I'm looking to jump into sour beer making. I've got a few standard batches under my belt and feel like I'm not having any trouble with the brewing of ales. I was wondering what are good resources for how-to's on sour beer making. I'm mainly looking to start with a berliner weiss, and then branch off from there into other styles. Anyone know of a good book, or websites I can check out to learn some of the basics and get a start?
I find this website to be extremely helpful for brewing sour beers at a homebrew level" http://www.themadfermentationist.com/ Especially this post: http://www.themadfermentationist.com/2009/11/brewing-sour-beer-at-home.html
If Lambics might be in your future, here's another great resource: http://hbd.org/brewery/library/LmbicJL0696.html
Here is a book on wild beerhttp://www.beerbooks.com/cgi/ps4.cgi?ACTION=enter&thispage=1384&ORDER_ID=!ORDERID!
Link doesn't seem to work. It's titled "Wild Brews". Haven't read it, but the other books from this publisher are great, so I'd imagine this one is as well.
I think the Lidill Lambic link is an easier to follow reference for Lambics, as Liddil's page is more condensed and to the point (Although it doesn't cover the other types of sours that Wild Brews does). Wild Brews was a nice read, but I kept losing focus because I wasn't as interested in the history as I was in the actual brewing methods used (Turbid mash schedule, grist, etc.)
That's nice to hear, about the history and such. "Farmhouse Ales" has a lot of history as well and I've probably read that one about five times.
I was wondering about this too when I got the Williams Brewing catalog and saw that they sell Lactobacillus and Brettanomyces (a few different strains)
Good place to start as it is one of the quicker sours to brew. There are lots of opinions on Berliners, but I'm not a fan of the "quick" pre-fermentation souring methods like sour mashing. Brewing With Wheat is probably the best book if you want to read about them in depth. I do a hopped decoction, no-boil, and ferment with US-05, Lacto, and Brett. Good results, and my most award-winning recipe (first two batches both won golds). Writing my own book on sour beers, an expanded (currently 135,000 word) version of the post quirkzoo linked to above. Just waiting for the last few brewers I talked with to send me their edits before I start the copy-edit process.
Awesome! Thanks for all the help everyone. I'm still pretty damn new to brewing (4 5 gallon batches so far) but I want to be doing more than just pale ales and porters in the near future. Great resources, just ordered 'brewing with wheat' and 'wild brews' from amazon. Starting to read the websites you people recommended now. I'll let you know how it goes in a month or 2 when I decide to jump into it. Also, should I get some new tubing and siphon pump, etc. for anything I do with lacto/pedio/brett? I've been pretty careful with my sanitation so far, but I know how people are about contact with wild fermentation, and there has to be a reason for it. Thanks again guys
