Late Addition Brett: For Homebrew and Commercial Beers

[guy_cliff]

I'm interested to know if people have experience of opening bottled and fully carbonated beers to add Brett to them at a later date?

The inspiration came after a recent batch of Tripel turned out pretty poor; however, at the time of bottling I put aside 6 bottles to which I added dregs from a bottle of Boon Marriage Parfait. The bottles with the brett turned out really well, and I was subsequently wondering if I could salvage the poor bottled beer by giving them a late addition of Brett.

That then got me thinking that I could in fact try experimenting by adding Brett to other commercial beers to see how they behave. Since the tripel I made was attempting to be akin to Westmalle, my first thought is to pitch some Brett into Westmalle bottles and see what goes on. Others I'm also thinking of trying: Duvel, Straffe Hendrick (I'm a big fan of their Wild versions, which I'd be curious to try to reproduce) and La Trappe Quadrupel.

In the case of the Westmalle I'm not overly concerned about bottle bombs, as those bottles are pretty thick already and the carbonation already in the bottles will mostly work out when I open them up. My homebrew has been bottled in Westmalle bottles, so the same goes.

I'd be interested to hear thoughts, or success / failure stories!

 

[Miraculix]

Nothing to contribute, but seriously interested as well.

 

[deadwolfbones]

Also interested!

 

[guy_cliff]

Okay, so I hope to be trying this out on the weekend.

Plan will be to simply disturb a bottle of Geueze ahead of time, and then use a one-time use plastic pipette to transfer a few ml of the geueze to each bottle of beer. I'll try it out on my beer and also the Westmalle for now.

I'm going to use Boon Marriage Parfait; previously when I blended the sour with my tripel I had astoundingly different results between those bottles that I used Marriage Parfait, vs those that had Timmermans Lambic. The bottles that received Timmermans all went incredibly sour; still pleasant if you like super sour beers, but not much depth. The Marriage Parfait bottles were much more balanced, and akin to a geueze aged for a year or so: sour but not astringent, and still allowed the base beer depth of malt to show through.

This experiment will take a good few months, but hopefully in the meantime some others may chip in with their experience of doing similar.

 

[Kee]

I like the experiment. In theory it's not that different from adding Orval dregs to the bottling bucket, something I used to do quite a lot (idea from BLAM). (Which reminds me to buy some Orval on my next trip, I can't get it here).

Let us know how it turns out.

 

[Tetrarch]

I like the sound of this experiment, I think I will join in. What commercial beers are you using and why not try a few other gueuze/lambic sours?
Any idea on how to estimate the finishing carbonation level?

 

[guy_cliff]

Kee, yes very similar to adding bottle dregs to the bottling bucket. My approach of using a pipette is largely driven by the fact that I don't currently have enough kit / space to designate a bottling bucket, wand etc. to sour beer, so therefore using plastic disposable pippettes allows me to keep all my kit sterile from Brett.

Tetrarch, definitely could try with different Geueze. As I put above, I tried Timmerman's and Marriage Parfait previously and the MP turned out significantly better... I also picked up a case of it on a recent visit to Belgium so obtained a good volume at a fair price. I was hoping to pick up a box of Oude Beersel lambic whilst there as well but didn't have any luck.

At present don't have access to any reasonably priced 3F otherwise would give that a go too.

In regards to volumes CO2, I'd be interested to canvas some thoughts on this. Based on some reading, all of which points towards this detailed analysis, it seems like a rule of thumb is that 0.5volumes CO2 equates to 1 fermentable gravity point. We must account for the fact that at room tempterature a pre-carbonated beer will still have around 0.8 volumes of CO2 in solution, so a rough volume of CO2 at the end of fermentation with Brett would be given as

0.8 + ( 0.5 x 1000 x (FG - FG_Brett) )

where FG is the original FG of the beer, and FG_Brett is going to be the (unkown) final gravity after adding Brett and re-bottling.

In Brew Like a Monk, Hieronymous quotes Westmalle tripel as having an OG of 1.081 and an apparent attenuation of 88% from which I calculate an estimated FG of 1.010. I can only speculate as to how low brett could take Westmalle, or my own beer. But I will consider three options: FG_Brett = 1.005, 1.000 and 0.995.

Using the formula above this would lead to carbonation levels of 3.3, 5.8, and 8.3 volumes of CO2 respectively.

I appreciate that this puts the highest pressure scenario right at the limit of what one would normally look to carbonate even a belgian bottle up to. So I'd be interested to know of any thoughts on how safe this is likely to be in the thick Westmalle bottles. From prior experience, I didn't have any issues with using 375ml Geueze bottles on my own tripel with a similar FG, but this time I'd be looking to add straight to the bottles the commercial beer is already in.

 

[Kee]

In regards to volumes CO2, I'd be interested to canvas some thoughts on this. Based on some reading, all of which points towards this detailed analysis, it seems like a rule of thumb is that 0.5volumes CO2 equates to 1 fermentable gravity point.

In Brew Like a Monk, Hieronymous quotes Westmalle tripel as having an OG of 1.081 and an apparent attentuation of 88% from which I calculate an estimated FG of 1.010. So if we were to say that Brett can take this down to a final gravity FG_Brett = 1.000 then we would be looking at approximately 6 volumes of CO2.

I appreciate that this puts us right at the limit of what one would normally look to carbonate even a belgian bottle up to. So I'd be interested to know of any thoughts on how safe this is likely to be in the thick Westmalle bottles. From prior experience, I didn't have any issues with using 375ml Geueze bottles on my own tripel with a similar FG, but this time I'd be looking to add straight to the bottles the commercial beer is already in.

I have not idea if it's possible to calculate how much lower brett will take down the gravity. But I can say that the brett from Orval dregs (mileage may vary with other bugs) will give you a distinct brett flavor before over-carbonation becomes a problem. My modus operandi has always been to sample a bottle (or several) every few weeks, with the expectation that I could always refrigerate the rest if there were a problem.

That's not the most elegant solution, but it works for me.

 

[RPh_Guy]

A warning:
Bottles made for high pressure are necessary for anyone adding Brett at bottling. Attenuation is unpredictable.

Relevant info:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/bottle-conditioning-with-brett.508386/
Here it mentions that Orval uses WLP650 at bottling (not sure if that's true). However they presumably use a highly attenuative Sacc strain for primary, and obviously have commercial-level process standardization.

My opinion:
I honestly can't think of a reason why I would add Brett to any commercial bottle of beer. I'd rather brew it myself and also eliminate any risk of bombs/gushing by giving Brett time to reach terminal gravity before bottling.

 

[Tetrarch]

On the other hand ... :
https://homebrew.stackexchange.com/...ny-volumes-co2-will-push-out-a-champagne-cork
&
http://www.chemistryviews.org/details/ezine/889289/Sparkling_Wine_Champagne__Co__Part_2.html
Once you open a commericial bottle in order to add your brett dregs do you not lose a significant amount of CO2? Maybe let it stand and wafm up?
To be on the safe side, I will use 500ml Copper PET bottles and Belgian style 500ml champagne bottles.

 

[jfolks]

The sour hour recently talked about a similar experiment - someone tried to sour some bud light or something - they said it was gross.

But given the quality base beer, this might work. Fun experiment I guess