My thinking for the barrel is that it'd be beneficial to keep the pH fairly high so Brett will produce more flavor, no? Acidity suppresses flavor production.Design the beer to be more of a quick turnaround sour when it goes into the barrel, then start adjusting subsequent beers and adding more hops, going more Brett forward as you take your first few pulls.
I'm definitely concerned about over oaking! This barrel was a gift, otherwise I would have selected a used barrel.Things can absorb too much oak flavor and it’s not pleasant.
I’d say your best bet is to get a solid hard bung and boil some water and roll it around in the barrel a few times to extract some of that harsh “lumber yard” flavor. Do that a few times just before filling. That will also ensure the barrel is swelled and the staves are tight. I would avoid sulfite solution at all costs. It’s hard to get that sulfur/fart smell out of the barrel once it’s in there.
Thanks guys, good ideas.Your idea about blending is fine but the barrel is going to be an issue. It will take you many beers to extract out enough oak to let beer hang out in it and not get over-oaked. Even fills of water will take a while because water does not extract from oak at the same intensity as alcohol.
Ideally if you could find a distillery near you that would be willing to run a couple passes of spirit through it you could get good extraction and then run a couple clean beers through it to get the barrel closer to a light oak character.
had some extra wort from a couple brews over the past year that had dregs added - used these for blending into a fresh Saison.
halo, super curious about these results, as i too have 4 separate quart jars of fresh wort and various old dregs from sours, etc, saved in the fridge. is there anything i shouldn't do? thinking just blend, swirl and plug with airlock? 32oz jugs with fresh wort and various dreg yeast combos. maybe sprinkle some dry yeast into a couple too.
I would then move the leftover “acid beer” to a smaller vessel to store it (this is where spare kegs or progressively smaller carboys come in handy). . . I make an extra gallon or two per batch to keep around for easy blending.
Thanks! Sounds interesting. I'd like to try some "spontaneous" beers after I get some blending stock going.My program probably isn't the best or most sophisticated.... but here goes:
I have 5 fermenters that I cycle sours through. I have a couple basic base recipes... one dark, one golden. Both really only get aged hops unless a fermenter is getting out of hand with acidity. One was formerly a spontaneous ferment that actually worked... call this the wild, two that are a mix of commercial and bottle cultures that have been going for 4-5+ years now, one that is a mist of the commercial and wild yeast (it wasn't getting sour enough and needed a kick... the wild can get aggressively sour) and one was a MTF Bootleg Biology release. All have about a half ounce of oak cubes that have been reused more than a few times (this was an addition into my 2nd year of this and made a large difference). I typically will brew and pitch directly onto the yeast cake (if it doesn't kick off in 3ish days, I will pitch some sacc... mostly non-killer wine yeast). I'll pull a beer out and that day typically have fresh wort available to put on the cake. When there is too much sediment I will pull off the cake into a half gallon mason jar... casually wash, make a starter, and a week or so later pitch that into the cleaned fermenter it came from.
I typically ferment in those for 6-9 months.The two pure commercial and bottle culture fermenters can reliably produce great sours after 6 months. More than a few times, I haven't needed to blend to get great results. The wild fermenters create the most complex and flavorful beers, but have some rough edges and are a bit unpredictable. The MTF isn't real sour, but has a nice funk. When I feel a sample is in a good spot, I transfer to a keg. I have 6 kegs dedicated to blending stock. For the most part, they are solo fermentations, but a few times they've just been topped up. I try to keep those from the same fermenter. I keep them at room temp and 3-4ish psi. Just enough to keep the keg happy.
From there I will take notes on each as they get kegged, and tape them to the kegs. I tend to need a blend every ~2-3 months, so I will re-taste and take new notes to see how they are progressing. My blending process is pretty simple, review my notes, pull off samples and mix until I'm happy. Some beers will get 2 blended... some get up to 5-6. Depending on what I am doing with the blend, I will look for different tendencies. More acidic fruits, get less acidic blends. The best blends tend to just be kegged for serving, get some dry hops, or a smaller amount of fruit. The more meh sorts of blends might get more fruit, more assertive fruit, or blended with wine (I find getting good grapes is difficult in my area)/fruit to get them to the right point.
If I'm fruiting the sour, I will transfer to a fermenter with the fruit. I have markings on that fermenter to closely enough estimate the volumes I need. If I'm dry hopping, I transfer to a keg and dry hop in there. If there is nothing to add, I just transfer to a new keg. I like to pull off 2-3 bottles worth to age long-term, so from here I will pull those off and carbonate with carbonation tabs. The rest gets put onto one of my sour taps.
I think I had 3 or 4 attempts before I got one that actually worked without getting mold or tasting terrible. I brew inside, so I'm sure it picked up some of the yeast floating around my brewery area, but it definitely picked up some wild stuff. It isn't outstanding on it's own, but makes for a great part of a blend.Thanks! Sounds interesting. I'd like to try some "spontaneous" beers after I get some blending stock going.
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