re: Homebrewing Thread: Volume II

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Does anyone have any experience using cucumber with their brew? I want to make a cucumber mint kettle sour. I figured I would just cube up about 1 pound/gallon and let it sit in the fermenter. I'm just worried since I know cucumber contains water how that would affect the finished product. Maybe better to puree the cucumber?

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I've done it. Made a cucumber quick sour. I used 1/2 lb of cucumber (1 cucumber), peeled and cut into medallions. I added them in the keg. It came out great.

However, keep in mind, that a soured cucumber, is a pickle. My beer tasted like homemade pickles. It was delicious.

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Did you use lactose to sour it?

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No, kettle sour with lactobacillus.

MILK THE FUNK GOSE RECIPE

Stats
1.035 OG
1.004 FG
4.0 ABV
2 SRM
No hops if possible. If hops have to be used, then ~3-4 IBU from mash hops
Mash 60min @ 145°f


Malt Weight %
Floor-Malted Bohemian Wheat (DE) 5 lbs 50
Floor-Malted Bohemian Pilsner (DE) 5 lbs 50

Adjunct
Adjunct Weight Time
Salt (fleur de sel) 0.5 oz 0 min
Ground Coriander Seed 1 oz 0 min
Hops
No hops if possible. If hops have to be used for legal reasons (for commercial breweries, for example):

Hop Weight Use Alpha Acids
Golding (UK) 2 oz Mash 8 AAU

Yeast / Bacteria
Name Laboratory Product ID Attenuation
Lactobacillus Blend (brevis, delbrueckii, and plantarum) * Omega Yeast Labs OYL-605 N/A
Brett Sacc Trois White Labs WLP644 87.5

* If OYL-605 is not available, substitute it with a probiotic culture such as Goodbelly Mango or Swansons Plantarum. See Culturing From Probiotics [2].

Steps

1-2 days before brewing make a 1 liter starter of 1.040 wort, and add your vial of WLP644. Let it sit at room temperature until use. Also make 1 liter of 1.040 wort, and pour OYL-605 into the starter. Incubate 24-48 hours at room temperature to increase the cell count.

Mash in at 145°f for 60 minutes; if hops have to be used, make sure to add the hops to the mash.

Sparge as normal.

Bring the wort to a boil, add salt and coriander, and then turn the heat off.

Adjust PH ~4.2 to limit growth Clostridium butyricum and other potential off-flavor bacteria. Not necessary, but this is a best practice suggestion. See How to Pre-Acidify for instructions.

Chill the wort down to 90°f or below, and transfer to a CO2 purged carboy or keg. Add the 1 liter of OYL-605 Lactobacillus Blend starter. Allow it to sour for 24 hours. No external heating is required.

After the souring phase, pitch WLP644 Trois (boiling to kill the Lactobacillus before adding the WLP644 Trois is optional; see kettle souring). You can aerate if you feel necessary. After 2 weeks a stable gravity should be reached.
Rack or transfer off as normal to bottles or a keg.

HOW TO PRE-ACIDIFY

After the production of the wort, but before pitching the culture of Lactobacillus, some brewers like to slightly lower the pH of the wort with food grade lactic acid (available at homebrew stores) or phosphoric acid before adding the Lactobacillus. Acidifying the wort before pitching Lactobacillus has several benefits, such as discouraging unwanted microbes that may have accidentally been introduced into the wort, and helping to prevent Lactobacillus from degrading foam proteins. The idea is to get the wort down to a pH of 4.0 - 4.4 before adding Lactobacillus.

Post boil, the wort pH is generally around 5.0 - 5.2. Adjusting the pH of wort before pitching Lactobacillus can then be done fairly easily by taking a trial and error approach.

Using 1 mL of 88% lactic acid per .1 shift in pH for 5 gallons of wort is a good starting measurement.

As an example, say that 5 gallons of wort has a pH of 5.0 just before pitching the Lacto. Begin by adding 5 mL (1 US teaspoon) of food grade lactic acid to the wort for a target of ~4.4 pH. Stir gently, then take another pH reading. Continue to add 1-2 mL of lactic acid until the wort has the desired pH.

Derek Springer has observed that it takes about one tablespoon (15 mL) of 88% lactic acid to reach a pH of 4.2 - 4.5 for 5 gallons of wort [21], however a higher amount may be required if the brewer's water is high in bicarbonate (24 mL for 5 gallons of wort to reach a pH of 4.4 was reported by Sean McVeigh for his water which contains 375ppm of bicarbonates [22]).

Once a pH of 4.0 - 4.4 is reached, pitch the Lactobacillus culture. This small amount of lactic acid shouldn't have much of an impact on flavor. If a more precise method for determining the required amount of lactic acid is required, a sample of the wort can be pulled and lactic acid or phosphoric acid can be added to it until the target pH is reached, and then that amount can be scaled up (a micropipette might be required to measure very small amounts of lactic/phosphoric acid).

Perfect man, cheers!

I finally have a free carboy available for a long aged sour. I got that book you recommended but havent got too far into it. But i learn better by doing. So is there a recipe online/ or in that book you recommend to start out with?

I would like to do one only for a few months first. so i can taste the rewards of the work. then id like to do a really long age. it that possible?

or should i just do a long aged and do a quick kettle sour to drink on?

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I finally have a free carboy available for a long aged sour. I got that book you recommended but havent got too far into it. But i learn better by doing. So is there a recipe online/ or in that book you recommend to start out with?

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They have one in the book i believe. Recipe formulation is rather simple for these types. Here's mine for my 1st long aged saison.

6 lbs 12.0 oz Pilsen (Franco-Belges) (1.8 SRM) Grain 7 60.0 %
3 lbs 12.0 oz Wheat (BestMälz) (2.3 SRM) Grain 8 33.3 %
12.0 oz Spelt (2.5 SRM) Grain 9 6.7 %
0.40 oz Saaz [2.66 %] - Boil 45.0 min Hop 10 3.1 IBUs
0.40 oz Saaz [2.66 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 11 0.7 IBUs
1.0 pkg Belgian Saison I Ale (White Labs #WLP565 Yeast 12 -
1.0 pkg Brettanomyces Bruxellensis (White Labs # Yeast 13 -
1.0 pkg Lactobacillus (Wyeast Labs #5335) [50.28 Yeast 14 -

Mashed in at 149 degrees.

I pitched all yeast, brett, bugs, and bottle dregs at 1 time. I built up the dregs in a starter on a stir plate.

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I would like to do one only for a few months first. so i can taste the rewards of the work. then id like to do a really long age. it that possible?

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Well, you could possibly speed it up by developing starters for your LAB (lactic acid bacteria) and your brett. This being your first, i wouldn't rush it, and just co-pitch together and take readings every 3 months. Try to avoid O2 ingress as much as possible.

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or should i just do a long aged and do a quick kettle sour to drink on?

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Personally, i'd go this route. It's what i've done actually. I try to keep a kettle sour on tap and experiment with ingredients. So far i've done cucumber, spruce, and a blackberry/blueberry. Next will be mango/coconut or mango/peach.

Or, if you could do a 100% brett, if you want to experiment with funk. Again, you'd need to build a starter, unless you're using a giga yeast or other high cell count culture.

But i'd just co-pitch for a long aged, and do kettle sours in the meantime while you wait. Also, i highly suggest joining the milk the funk facebook group, and going to the milk the funk wiki page. The wiki page is very current and has an abundance of information regarding starters for both LABs and Brett, as well as quick souring information, and even has a list of commercial LABs and the correct quick souring temps and recommended durations. It's really a one stop resource.

American Sour Beers book is great, but obviously, can't be updated as often as a webpage. I use both, but fall back, mostly on the MTF wiki.

I need to brew my next long aged sour. May try to do it next weekend.

This one will be another split batch. 1/2 will get Bootleg Biology's Solera blend, the other half will get Bootleg Biology Mad Fermentationist blend.

After that, the next funk/sour project will be a legit, 3-6 month brett beer. Plan to use Bootleg's Saison Parfait sach strain in the primary, and pitch Bootleg's Funk Weapon #2 after primary and let age. I will probably age it on french oak, and maybe do a dry hop at the end.

In addition, i will be doing my first round of testing of my long aged sour #2 split batch. Complete variation of sach, brett, LABS, and brett for each.
Fermenter 1 has Wyeast Belgian Saison, Omego Lacto Blend, and Bootleg Funk Weapon #1 plus some assorted dregs.
Fermenter 2 has White Labs Belgian Saison II, Bootleg Sour Weapon (Pedio), Bootleg Funk Weapon #3, and wicked weed dregs.
I'm excited about these. They've been in the fermenter since early January.

Well I think I have decided to do what bug said and make a long aged and let it sit then do kettle sours in the mean time.

BTW, I just tasted my NEIPAv2 and it is out of this world.

Any one with keezers/kegerators have them outside in South Louisiana? I've had mine inside for years but am working on my outdoor kitchen and would love to have it outside as part of that but am worried about it working too hard and also worried that it won't be able to maintain temp at all in the summer.

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Any one with keezers/kegerators have them outside in South Louisiana?

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I have an old fridge i drilled holes in the side and put 2 taps into, in my garage. Has been running fine for about 2 years now. I also have a fermenting freezer in there 2 that's been there for 4 years and it's running great as well. It's hooked up to a temp controller so the compressor doesn't kick on for very long.

I will admit, the fridge stays a good 5-10 degrees hotter in the summer. Without opening the door, in mid summer at it's hottest, it gets to about 50 degrees in the fridge. But typically stays around 45 which is fine for me.

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i have a cheap mini fridge outside on my patio and it is wonderful

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You in BR?