Brewing Up Some Funk

Chalese and I began our epic road trip to Maine on Thursday, but before we left I managed to squeeze in two brew days. Most beers only take a couple of months to ferment and mature to perfection, but since these two beers have an entire year to sit I decided to utilize different strains of bacteria and yeast that require more time than standard ale yeasts. The first batch contains two strains of yeast (saccharomyces and brettanomyces) and two strains of bacteria (lactobacillus and pediococcus)—a medley that should create a dynamic sour profile. The second batch only contains brettanomyces, which is rarely used exclusively.

My stainless steel Blichmann pots are in a storage unit in Ellsworth, Maine, so I had to improvise. Morgan Williams and I fashioned a lauter tun out of a water cooler, copper tubing, and the necessary fittings—directions found on homebrewtalk.com.

The supplies Photo by: Morgan Williams

Teflon tape is your friend Photo by: Morgan Williams

Drilling holes for the strainer Photo by: Morgan Williams

Fully assembled

Inspired by Russian River’s Consecration and New Belgium’s La Folie I formulated a recipe for a sour brown ale with plums added to the secondary fermenter. My mom, Chalese, and Morgan helped harvest plums from two trees that loom over the west patio of our house. The trees were in short supply this year, but we still managed to collect over a pound and a half of fruit—excluding the pits.

Putting it to the test Photo by: Morgan Williams

The lauter tun worked flawlessly. In Maine I rinse the sugars from the barley using a fly-sparge system that continually drips water over the grains while the sweet wort—sugar water—flows into the boil kettle at the same rate water is dripping over the barley; this is a three-tiered system that utilizes three pots—the hot liquor tank (holds the hot water), the lauter tun (separates the barley from the hot water), and the boil kettle (collects and condenses the sweet wort). My new homemade set up in Colorado functions best with a batch sparge that works by adding water in three large additions to the lauter tun and then allowing the water to slowly drain into the boil kettle. During a typical fly-sparge, I tend to extract 89% of the available sugars from the barley, and with the batch sparge I hit an efficiency of 84%.

The first runnings Photo by: Morgan Williams

As ripe as it gets

The plum trees on the west patio

The harvest Photo by: Chalese Carlson

I sanitized the skins with Everclear rather than using heat to pasteurize. When fruit is heated it often looses freshness and takes on the consistency of jam.

Slicing and dicing Photo by: Chalese Carlson

For the primary fermentation I pitched WhiteLabs Bastogne yeast, and then I racked—siphoned—the beer onto the sliced plums and added the funk—souring yeast/bacteria.

Plums in the fermenter

Plums, funk, and CO2

A few days later I brewed the Belgian pale ale that is being fermented solely by brettanomyces. I am hoping this beer will taste similar to the Trappist brewery Orval but without the spiciness from the Saaz hops. The mash and boil was non-eventful but the yeast starter was one of the most phenomenal spectacles of fermentation I have yet seen. Brettanomyces produces a pellicle colony—solid mass of yeast cells on the surface of the substrate. Its appearance makes you wonder how anyone would have first wanted to sip on the liquid beneath the mass without knowing the possible effects. While Brettanomyces is feared by brewers and winemakers alike, its presence is most welcome in this beer. Bring on the funk.

Brettanomyces in the starter

Pouring the starter into the carboy Photo by: Morgan Williams

The Night Brett Snuck in Through the Air Lock

Almost exactly one year ago Luke Gottlieb and I brewed a Belgian style ale that included one quart of local raw gamble oak honey. The beer was left to ferment in the secondary for the school year, and when I got home from Maine the first thing I did was run down stairs to check on my baby. It looked unchanged, but as I examined further I noticed that something unusual was floating on the surface. Near the edge of the carboy there was a scattered mess of hard bubbles. These bubbles are not a byproduct of normal fermentation--from Saccharomyces that is--but more likely a result of a wild yeast contamination. In this case I believe the culprit belongs to the the Brettanomyces genus. I am obsessively sanitary when brewing, so there is a very slight possibility that the Brettanomyces--Brett--made it into the beer during handling; what is more likely is that this wild funk snuck in through the air lock--the plastic contraption on the carboy that contains water to allow CO2 to escape but keeps air out.

When this beer was first fermenting, it was in a room that fluctuated in temperature. Each night the temperature would drop, and a pressure differential would be created between the inside of the carboy and the rest of the room. In the morning, the air lock would be empty and air would be allowed to flow into the carboy. It is most probable the intruder came in during this time.

The carboy at a distance

The funk on the side

I once read that no known pathogens have been found in infected beers, so I wasn't afraid to taste it--in fact, I was excited. Being a lover of sour beers I began to imagine a tart treat. What if Luke and I had created what beer aficionados salivate over? On the other hand, it could turn out to be a band-aid ale, which thanks to Matt McElwee, I have had the displeasure of trying. I withdrew a sample and did a one handed drum role as I sniffed and then poured the liquid over my tongue.

Looking a little better outside the carboy

The taste was........... lacking any resemblance to an infected beer. In fact I couldn't pick out any off-flavors other than a slight burn of alcohol and some esters that tasted like bananas. It almost tasted like a light after dinner liqueur, but the taste of band-aids and tartness was absent. The Brett might have attempted to establish itself but the high alcohol percentage probably restricted its growth.

Even though Luke and I were lucky our beer wasn't ruined, the problem could have been avoided by using a different style of air lock. The standard 3-piece air lock that I usually use does not account for any changes in pressure but the "bubbler" style does. The bubbler air lock allows water to pass into two chambers to offset any differences in pressure. I have since outfitted all of my carboys in Colorado with the bubbler style to keep out any more unwanted yeasties.

Below are the two styles with blue dye added to the water.

The 3-piece

The "bubbler"