De Bom blend - saison w/ scuppernong grapes

[carboywonder]

Hi all,

Brewed up my standard saison recipe. Pitched Ardennes and the Wyeast De Bom sour blend. De Bom is supposed to produce a sour beer in a couple months. After a month and a half I was getting some sourness, but not anywhere near where I'd like. At that time I added 9 lbs of pressed scuppernong grapes. It's been on the grapes (skins, seeds, and all) for about a month now. Tastes quite nice, very vinous. However, the acidity is still not where I'd like it to be.

Any thoughts on how to increase the sourness? Should I just let it ride and give it more time? Pitch some dregs? I am hoping to have the beer ready by January as I will be leaving the country for several months come February.

Also, any idea when I should rack off the grapes? I'm not getting any unpleasant tannins as of yet.

Thanks!

 

[lousbrews]

Hi all,

Brewed up my standard saison recipe. Pitched Ardennes and the Wyeast De Bom sour blend. De Bom is supposed to produce a sour beer in a couple months. After a month and a half I was getting some sourness, but not anywhere near where I'd like. At that time I added 9 lbs of pressed scuppernong grapes. It's been on the grapes (skins, seeds, and all) for about a month now. Tastes quite nice, very vinous. However, the acidity is still not where I'd like it to be.

Any thoughts on how to increase the sourness? Should I just let it ride and give it more time? Pitch some dregs? I am hoping to have the beer ready by January as I will be leaving the country for several months come February.

Also, any idea when I should rack off the grapes? I'm not getting any unpleasant tannins as of yet.

Thanks!

Patience = sourness. The the best advice I got.

 

[Oophaga]

Also the De Bom is supposed to produce sourness but also is supposed to be pitched on its own, the Adrennes is a serious yeast and most likely got to quite a bit of the sugars that would otherwise gone to the lacto.

 

[hirschb]

Also the De Bom is supposed to produce sourness but also is supposed to be pitched on its own, the Adrennes is a serious yeast and most likely got to quite a bit of the sugars that would otherwise gone to the lacto.

Agreed. I think this is what happened.

 

[carboywonder]

Yea, I probably should have pitched it alone. Oh well. That said I had expected the bugs to go to town on the sugars from the grapes, but the sourness did not noticeably increase. Should I add some honey or sugar when I rack off the grapes and maybe pitch some dregs or just let it ride?

 

[vagabondat02]

I'd pitch some dregs and dig in for the long haul. Alcohol production has certainly killed off your Lacto at this point.

 

[carboywonder]

So my patience has run out. Normally I would be fine waiting, but I would really like to serve this at a party in a few weeks. The beer tastes great with amazing flavor from the grapes, but the sourness is not quite there. It's slightly tart, pH reads about 4.1.

I am planning to add some lactic acid at kegging, but I'm not sure how much. From what I have read I'm debating somewhere between 5 to 10 mL / gal. Would this be enough to get me into the 3.5 to 3.7 range? I'm not looking for something to scrape the enamel off my teeth.

 

[joshareed]

I'd start at 5mL/gal and taste. I'd also give the keg a good shake and a day or so to homogenize. I had good luck with this in a gose that had some existing tartness but not where I wanted it. You can always add more but you can't take it out.

 

[carboywonder]

Update, added 5 mL/gal lactic acid at kegging. Beer has been well received and does not taste artificially soured at all. The scuppernongs give it an amazing aroma.