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Author Topic: belgian sour mix not sour  (Read 3483 times)

Offline jptheelder

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belgian sour mix not sour
« on: September 19, 2010, 05:01:20 pm »
I made the all grain option of the Berliner Weisse from brewing classic styles styles almost 7 months ago. my LHBS did not have just lactobacillus, they had the White Labs #655 Belgian sour mix 1. I pitched my yeast, US-05, and the sour mix at the same time and fermented at about 70, and left it on the primary until the FG was reached. Over 6 monthe later, there is NO sour flavors. I can taste the brett but not he lacto and it tastes more like apple juice than anything else and not what I was trying to make for my first sour beer. Could the US-05 frement out the sugars before the sour mix got started? I did not make a starter for the WLP655. what else would cause this lack of sour?  I am going to make a Flanders Red and again the only thing my LHBS has is the WLP655. What should I do that I did not the first time, use only the sour mix and no yeast? 

Offline uisgue

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Re: belgian sour mix not sour
« Reply #1 on: September 19, 2010, 06:52:53 pm »
I have not yet done a sour, so I can not address your main question.  All I can say is that if your LHBS can not get the yeast you want, order online.  Shipping may cost extra, but maybe you can think of some other things you need that you can bundle into the order.
Doug Hickey
Crescent City, CA
Symposia Brew Corps

Offline tschmidlin

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  • Redmond, WA
Re: belgian sour mix not sour
« Reply #2 on: September 19, 2010, 09:14:05 pm »
I saw Jess from Wyeast give a talk about sour beers.  The main points were that lactobacillus usually can't handle high IBUs, alcohol, or low pH, and it likes to be warm.  So if you were above 10 IBUs then that doesn't help, although since it was a BCS recipe it's probably fine.  It's possible that the yeast got going quickly enough and got the alcohol level too high for the lacto, although that doesn't seem likely for a Berliner weisse.  Or if the fermenting yeast combined with the lacto and brett dropped the pH quickly enough, the lacto could be unhappy.  You said around 70F, so that is generally warm enough but I think lacto prefers to be even warmer.  So at this point I think you should warm it up and see what happens.  Take it to 75F and give them more time to work.  The pediococcus could still be doing something in there to give you more sourness too.

All of that being said, Ron (the brewer at Cascade Brewing who won Gold and Silver in Sour Beers in 2009) told me that they don't add their lactobacillus until after primary and then just wait for the beer to get sour enough.

I think for the Flanders you should pitch the blend and let it go for a while and see what happens.  Patience. :)
Tom Schmidlin