Coalface]

bufff! that's opening the door to a new dimension! hehehe
Some yeasts produce a little tartness, but barely noticeable.


I always make kettle sours, that is:
1- Calculate your recipe for extra 15' of boil.
2- Do the mash and boil for 15' with no hops
3- chill to 35ºC
4- add ~5ml/10L of lactic acid 88% or until you get <4.5PH (wait some minutes to test the ph again and remember PH is logaritmic, be careful with your corrections) -> this prevents infections
5- add lactobacillus: i've used lallemand sour mix (mild flavor) and inner health IBS capsules (strong flavor). Pitch around 10Billion cells per 10L (1g of the sour mix or 1 capsule of the IBS thingy). Don't use dairy stuff, you might get other bacteria you don't want and you will add different flavors to your beer
6- sanitize the kettle lid, put it on, wrap it with cling wrap and keep it around 30-35ºC for 18-24h until you reach your desired PH target (3.4-3.8 depending on the style of beer). I put in my fermenter fridge with a heating mat (specific for homebrewing)
7- once souring is done, do your boil as usual


Recipe suggestion:
70% Pilsner
20% Wheat malt
6% Flaked wheat
4% Aromatic/munich malt

OG 1046
FG 1003
ABV 5.6%
IBU 8 (Styrian Goldings at 60')

Mash/sparge water PH 5.4, low minerals, Cl to SO4 Ratio balanced-to-malty

MASH:
- 40ºC, Mash in
- 45ºC, Time: 15 min, Beta Glucanase Low, avoid grain gumming up
- 55ºC, Time: 15 min, Beta Glucanase High, improve head
- 67ºC, Time: 60 min, Saccharification/Beta-amylase, extract main fermentable sugars
- 72ºC, Time: 20 min, Glyco-protein/Alpha-amylase, stabilize head/foam
- 78ºC, Time: 10 min, Mash out, improve extraction
- 78ºC, Sparge, improve extraction

Kettle sour as described and boil as usual

Pitch White Labs - American Farmhouse Blend WLP670 at 20ºC
Add 30g/10L of light toast oak chips (pre-boiled in express cooker for 20')
After 1 day, raise 1ºC/day to 22ºC
After 1 week, raise 1ºC/day to 24ºC
When you need the fermenter fridge for other beer, just take this one out, cover it well and put it somewhere around 20ºC
Ferment for 8 weeks
Bottle at 3.2CO2 vol.
Condition at least 2 months (better 4 months) with bottles on the side (helps to prevent pellicle)

I've tried but I haven't been able to make a decent brett in less than 4 months.
They say you can doing 100% brett. fermentation, but that's a different story...

So I had a go kettle souring based on the above recommendations, wasn't able to get flaked wheat so just increased the wheat malt.
took quite a bit of lactic acid to get to 5.4, probably twice as much as your suggestion....

then soured it for about 36 hours, my pH strips only went as low as 3.8 so don't know what the final pH was.
I fermented with the WLP590, ramping up to 26 degrees. After 4 days I added 2kg of pureed strawberries to the fermenter. It was fermented for 13 days, cold crashed and kegged......

Strawberry flavour was subtle, would probably up the amount next time, and the sour was not too overpowering, was very happy with the flavour balance.

Had a small BBQ and the keg was all but empty the next morning, and the other keg of XPA was still mostly full. All who tasted it agreed it was the best thing I've brewed yet.

About to do a mash and sour today and repeat the process with 3kg of end of season nectarines. really looking forward to it!

Thanks again East Gummy!!!!

 

[goatchop41]

The level of sourness is something you can measure with pH strips or a pH meter. If you do a kettle sour, the longer you keep your kettle with the lactobacillus at 35° the more lactic acid it will generate, the lower the pH -> more sour.

inner health IBS lactobacillus plantarum capsules

The best part about L. Plantarum is that you don't even have to keep it at 35oC - you can leave it at room temp and it will still be fine!

 

[this_heat]

Hey guys, first time posting on here. (hi!)

I've got a couple dozen BIABs under my belt, but only one was a saison. It turned out pretty well and I'm keen to keep improving so its joins my regular cycle of pale ale / stout / wheat beer.

My original saison attempt was with belle saison yeast (it was what was available from my LHS), which was fine, but I've got WLP590 because I'm keen to experiment in getting a more pronounced yeast quality.

I'm in the north Illawarra, so we're getting water from the Woronora dam, like much of southern Sydney. I've never done any water chemistry in any beers... yet. My question is: are there any good reasons to change the water profile for a saison in this neck of the woods?

Here's what I'm getting via Sydney Water:
Total Chlorine 1.3 (mg/L)
pH 7.73 - 8.17
Calcium 12.1 - 14.3 (mg/L)
Sodium 15.3 (mg/L)
Sulphate 5.7 (mg/L)
Iron < 0.005 - 0.033 (mg/L)
Magnesium 2.22 - 3.44 (mg/L)
Chloride 27.5 (mg/L)

 

[Coalface]

Hello again...
I've been making sours regularly since @eastgummy gave me those first initial pointers.
I started a kettle sour yesterday.... and cut out some steps from the process due to laziness/time constraints and part of that related to sanitation.
I woke this morning to find the kettle full of bubbles which I usually don't get from lactobacillius. And there is a strong smoky bacon odour ... I think I may have a wild yeast running amok in the kettle.

pH was still above 4, so my question is, what to do next..... let it sour with the possibility the off flavour will increase, or go to boil now and hope that whatever off flavour that has already been produced boils off during the boil?