100% brett

[Chupa LaHomebrew]

Well, like I said I don't know if it will be any good, but I'll have the whole recipe up on my blog by sometime next week. Hit the link below.

[Dirk McLargeHuge]

I have a flanders red that has been fermenting for 9 months now....

I made it without any Saccharomyces! Calling it "Sans Saccharo"

I made a 1L starter of Brett Brux a week before i brewed it. I pitched that right away. While brewing it I took a batch 2 Beatification and carefully poured two small glasses so that I could add the dreggs of it to the beer. After a month of primary, i transfered it to glass, added 2 oz of french oak cubes that were soaked in pinot noir (from RR valley...post road) for a year, and added 1 oz of Vinnie's dime bag.


Probably going to bottle it soon. But I'm not sure on how to do it because I don't want to add any saccharo. Do you think that I'd only have to add dextrose and it'd prime correctly? One thing i hate about brewing beer is that you can spend all this time preparing such a great beer and totally fuck it up at bottling.

Could you keg it and force carbonate? I want to do one of these beers, too, eventually, and am curious.

[brewinhard]

Good question Booboo about bottling. You definitely don't want to fuck that beer up after being so patient. If it was me, I would pitch some fresh yeast (champagne - EC-1118) and bottle condition. But, I see where you are coming from. I believe Brett slows down considerably after 9-10 months of fermentation, so they might not have enough mojo to bottle condition. On the other hand, if you are patient and wait it out, the beer could carbonate very slowly from the Brett anyway. I personally would not risk it, add fresh yeast, and enjoy your hard - earned beer with carbonation and peace of mind. Might have to change the name though... How did you handle aeration with that one with the Brett going into primary?

[Chupa LaHomebrew]

OK, I updated the bloggy with the new brew. Don't mistake my brew as an authority on the subject though... In fact I think there still are no authorities on all-brett brewing, which makes it kind of fun and hard to predict. Not sure whether I am going to keg this or bottle it yet.

Sprayin' Brett IN YO' FACE!!!

[Bellmer]

Chupa -

I checked out your blog entry last night after the session and I really like the direction your recipe is taking. Kind of reminds me of some of the low alcohol beers made by Jolly Pumpkin. I (and I'm sure everyone else) will be interested to know how it turns out. That said, I have a couple of questions about your decisions.

I know that you decided to aerate,ferment sort of cool, and grew up the yeast in a starter even though the OG is 1.037. From all that I've heard and read on the subject, this seems to run counter-intuitive to getting the desired character in the beer (well, the cool vs. warm argument seems to really depend who you ask. Cooler theory is it works slower and produces better flavors, warmer that the warm temps force it to throw off some of the wild esters that aren't always good). So, I know in your blog you reference some people whose help you sought out on the subject, and thought it might be helpful for us if you described your reasoning (or theirs as the case may be) behind using each of these decisions in the brewing process.

Thanks Chupa.

[Chupa LaHomebrew]

Well, let's see if I can retrace my steps. Most were based on the idea that I'd rather have too little funk than too much, too phenolic, or band-aid flavors:

1) Large starter: Most wisdom says to pitch brett at lager pitching rates, and the tube was about to expire anyway.

2) Relatively cool ferment & aeration: Based on looking at 4 all-brett ales on Madfemrentationist. The cooler fermented and aerated ones seemed to receive better tasting comments. I may take the beer up to 74 in the primary though.

After I got a recipe together, I emailed Vinnie C., Chad Yakobson, and put out a post on the BBB. Nobody noticed any glaring errors, so I went with it. I think ferment temp and aeration are debatable, but large starters are widely agreed upon.

The beer is taking off REALLY SLOWLY. I checked this morning and just a trace of krausen. Maybe a bubble every minute. But, let's see what happens. I've heard tales of this from a lot of brett beers.

[Chupa LaHomebrew]

Here's the email I sent to Chad and the reply:

Hey Chad,

Any advice on ferment tips, pitch rate, and aeration levels? I'm looking for clean, fruity, tart, with a little funk, but not band-aid too horsey.

This is going to be a 5 gallon batch of low-grav beer, like 1.037. Basically a berlinner weisse base with 2-4 oz. sauer malt added so the brett can convert the lactic acid to esters.

I was going to do a 1 qt. starter on a stirplate, and then step it up with another 1-1.5 qts.

I was going to ferment at 70-72 and just aerate by shaking. Probably let it go for a month or til it's done.

Sound good? I'll make sure to keep it clear of O2 after the ferment starts. But, what would be the effect if I didn't?

Thanks,
Sean

Hey,

So for aeration I would just give it what you normally give your Sacch fermented beers. The oxygen in the beginning helps get fermentation under way. As it has been shown that small amounts of oxygen increase fermentation greatly.

I would the 2-4 oz of acidulated malt sounds good!

As for starting the yeast.. Let it go a few days before you pitch it in. it takes a few days till cell counts increase and propagation is tricky as their are a few schools of thought... I believe you should let the yeast grow out till cell growth is sustained. It has a sigmoidal curve. the top is called the t=phase I believe. I believe in pitching then as it has built up the most glycogen and its reserves are at thier greatest. Pitching then gives a good feremntation. With Bretta this is iffy as what I'm saying pertains to Sacch but I'm noticing lots of similarities in the lab. This is what I'm currently looking at and it seems good. Keep the propagation semi aerobic. You'll notice some souring after about 4-5 days. I keep a foam bung in them this is standard. then I keep it iat 28 degrees so about 77 in F and constant agitation but slow at about 80 rpm. barely enough to keep it all swirling but very gentle.

So pitch and really leave it alone is my thoughts. I'm giving my lab ferments 21 days before I even open them to check gravity.. I'm not concerned only as long as they finish.. Same thing for you.. as once this finishes you need to condition it give the brett a month or two to finish out at say 55-60 degrees conditioning.. Then I would say bottle leave two weeks depending to get the carbonation and you should have a tart good tasting beer. The brux likes to create acids. It is my biggest acid yeast.. but kept anaerobic I have created some damn clean beers in the lab with a slight tart.. fruit is not high on this one but you should get some nice esters with the acidulated malt..

This is my take so far... Keep track of any deviations from your plans as it could be beneficial...let me know how it goes...

cheers,
Chad

[brewinhard]

Thanks for the post Chupa. Very interesting. I think one thing is for certain... Give it time like 1-2 months in primary before kegging/bottling. I am looking at making an all brett beer soon and am going to try the Singularite recipe from Wild Brews. Looks good (acid malt, wheat, pils, and I was going to add a touch of Vienna for character). 25 IBU's. Please let me know if you get what you are looking for with your aeration methods in primary.