Berliner time.. Bring me your best.

Thanks for the reassurance. Didn't realize lacto made a pellicle, but yup I think your right =). Will do a nice job of keeping out the o2!

 

Thanks for the thread guys, I think this summer is Berliner Time indeed! I'm still a month away from a brew date, but looking forward to it.

 

I brewed a berliner last year with the 'sour wort' method and 15minute boil. Turned out excellent, put it on apricots probably one of the best beers Ive made so far. However I popped one over the weekend and the fruit is now fading pretty good and its developed a very strange after taste. Not sure what it is but its not very desirable. I ended up dumpding half of it Dont think its an infection or anything as the bottle did not gush at all.

Also I can vouch for the wyeast lacto not being very sour. I did another one with the wyeast and Id barely even call it tart. The sour mash/wort method with the grains is def the way Id go. And to the guy adding lacto post boil just be aware you are now introducing live lacto into your post boil equipment which can be a little risky.

 

Doesn't this infect your carboy?
That's what I was worried about when reading how you sour the collected wort instead of the whole mash. It would be nice to be able to get a pre-lacto OG.
I'd also like to try the same recipe both ways to see how much of a difference it makes.

 

Sour the pre boil wort right in your boil pot instead of a carboy

 

Derp lol of course. Then you could sparge before the sour as well, theoretically making it more sour due to the increased exposure to lacto. I'm going to try this method with my next one.

 

I thought sanitation doesn't kill lacto though. Am I crazy, or does starsan kill it?
Or are you sterilizing it with something else?

 

In the process of boiling. Stank out the apartment and my wife has barricaded herself in a bedroom. Must be doing something right.

 

Is there a way of knowing how much sugar you are going to lose to the souring process? I'm going to try this in a couple weeks and I'd be aiming for 3.75-4% and not 2.5% so I want to plan accordingly. Thanks

 

I've heard a lot of variation with how much the lacto is lowering peoples SG. Mine went the whole way from 1.039 to 1.016 in a weeks time. I didn't do a mash out and I'm not sure if that's part of the reason it dropped so much. I ended up adding dme and corn sugar back to reach an OG of 1.030.

 

I boiled mine on tuesday, and yeah, it really did a number on the garage and kitchen (where i run my chiller) in the odor department. I thought about adding some sugar or DME to bump the gravity back up, but thought that since this is my first attempt, I will just do it as is, evaluate the final product, then make determinations as to what to do differently next time. The best part about brewing this style is it is so cheap that you don't have to worry too much about the cost if something goes wrong or it doesn't come out quite right. The sample I tasted before boiling was pretty good, but it was still a little tough to get through the aroma, but I am really looking forward to trying the finished product!

 

Here is 1 week, pre-boil

 

Well I just took a gravity reading, been in the primary for about a week now, seems finished.
It tastes really good, but has the aroma of blue cheese....lol is this normal? I mean, I like blue cheese a lot but I've never smelled it in any berliner.
The lacto should be dead AFAIK, boiled for 20 minutes.

 

My gravity didn't change at all.

 

For inoculating the wort is any old malt fine? I have a bag of crystal that has been sitting in my brew closet for a handful of months.

 

Is it normal for the airlock to be bubbling during the sour worting?