Brett/Lambic Sour Mead Need Input!

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seth8530

The Atomic Wine Maker
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Hey all! After doing tasting of some very good sour beers in the Oregon area I have decided to relent and and make a DRY sour mead. The only thing is, I am not sure whether I want to use brett or lambic bacteria or any combination of the two...

I have checked out wyeast lambic strain catagory

http://www.wyeastlab.com/hb_yeaststrain.cfm

and White labs

http://www.whitelabs.com/wine/pro/listings?style=5

but I have not really found any other groups that also sell brett/lambic bacteria and yeast. If someone could find some more strains that would be great!

What I am planning on doing is making a 20 gallon batch of mead. I plan on doing half of the batch under cold ferment conditions with normal yeast to make a relatively high dry ABV mead.

At the same time I will also be fermenting the brett/lambic portion of the mead which will likely have a lower ABV than the cold fermented yeast batch since I need to ensure that I stay within the brett/lambics ABV range so that it will go dry.

Then, once these guys age out for a year or so I plan on blending them together to get the desired character that I want.

Input would be greatly appreciated! If anyone knows of any high ABV lambic strains they would be a life saver!
 
I put Brett. B in a bochet and it stopped at 16% (same as the other portion with BM4X4). It shouldn't be a problem for the brett, but the bacteria won't go above 9-12% I think. Get them in early so they can work before they get killed off.
 
I've heard horror stories of people who ran into contamination issues after using Brett in some capacity. Is it something that you have handle more carefully in terms of sanitation and cleaning?
 
Brewers tend to be affraid due to a lack of using killer yeast and SO2, which will get rid of most commercially available brett strains; wine makers fear because you can't get brett out of wood (barrels), and it can spread through their cellars. If you are sanitary, you are safe: I use different tubing and other soft plastics, and heat sanitize buckets and funnels (if they are rated for >220F) by putting in boiling water and allowing it to cool to room temp, then running through some iodophor or star San. No contamination yet. But I also do clean ferment tests commonly just to make sure equipment is not infected: run some wort made from DME through all your equipment and let it sit covered in a bucket and see if it grows anything, after a week it should still be clean.
 
Brewers tend to be affraid due to a lack of using killer yeast and SO2, which will get rid of most commercially available brett strains; wine makers fear because you can't get brett out of wood (barrels), and it can spread through their cellars. If you are sanitary, you are safe: I use different tubing and other soft plastics, and heat sanitize buckets and funnels (if they are rated for >220F) by putting in boiling water and allowing it to cool to room temp, then running through some iodophor or star San. No contamination yet. But I also do clean ferment tests commonly just to make sure equipment is not infected: run some wort made from DME through all your equipment and let it sit covered in a bucket and see if it grows anything, after a week it should still be clean.

That's a good testament to your cleaning/sanitizing methods! It would be interesting to see how a mead treated with Brett would turn out.
 
The brett bochet is exactly what I wanted. 6gal with bm4X4 to bring out all the dark fruity flavors; 1gal with brett B to give some spicy, smokey, leathery, and horsey character; both have ~15g/gal oak (mostly Hungarian M+, with some French medium as well). I think a 1:6 blend will be perfect based on the taste right now (~6mos), but we'll see in another year. If anyone is interested in brett, get a 1gal glass jug and see what it's like, I'd suggest the wyeast products over whitelabs because they're a little more tame and mostly give aromatics (compared to whitelabs). I think wyeast's brett L would be great in red melomels/wines for blending because of the distinct cherry/tart fruit flavor, whitelabs brett L is just a world of funk that doesn't bring too much to the table except for lambic style beers.
 
The only input that I can provide is second-hand, but hopefully correct and useful. I read that brett strains do not impart much sourness on their own. So if you are just looking for sour, lactobacillus or pediococcus would serve you better. If you want sour with some of those bretty flavors, Lambic or a blend of yeast(s) and bacteria(s) is the way to go.
 
I put Brett. B in a bochet and it stopped at 16% (same as the other portion with BM4X4). It shouldn't be a problem for the brett, but the bacteria won't go above 9-12% I think. Get them in early so they can work before they get killed off.

Do you remember which brett strand you used? Is lacto really capable of fermenting up that high?

Brewers tend to be affraid due to a lack of using killer yeast and SO2, which will get rid of most commercially available brett strains; wine makers fear because you can't get brett out of wood (barrels), and it can spread through their cellars. If you are sanitary, you are safe: I use different tubing and other soft plastics, and heat sanitize buckets and funnels (if they are rated for >220F) by putting in boiling water and allowing it to cool to room temp, then running through some iodophor or star San. No contamination yet. But I also do clean ferment tests commonly just to make sure equipment is not infected: run some wort made from DME through all your equipment and let it sit covered in a bucket and see if it grows anything, after a week it should still be clean.

Not a bad call on making a post effort deco run just to make sure everything is all nice and clean. I guess you might be right that so logn as you clean well and start with a nice healthy yeast strain you should be able to out compete.

The brett bochet is exactly what I wanted. 6gal with bm4X4 to bring out all the dark fruity flavors; 1gal with brett B to give some spicy, smokey, leathery, and horsey character; both have ~15g/gal oak (mostly Hungarian M+, with some French medium as well). I think a 1:6 blend will be perfect based on the taste right now (~6mos), but we'll see in another year. If anyone is interested in brett, get a 1gal glass jug and see what it's like, I'd suggest the wyeast products over whitelabs because they're a little more tame and mostly give aromatics (compared to whitelabs). I think wyeast's brett L would be great in red melomels/wines for blending because of the distinct cherry/tart fruit flavor, whitelabs brett L is just a world of funk that doesn't bring too much to the table except for lambic style beers.

Are you talking about the brett lactobacullus? (sp). Do you have expierence with that strain? To be honest I am more after sour flavours with a little bit of funk added to it. I am considering using buckwheat to add to the funk a little bit.

The only input that I can provide is second-hand, but hopefully correct and useful. I read that brett strains do not impart much sourness on their own. So if you are just looking for sour, lactobacillus or pediococcus would serve you better. If you want sour with some of those bretty flavors, Lambic or a blend of yeast(s) and bacteria(s) is the way to go.

Thanks for the input. I am just concerned about these blends since most of them do not give ABV tollerences so I am not quite sure what kind of sugars I should be shooting for in my must.




Right now I am considering doing a 50 50 brett/lacto and normal yeast plan... Perhaps I should use more s 33:66?
 
It was wyeast's brettanomyces bruxelensis, no bugs (lacto, pedio or acetobacter). I don't think commercial lactobaccilus strains will get that high, I know some wild strains can contaminate wines though. I would say use lacto and/or pedio with a bit of brett for most of the ferment, when it slows, pitch a healthy starter of uvaferm 43(? I think that's the number) or QA23 to finish out the gravity.
Personally, I find wine levels of acid to take away from mead. I know it's hard to get the balance, but proper use of acids, tannins, low finishing pH, and general complexity can balance out a lot of things while not making a mead taste like wine. I generally put 1g/L cream of tartar up front, and, based on my experiments treating mead with lactic acid, I might start adding an extra 1mL of 88% lactic up front as well. I find upfront acid additions mellow out more than after ferment additions which can get a little "prickly" on the palate.
 
Check out wyeast's 3763 Roeselare, it's a nice blend and i'm thinking it might be what you're looking for.
 
Thanks for the input. So, here is what I am looking at right now.

I plan on making my primary honey buckwheat ( I got some really funky honey).

I plan on first inoculating with a lactic bacteria such as the following.

http://www.whitelabs.com/yeast/wlp672-lactobacillus-brevis?s=pro

I called white labs and they indicated that it should be able to survive to around 8% abv and that I should add the brett once the bacteria takes the PH down to around 3.5.. ( I might need to add some sort of buffer to the mead).

Once the PH is down I will pitch my brett strain.

Right now I am thinking of this guy.

http://www.whitelabs.com/yeast/wlp653-brettanomyces-lambicus?s=pro

According to the white labs people it should be good for between 8-12% ABV. Also, according to them I should aim to have a fermentation temperature of around 85 degrees to encourage the lactic bacteria and the brett.

As far as nutrient protocol I will follow my standard fermaid o/k SNA program. I will shoot for an abv of around 12%. If the brett dies early that will be fine. If not, well I guess I will have a nice dry funk-o-mel on my hands.
 
So right now I am in the process of souring a sassion themed beer with the lacto strain mentioned in the above post. This should be a good trial run for it. Also, I have ordered 5 gallons of raw buckwheat from Bee Folks. $290 with shipping, not too bad for quality product.
 
So the lacto beer has a really awesume lemony sour tart taste. It is not just sour, but slightly fruity actually. I look forward to seeing what this strain will do with some brett in the mead.
 
So this is a rough outline of the fermentation plan. Of course, I neglect to mention a good nutrient schedule but I am just hashing things out. The numbers are rough and aproximate.. However, I will tighten them up once I get my sugar source.

So the whole reason for this quacky plan is that I want to be able to carbonate this brett sour mead and still have residual sugars. The plan I have come up with is a bit hairy but the general idea is to take the ABV past where the brett can handle but where a strong sach yeast can handle. Once I am at that point add sugars that the brett could ferment if the abv was low enough but the sach could never ferment. After aging for a year or so use priming sugar and bottle carbonate. I am shooting for something that follows the line of thoughts of a gueze in beer land. But I plan on doing it with honey.. .So not quite the same, but I think it will be fun either way.


Use honey to get an OG of around 1.110 ( 14% ABV potential)

Buffer the must with Potassium carbonate up from around 3.8 to around 5.5 so that the lacto has room to work.

Once the PH drops to around 3.5 ish pitch the brett starter and ferment up to around 9% ABV ( as soon as the brett is pitched start a strong ec-1118 starter on the stir plate).

Once the ABV reaches around 9 percent add in the strong ec-1118 starter. IE gravity of around 1.040.

Once the ABV reaches around 13-14% add the crystal 40 syrup ( 38% fermentable by sach yeast) ( make sure the dilution does not drop abv below 13%) to hopefully ensure the brett does not come back to life and ferment the sugars that the ec-1118 can not ferment. Thus hopefully ending up with a brett sour mead with left over residual sugars by not permitting the brett to eat the complex sugars and allowing the sach to eat the fermentable crystal sugars. Then I would be able to bottle carbonate as well using the ec-1118 too.
 
1118 is one of the yeast killers so it should get rid of the brett pretty quickly so you should be fine there. Interesting plan! Definitely want some updates when you get around to it
 
1118 is one of the yeast killers so it should get rid of the brett pretty quickly so you should be fine there. Interesting plan! Definitely want some updates when you get around to it

Thats the plan, I really do not know how this will turn out.. But, I hope that everything at least works somewhat as intended.

Yesterday, I extracted sugar from 15 lbs of crystal 40 and 15 lbs of crystal 60. Approximate fermentability by sach on these guys is 38%. The final result from all this work including a sticky floor was 2 gallons of syrup with a specific gravity of around 1.183. The colour is really dark and has kind of a bitter chocolaty kind of taste with some interesting dark fruit stuff going on with it along with some roast and marshmallow flavors going on with it. I think that this will not only provide some nice hopefully unfermentable sugars, but it will also bring something to the table.

So pretty much if you correlate the specific gravity to the number of sugars in grams per liter and multiply out by the volume we get ourselves as having 3663 grams of sugar. And if you assume 38% are fermentable and 62% are not we get 2252 grams unfermentable and 1380 grams unfermentable.

If you divide these guys out by the target final volume ( 57 +7.57 liters) we get sugar contents in grams per liter of 33 and 21 grams per liter respectively. Which correlates to 1.01 and 1.006 respectively. So, if all the fermentable stuff ferments out and unfermentable stuff does not ferment ( the hope) we should end with a gravity of 1.010.




So here are some more details on the plan




1) Bring the initial gravity up to 1.125 using buckwheat honey. Ensure volume is around 57 liters.
2) Buffer with carbonate until PH rises to around 5.5
3) Add lacto starter ( rude boy here is already cooking)
4) Once PH drops to around 3.5 add the brett starter
5) Once the SG drops down to 1.058 ( 8% ABV) add in the ec-1118 starter
6) Once Gravity drops down to 1.01 add the 2 gallons (7.57 liters) of malt syrup. This should take the ABV from 15% ABV down to 13.29% ABV.
7) Let it ferment until it finally quits and rack to secondary with oak. The plan is to end up with a final gravity of around 1.010.


Nutrient plan.

Using this base equation

mg/L YAN (PPM) =(.10*(mg/L) fermaidK +.04*(mg/L)*FermaidO+.2(mg/l) DAP)

and realizing that the legal limit for fermaid K is 250 mg/l and that I will not be using DAP.

we get


350 =.10*(250 mg/L) fermaidK +.04*(mg/L)*FermaidO
325=.04(mg/l) Fermaid O
8125 mg/l fermaid O
250 mg/l fermaid K

Thus we need a total of 463 grams of fermaid O and 14.25 grams fermaid K



I will add 1/3 of the nutrient up front 1/6 at the end of lag phase 1/6 at the 1/3 sugar mark and 1/3 and the 1/2 sugar mark.

Thus add 14.25 grams fermaid K and 154 grams of fermaid O up front

Add 77 grams of fermaid O at the end of lag phase

add 77 grams of fermaid O at 1.083

add 144 grams of fermaid O at 1.0625
I am hoping to get this guy rolling pretty quickly. If all goes well I might go ahead and do the first 3 steps today or Tuesday.
 
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Alright, this project is underway.Looks like my intial volume will be 63 liters but I think that is going to be ok. I will still follow the nutrient schedule established for 57 liters. I added carbonate to the mead tonight so I will see if that gets me where I wanted to go. If not, I will see tomorrow. If all looks fine, I will pitch in the morning. Brett is going into the stir plate as we speak.
 
Starting gravity the day after mixing is at

1.134

PH day after adding carbonate is at 5.2.

All in all it looks like is everything is on target. The brett starter on the stir plate is showing signs of life and the live and kicking lacto culture is going in now.

So now, if all goes well we should end up at around 14.54 ABV after the addition of the malt ferments out and should be at 16.2 ABV after we hit 1.01 but prior to the malt addition. I think it is pretty safe to say that the brett will pretty much be out of the picture by then.
 
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