"Sour" beers not sour enough...

[StopTakingMyUsername]

So I've brewed about 6 sour beers to date.
I've done some mixed fermentations, and some kettle souring.

The problem I'm encountering is that the sourness is very faint to non-existent.
I know not to use hops, and I've been lowering the mash ph to 4.5 before kettle souring with lactobacillus.

The beers definitely have a quick hit of "tart" to them. When the beer hits your tongue it is sour... but it disappears immediately.
It's nothing like the sourness experienced by Cascade, De Garde, or Upland beers (or really, most commercial sours).

Why is my sourness so weak?

PH has been steady in the 3.2 - 3.4 range.
Finishing gravities have usually been between 1.007 and 1.010, although I've taken samples of De Garde beers and Sante Adairius beers, and both clocked in around 1.012+ but were VERY sour.

What's going on here?

I understand there's a difference between TA and PH, but if TA is what makes the beers more "sour", how do I attain more of that?
Everything else seems to be where it needs to be.
Unless my water is buffering the good acid out? But I'd think that'd stop the PH as well..


I'm confused.
help?

 

[StopTakingMyUsername]

Also, I dont have much experience with pedio, unless it's in a mixed culture that I threw in.

I've read that both lacto and pedio contribute lactic acid, but pedio contributes more complex, and 'stronger' lactic acid? Maybe that's the piece I'm missing?

 

[DisturbdChemist]

There might be multiple ways that you could have your beer be more tart. How long are you letting the sour mash sit? or the lacto/pedio sit? What is the usual grain bill? Do you leave long chain sugars for the lacto and if brett to chew on?

 

[wardens355]

What is TA?

 

[m00ps]

Ive got the same number as you under my belt. My first 3 turned out much more sour than I wanted them to and much quicker than I intended. I used a large variety of different microbes from many different commercial bottles from various breweries. I think the large variety of microbes is what helped them sour so quickly. None of them went too far past 2 months in the secondary. Luckily, ive developed more of a taste for sours now and i really enjoy these first ones.

I am currently using starters made from dregs of the most successful of my first round of sours to try to get things moving faster (without using new methods like sour worting). Before, I just added dregs directly to the secondary. This time, I let a 1.5L sour starter go for 2 weeks and tossed that in. The wort of the starter was noticeably sour.
Here's my method and thoughts. May be useful, may not. I will say that I have one sitting right now that is a month out from pitching ym sour starter and its at 0.994 and Im considering calling it done
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=543576

 

[Agate]

What's your water profile?

 

[microbusbrewery]

What is TA?

I think it's Titratable Acidity.

 

[StopTakingMyUsername]

There might be multiple ways that you could have your beer be more tart. How long are you letting the sour mash sit? or the lacto/pedio sit? What is the usual grain bill? Do you leave long chain sugars for the lacto and if brett to chew on?

I have kettle soured with omega lacto for 2-3 days until the ph hits <3.4.
In older batches, I realize that I added too many IBU and that prohibited the lacto from doing anything... but the recent batches (all have been berliners) aren't nearly as tart as I'd like either.
I had one saison that finished at 1.007, and people told me it's "sour", but I guess I'm not really feeling like it is very much - could just be my palate.
Also having some issues hitting high enough carbonation (since we keg carbed the last few), so I'm assuming that plays a big role...

Usual grain bills are just pils/wheat + little stuff like acidulated, aromatic, or spelt. For berliners I mash LOW like 145-146 F. So no, there are no real long chain sugars there. I haven't used brett in any berliners except this most recent batch that's fermenting (which is currently down to 1.006 and tasting pretty nice)

What is TA?

Titratable acidity (or Total Acidity, depending on the conversation)

Ive got the same number as you under my belt. My first 3 turned out much more sour than I wanted them to and much quicker than I intended. I used a large variety of different microbes from many different commercial bottles from various breweries. I think the large variety of microbes is what helped them sour so quickly. None of them went too far past 2 months in the secondary. Luckily, ive developed more of a taste for sours now and i really enjoy these first ones.

I am currently using starters made from dregs of the most successful of my first round of sours to try to get things moving faster (without using new methods like sour worting). Before, I just added dregs directly to the secondary. This time, I let a 1.5L sour starter go for 2 weeks and tossed that in. The wort of the starter was noticeably sour.
Here's my method and thoughts. May be useful, may not. I will say that I have one sitting right now that is a month out from pitching ym sour starter and its at 0.994 and Im considering calling it done
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=543576

I have an incubator (igloo cooler with heater and pid) and tons of mason jars and old vials filled with grown up dregs cultures.
Definitely doing this as well!
How did you get a beer down to 0.994?? That's impressive. Lowest beer I've ever made was 1.006.

What's your water profile?

I can't post a water report, but here's what I have for our water (it changes, so I don't keep up with it every single time because I have no way to know)
Alk (CaCO3) 43.2
Ca 13.7
Mg 2.88
Na 1.39
Cl 1.42
SO4 3.42
pH 7.79
Hardness 46.4

I haven't really messed with water chem on sours yet, but I have done it for IPAs.
Can you give me any suggestions on profiles for sour beer?

 

[Agate]

Ok, here's my thought. You have really soft water, which means it takes less lactic acid to drop your pH. Like if using Bru'n water, with too much bicarbonate, if you have too hard of water you might take your acid adjustment over the flavor threshold and you'll taste the contribution of the acid.

So with soft water, only a relatively small volume of acid is needed to drop pH to 3.5 or so. If you had, say, 200 ppm bicarbonate, it would take a lot more volume to get to the same pH. So you get to 3.5, and it doesn't taste all that doe because there isn't all that much lactic acid in your beer.

Also, I understand that lacto doesn't reproduce well below pH 3.8, so a small volume of acid with soft water might hit that limit.

My bicarbonate level is 215 ppm, and at pH 3.5, my beer is friggin' SOUR! Just a dumb idea, could you buffer your water with calcium carbonate to force a higher volume of lactic acid to hit your desired pH? And FYI, I'm one of those guys on that other forum that has their beer get too sour! First world problem. [emoji13]

I hope this helps! Someone will tell me if I'm way off base.

 

[m00ps]

As for the absurd attenuation of my sour culture, I can only point to the variety of sourcing microbes. I have one's going on about 60 days at 0.992 and the other at about 30 days at 0.994. The first one is entirely sour and a fermentor sample convinced a local brewery to make a full size batch with me using my culture.

So yeah, I'd just reccomend adding as many sour dregs as you can or culturing it up

 

[StopTakingMyUsername]

Ok, here's my thought. You have really soft water, which means it takes less lactic acid to drop your pH. Like if using Bru'n water, with too much bicarbonate, if you have too hard of water you might take your acid adjustment over the flavor threshold and you'll taste the contribution of the acid.

So with soft water, only a relatively small volume of acid is needed to drop pH to 3.5 or so. If you had, say, 200 ppm bicarbonate, it would take a lot more volume to get to the same pH. So you get to 3.5, and it doesn't taste all that doe because there isn't all that much lactic acid in your beer.

Also, I understand that lacto doesn't reproduce well below pH 3.8, so a small volume of acid with soft water might hit that limit.

My bicarbonate level is 215 ppm, and at pH 3.5, my beer is friggin' SOUR! Just a dumb idea, could you buffer your water with calcium carbonate to force a higher volume of lactic acid to hit your desired pH? And FYI, I'm one of those guys on that other forum that has their beer get too sour! First world problem. [emoji13]

I hope this helps! Someone will tell me if I'm way off base.

Interesting theory.
I've been lowering the ph to 4.5 prior to pitching lacto, as I've read that this inhibits some sort of proteolytic enzymes that degrade head retention (not 100% sure on this, just recommended by several sour Brewers). If anything, it's less work for the lacto to get to low 3s from 4.5 than 5.x

I think you might be on to something with the buffering idea - but if that is the case, then I'm just having to add more lactic acid to get it down to 4.5 right?

 

[Agate]

Yes, it should take more lactic acid if you have more buffering. It would be easy enough to test, though. Figure out how much acid it would take, using Bru'n water, to drop one of your not-sour-enough beers to pH 3.5 or so, then adjust your water profile to have more bicarbonate, and figure out how much more acid it would take to bring that one down to 3.5. Figure out an appropriate dosage and try it in a glass to see if the sourness is where you want it to be.

The pre-souring thing works, too, but only if you kill the lacto within 18-24 hours, as it just slows down their proteolytic activity. They'll eventually break down those proteins even at low pH.

 

[wardens355]

I hope this helps! Someone will tell me if I'm way off base.

I think carbonate/bicarbonate does not have much buffering capacity at pH 4.5 or less, but am not sure. I think the prevalent species at that point is carbon dioxide. Not sure about other buffers, but the only other I can think of is phosphate, and being that drinking water does not contain phosphate, that shouldn't be an issue in this case.

 

[Agate]

That could very well be - I'll be the first to admit I'm not a water expert. Just throwing a theory out there, and I welcome any feedback to prove otherwise!

 

[Agate]

Well I just did a rough estimate as above with Bru'n water, and with my water, it would take 30.2 ml to drop pH to 3.4, and 25.9 ml to do the same with distilled water. Don't think the extra 5 ml is going to make a significant difference for flavor, so I don't think my theory holds much water. Unless I messed up the calculation, that's very possible!

 

[StopTakingMyUsername]

well, the other thing that's kind of puzzling to me is that breweries such as De Garde and Sante Adairius are making beers that are VERY sour, but have FGs of 1.012 or more.

I'd assume that dryness+carbonation would have a lot to do with the perceived acidity, but those higher FG's are kind of throwing that theory for a loop

My only other theory is that lactobacillus and its byproducts produce a more gentle, one-dimensional sour, and the only way to get that face-puckering, bracing acidic sourness is via a combination of lacto and pediococcus (and its byproducts).

 

[Agate]

Could be some acetic acid in there, too. Brevis will throw a little acetic into the mix, which can make it taste more harsh.

I wonder how increasing amounts of lactic acid will effect SG. I could see it increasing it slightly, so maybe the beer is drier than SG would indicate? Does anyone know?

 

[jrfehon]

Getting back to basics, what's your mash temperature?

 

[StopTakingMyUsername]

Getting back to basics, what's your mash temperature?

well,the only sour beers I've attempted are Berliner Weisse and just a sour golden (similar to Rare Barrel recipe on the Sour Hour podcast)

For berliners I mash very low 146-148 F
For the sours, I have brett in the cultures so I mash 154+

 

[StopTakingMyUsername]

so 3rd attempt at a berliner is a dud. Not tart at all.

brewed 09/20
6# pils, 3# wheat, 5 oz acidulated. Mash 146.6 F for 90 min.
Added 11 ml lactic acid to get PH to 4.5, then pitched Omega Lacto (brevis and plantarum blend) at 94 F, after aerating wort with CO2. After 2 days, ph was 3.3
Boiled 30 min with a pinch of hallertau (0.2 oz maybe?) and then reused US05 cake from last batch+ a starter of Wallonian farmhouse w/ some dregs mixed in.
OG 1.038, 1.029 after the 2 days w lacto. FG 1.006

Tastes better than last batch due to the dregs + hops, but still ZERO sourness at all.

What is going on?!

 

[Calder]

so 3rd attempt at a berliner is a dud. Not tart at all.

brewed 09/20
6# pils, 3# wheat, 5 oz acidulated. Mash 146.6 F for 90 min.
Added 11 ml lactic acid to get PH to 4.5, then pitched Omega Lacto (brevis and plantarum blend) at 94 F, after aerating wort with CO2. After 2 days, ph was 3.3
Boiled 30 min with a pinch of hallertau (0.2 oz maybe?) and then reused US05 cake from last batch+ a starter of Wallonian farmhouse w/ some dregs mixed in.
OG 1.038, 1.029 after the 2 days w lacto. FG 1.006

Tastes better than last batch due to the dregs + hops, but still ZERO sourness at all.

What is going on?!

I'm no expert, but a ph of 3.3 and zero sourness does not compute.

Did you taste it before you boiled it? Is your ph meter reading correctly, if it were a few points off, it may not taste very sour.

Two days at 94 F doesn't seem very long. I generally go 5 to 7 days somewhere around 95 - 100 F. I don't add the yeast until it tastes sour enough. I don't have a ph meter.

 

[Agate]

What's your pH now?

 

[DisturbdChemist]

so 3rd attempt at a berliner is a dud. Not tart at all.

brewed 09/20
6# pils, 3# wheat, 5 oz acidulated. Mash 146.6 F for 90 min.
Added 11 ml lactic acid to get PH to 4.5, then pitched Omega Lacto (brevis and plantarum blend) at 94 F, after aerating wort with CO2. After 2 days, ph was 3.3
Boiled 30 min with a pinch of hallertau (0.2 oz maybe?) and then reused US05 cake from last batch+ a starter of Wallonian farmhouse w/ some dregs mixed in.
OG 1.038, 1.029 after the 2 days w lacto. FG 1.006

Tastes better than last batch due to the dregs + hops, but still ZERO sourness at all.

What is going on?!

That is extremely odd. If the pH is 3.3 that very sour. Anything below 4 is considered Sour. My sours have 20-30ibu and soured just fine. You aerate with O2 not co2.

 

[StopTakingMyUsername]

I'm no expert, but a ph of 3.3 and zero sourness does not compute.

Did you taste it before you boiled it? Is your ph meter reading correctly, if it were a few points off, it may not taste very sour.

Two days at 94 F doesn't seem very long. I generally go 5 to 7 days somewhere around 95 - 100 F. I don't add the yeast until it tastes sour enough. I don't have a ph meter.

I did. I took a sample before boiling and before fermentation. Both had a nice, bright, lemoney acidity to them.
After fermentation, it seems that that is gone.

Also, Omega Labs lacto works fast. It's a blend of brevis/plantarum...
http://www.omegayeast.com/?portfolio=lactobacillus-blend

What's your pH now?

no idea. ill check it tonight

That is extremely odd. If the pH is 3.3 that very sour. Anything below 4 is considered Sour. My sours have 20-30ibu and soured just fine. You aerate with O2 not co2.

Yeah, that's what I've been hearing. but I'm not exaggerating... it's not sour at all.
Also, before pitching lacto for sour worting you're supposed to aerate with CO2 to flush out any O2 that could cause off flavors... before yeast would be O2.

http://sourbeerblog.com/fast-souring-lactobacillus/
http://www.milkthefunk.com/wiki/Sour_Worting

 

[StopTakingMyUsername]

In case anyone is following (or finds this on Google), I've narrowed it down

I took another PH reading post-fermentation before kegging/carbing. The ph now reads 3.5 (explains why it's not sour).
I don't know how it went up from 3.3 pre-boil to 3.5 post-fermentation, but I have a few ideas:

1) my ph meter is either hyper sensitive to temp, or off in some way (which is weird, because the water readings and mash calcs have been spot on). I'm more likely to believe this, and will be getting calibration solution to remedy it.

2) fermentation somehow raised the PH by 0.2. I don't know how this would happen at all. Either way, I'll compensate for about 0.2 difference going forward, and let the lacto run until the PH is as close to 3.0 as possible.


Another test I ran:
I was cautious that maybe my own palate was just not very sensitive to sour. I took 12 oz of the berliner (3.5 ph) and began dosing with very small increments of lactic acid.

At 3.3 there was tartness present that would do nicely with some heavy carbonation

At 3.0-3.2 I was very happy with a nice, present, puckering acidity. Would be perfect once carbed

At 2.9 it was face-puckering sour to the point where I could taste it sticking in my teeth and gums. Not for everyone, but I still liked it. I wouldn't go beyond this point. 2.9 PH occurred with 2 ml lactic acid in 12 oz of berliner (starting at 3.5).

 

[feinbera]

I wonder how increasing amounts of lactic acid will effect SG. I could see it increasing it slightly, so maybe the beer is drier than SG would indicate? Does anyone know?

I just happen to know this, from reading up on how to estimate ABV for sours. Lactic acid in solution has about the same density as sugar, which means two things.

One: you can just ignore it for the purpose of ABV calculations, since any points of sugar converted to lactic acid won't show up as a drop in gravity (thus, any gravity drop that is observed is all down to conversion to alcohol, so the usual formulas still work).

Two: maybe those Sante Adarius beers show such high gravity (for sours) due to a metric buttload of lactic acid.

Source: http://www.themadfermentationist.com/2013/11/calculating-abv-for-sour-beers.html

 

[millsbrew]

Find anything else out? I'm curious about water profile. I need to start with RO water because we have a water softener. Thinking my second batch will have more hardness in the water.

 

[Calder]

Find anything else out? I'm curious about water profile. I need to start with RO water because we have a water softener. Thinking my second batch will have more hardness in the water.

Are you even paying to soften water you use to water the yard and wash the car?

 

[millsbrew]

Are you even paying to soften water you use to water the yard and wash the car?

No. But my towns water was so hard it was causing issues with mineral deposits in the pipes. So everything inside goes through the softener. Bottom line, I need to build from RO because it's either chlorine/salt or calcium/sulfate that are through the roof.

I'm building up a pipe line of sours and want a strong sour for blending. I have a 100% Brett I like, and need opposite end of the spectrum to mix with.

Thanks

 

[Agate]

So I had the opportunity to try a kettle sour last night that was made with very soft water. Despite the fact that it finished at pH 3.0, I found it only mildly tart. Nice beer, but not what I would have expected with pH that low.

My well water is pretty hard, with bicarbonate at 200+ ppm. I have a pedio-soured beer that is also at pH 3.0, and it is POWERFULLY sour... Degrease engine sour. Dissolve metal sour.

So back to OP's original issue, I really think it is a titratable acidity issue versus pH. This was an eye opener for me, in how much difference starting with soft versus hard water makes in perceived sourness at the same pH. I mean, it's huge.

 

[StopTakingMyUsername]

So I had the opportunity to try a kettle sour last night that was made with very soft water. Despite the fact that it finished at pH 3.0, I found it only mildly tart. Nice beer, but not what I would have expected with pH that low.

My well water is pretty hard, with bicarbonate at 200+ ppm. I have a pedio-soured beer that is also at pH 3.0, and it is POWERFULLY sour... Degrease engine sour. Dissolve metal sour.

So back to OP's original issue, I really think it is a titratable acidity issue versus pH. This was an eye opener for me, in how much difference starting with soft versus hard water makes in perceived sourness at the same pH. I mean, it's huge.

Interesting. You said the kettle sour beer was not sour at 3.0 (lacto, I'm presuming), but that the pedio soured beer (at 3.0) is intensely sour.
If you used to same water/treatments for both, then that would sound like the issue is the LAB and the sourness it creates.

Another thing that I've found is that commercial lacto/pedio aren't really blowing me away.
I'm leaning more towards open fermentation and lacto combinations with the main source being grains thrown in a DME starter. Goodbelly seems to work pretty decent as well.

I've only done 2 beers with pedio so far (commercial WL culture). They are both ~5 mos old and not sour at all. Barely tart.
Meanwhile, my open fermentation beer is 6 mos in and face melting sour.

 

[millsbrew]

So I had the opportunity to try a kettle sour last night that was made with very soft water. Despite the fact that it finished at pH 3.0, I found it only mildly tart. Nice beer, but not what I would have expected with pH that low.

My well water is pretty hard, with bicarbonate at 200+ ppm. I have a pedio-soured beer that is also at pH 3.0, and it is POWERFULLY sour... Degrease engine sour. Dissolve metal sour.

So back to OP's original issue, I really think it is a titratable acidity issue versus pH. This was an eye opener for me, in how much difference starting with soft versus hard water makes in perceived sourness at the same pH. I mean, it's huge.

So do you think building from RO will always result in a weak sour level? Too bad they can't do a brulosophy on it.

Also, seems that bottle dregs would help build on sourness compared to just commercial offerings. Why wouldn't people add those to their secondary?

 

[troglodytes]

This is super interesting to me. I'm about to do a kettle soured gose and was going to start with RO water. My water is great for making ambers and dark beers, but for light colored beers I build from RO.

I'm thinking I won't do that this time and just use pH test strips with tap water and campden tablets as I'd like the sourness to be pretty solid.

 

[Agate]

Well based on my one data point (and we all know how well that works) I would say it's a definite maybe. It certainly takes more lactic acid to overcome higher levels of bicarbonate, and I believe that flavor threshold is based on ppm of the lactic acid ion. So more bicarbonate means more lactic acid to get to a terminal pH, which kind of implies a stronger acidic character.

Now I'm thinking of doing a duplicate batch, one with hard tap water and one with distilled. Could he as simple as one of the pH meters having a bad cal. At least it would minimize the variables.

 

[willnewton]

There is no mention of calibration of your pH meter. Is your pH meter calibrated? Is it calibrated before each use? How old is your meter probe? How do you store it?

I agree with several of the posters here. Your "sourness" perception and pH readings do not match with what I generally see reported or have observed myself.

My sourness perception to pH reading - 3.3 or lower is intensely sour, 3.4-3.7 is sour, 3.8 or higher is more tart than sour.

I think your meter is out of whack.

 

[bruhaha]

I am preparing to try my first lacto soured Gose styled beer. After reading all of these comments, I am afraid that I'll fail to produce a decent sour.

 

[Agate]

I am preparing to try my first lacto soured Gose styled beer. After reading all of these comments, I am afraid that I'll fail to produce a decent sour.

Don't let the comments here concern you - they're really quite simple once you go through it a couple times! What are you using for your lacto culture?

 

[Ztp]

I have about 50 gallons of different sour beers under my belt, and the best advice I can offer is to mash high (158-159 depending on recipe) harvest dregs from your favorite wild/sour offering, build it up, and continually pitch on top of the old yeast cake. That same community of microbes will continually (thus far) produce a sourer beer, quicker, and with more complex flavors each time you toss new wort on it. I tried using commercially available lactos and am finally getting some decent tartness a year after it was brewed. You have to be picky on which commercial brew you use though as some breweries condition with wine or champagne yeast. I chose De Garde and Jester King bottle dregs. I cannot speak for kettle souring, but I know commercial offerings tend to be one dimensional. My beers are well soured within two months at room temp, and only get better after some fruit additions.

 

[gometz]

I agree with Ztp above. My sour mix started off as de bom blend from Wyeast and I've added at least 8 different dregs over the past two years. The beers can be bracingly sour if I don't use oxygen, hops, or low temperatures to temper it. After a few months the beers are plenty sour, but I'll age them a bit longer for complexity.

My Flanders Red has gotten 2nd place and an honorable mention, and my eye tamarind sour just won 1st place. I plan on entering a gose and a Berliner into competition soon as well.

 

[StopTakingMyUsername]

Well, I've had success souring with open-fermentation. In fact, one of our experiments became TOO sour, like throat-burning and acetic sour.
Tried a beer with a commercial pedio pitch, but it's only about 5 months in, and not getting any sourness at all (Guessing pedio just takes a while).

Brewed another berliner and ran into the same problem.
Lacto source was Goodbelly probiotic and a 1L starter from grain (Held at 95-100 F for a couple days)

It's definitely not the PH Meter. I upgraded to the Milwaukee MW-102, calibrate it often, and it's been spot on for all of our beers prior to this one.
PH 3.3
Lightly tart when we took our first sample. My palate is dulled to sourness, so I understand that what is "sour" to me may be "intensely sour" to others.
The first sample was good. Enough tartness for me to consider it "sour", but just a quick punch of it up front, then it dissipated into other flavors.

Decided to rack it onto some raspberries yesterday, and in the process, I took another sample for gravity. FG consistent at 1.007, so I'm ok with that.

Tasted it: NOT tart in the slightest.
It was like, the same level of 'tartness' you'd get from yogurt or sour cream.
NOT "sour beer"ish in any way.


So now I'm really confused.
The PH readings are accurate. That I can guarantee.

The only things I can think of that somehow might dissipate the sourness is either O2 introduction (bit of a stretch) or maybe the dregs mix I pitched in is evolving into flavors that overshadow such a light, faint sourness from lacto-only?

I'm about to just forget about lacto. We've done about six of these lacto-only soured beers now and none of them have came out sour (or well, STAYED sour).
Such a waste.