I just tasted SN and RR's collaboration beer "Brux", which they called an American Wild.. I enjoyed it, but I started thinking. Now that a lot of brewers are using Brett, can it truly be called "wild" anymore? I mean, it seems to me that Brett has been thoroughly domesticated at this point.
Agreed, though I think this falls in the Hipster/underground category. Just because something becomes popular in group, does that make it less unique?
love brews with brett in them still a wild yeast strain that can yield some complexity they have a huge range IMO but not SOUR but more musty,barynyard Saison Brett Anchorage Brews(all) Rayon vert Brux
brett is a "wild yeast" that you usually try to avoid getting into your beer and infecting it. this doesn't change just because some people culture it and put it in beer; in the grand scheme of things, it's still a "wild yeast."
Thanks Pahn, You made a good point. But at what point does a wild yeast become domesticated. At some point in history, all yeast was wild...
it's looking at it the wrong way around sort of... you don't need to worry about saccharomyces (brewer's yeast) making its way into your normal, hops / malt / water / saccharomyces beer. this is as opposed to the wild yeast, brett, that's floating around in the air and might come in and funk up the proceedings. the "wild" in wild yeast is in reference to that dynamic; i'm brewing beer / wine, and there's my normal yeast, vs the wild yeast in the air. when you take that wild yeast and domesticate it, it's still a domesticated version of wild yeast. just as if you spontaneously fermented a beer and it miraculously only ended up having some kind of saccharomyces in it; you'd say "wow, i just let everything in, but i only got good old brewer's yeast." in other words, 'wild' / 'brewer's' doesn't pick out where this particular bit of yeast came from, it references this strain of yeast's usual role in wine/beer making. --- note also that even if you were fermenting a beer with brett, you would likely practice the same sanitation procedures as usual to avoid "just any old brett" getting into the beer.
You can pitch cultured brett and bugs into a beer or you can throw the beer in barrels and see what truly wild yeast and bugs eat away at it. Ultimately the characteristics are going to be similar enough that they will be associated with one another and hit into the same general category.
Brett acts dirrefent in how it used as well; a straight brett ferment can be very fruity, whereas if a regular sacch strain is used first and finished with brett you get more of the funk.
I think we need a name to distinguish beers with Brett or bacteria in them from beers with Sac yeast only. "Wild" is as good a name as any, especially if it describes how a beer tastes. You can put a Bengal Tiger in a cage an it's still a wild animal.
