Aloha all. I’ve been Home Brewing for 7 years and am about to try my hand at brewing a Berliner Wiesse Beer. Wondering if anyone had any tips about using the Brettanomyces Yeast? Mahalo! I look forward to your responses!
It sounds like this is your first Berliner Weiss. I recommend souring the wort with lactobacillus and then fermenting with German Ale Yeast. Berliner Weiss is added at bottling. Which I have not done. Search the forum for threads on BW for info on sour worting.
berliner weiss is the beer. You, I suspect are thinking of the syrup which is added in the glass. But generally it’s true that BW is soured with Lacto and fermented with a clean yeast either with or without a boil in between to kill the lacto.
Oops I meant that Brett is optionally added at bottling.
I just made a berliner weiss that I am about to bottle next week. I just mashed, cooled to 90 - 100 degress and pitched lacto and a day after the lacto showed signs of working I pitched a kolsch yeast. Has a nice tart smell that I hope has a nice thirst quenching tartness in the heat of the summer.
I went the long route last year on a batch (6months) fermented with White Labs Berliner Wiesse blend and it was only mildly sour and pretty Bretty. I am inclined to try the sour mash approach this year (toss some whole uncrushed acidulated malt into the mash and keep it warm for a few days before pulling the wort off to short boil and ferment with a German ale yeast). It sounds easier, but will lack the leathery/horse blanket of the Brett.
Doesn’t have to be acid malt. All malt is crawling with lacto bacteria.
Agreed, but with acidulated malt you likely have more??? I haven’t tried the short method, but will be trying it this spring!
This is how I am going to make my next berliner weiss. I might keep my smaller mash tun just for that. For anyone that has gone this route how many days would you keep the mash going? What temp range? Just add the german ale yeast, no lacto? Would adding lacto add anything else or is all the lacto you need in the wort?
Pretty sure acidulated malt is just sprayed with lactic acid.
Ok, so does the lactic acid help with the souring or no? I haven’t tried the method, as I said…just trying to grasp the short approach better. I have heard that some tweak the flavor with lactic acid, just not sure if using acidulated malt would assist in the process - all other things being equal?
I believe you’d have to use a ton of it to get to the desired flavor level. Its rumored that Full Sail used lactic acid to sour their Berliner Weiss leading to its one dimensional flavor. If you use lactobacillus it’s supposed to be more complex. I suppose because they are contributing more than just lactic.
Acid malt is sprayed with lactic acid so sure, it’s going to add acid to the mash. However, acid malt is designed for minor ph correction in the mash, not adding perceivable acidity. As Jim points out, you would have to add an enormous amount to have any serious effect on the acidity of your BW. No need for acid malt if you are sour mashing.
+1 - The lactobacillus is doing the souring, so it doesn’t really matter whether it comes from acid malt or Pils.
I sour mashed (actually sour worted) a BW and it was delicious. Mashed as normal then topped the mash with enough acid malt to lower the pH to around 4.3. After that I cooled the wort to 110 and put it all in a big food safe (heat safe) zip loc bag and threw in a handful of unmilled pilsner malt. Filled a cooler with 110 F water (I have electric hot water heater so it was easy) and put the zip loc in and pressed all the air out. Mine was delicious with no off flavors or aromas after 2.5 days. Very tart actually.
I also did one with a lacto starter (w/ apple juice) and it took about 4 months to sour at all.