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From: lambic-request at lance.colostate.edu (subscription requests only - do not post here)
To: lambic at lance.colostate.edu
Subject: Lambic Digest #504 (December 07, 1994)
Date: Wed, 7 Dec 1994 00:30:23 -0700
Lambic Digest #504 Wed 07 December 1994
Forum on Lambic Beers (and other Belgian beer styles)
Mike Sharp, Digest Coordinator
Contents:
Re: Lambic Digest #503 (December 06, 1994) ("Phillip Seitz")
Re: In the realm of the senses (Spencer.W.Thomas)
Re: Lambic Digest #503 (December 06, 1994) (Michael Sharp)
A bit of Celis info (Jeremy Ballard Bergsman)
Survey, Judging Brett Character, cultures..... (Jim Liddil)
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 06 Dec 94 08:54:31 -0400
From: "Phillip Seitz" <p00644 at psilink.com>
Subject: Re: Lambic Digest #503 (December 06, 1994)
Marc Hugentobler says:
>Hey, while I am at it, I have been in endless search for the famed
>candi. I went down to the local candy store and found some but it is
>white as the driven snow! Clear crystalline cubes, is this light
>candi? I always had the impression that the candi had a light yellow
>tinge(the light candi that is).
Actually, the yellow stuff is the kind you find in ethnic grocery
stores. The white stuff (presumably clear, but a bit banged up) is the
light candi they sell in Belgian grocery stores. You can buy it as
rock candy, too, but it's expensive in that form.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 6 Dec 94 10:51:59 EST
From: Spencer.W.Thomas at med.umich.edu
Subject: Re: In the realm of the senses
On Saturday, I participated in a wine tasting/dinner party. It's the
first time I've done this since I started judging beers. We were
tasting 6 chardonnays (2 French, 2 US, 1 Chilean, 1 Australian), blind.
I was fascinated (but should I have been surprised?) to find many of
the same "fermentation" aromas in these wines that I've learned to
identify in beer. For example, there were a couple of wines that had
a distinct banana aroma (dare I say "iso-amyl acetate"?) And then,
there was the wine with the "sweaty" aroma. One other person said it
smelled like "old sneakers." Should I suspect a Brett secondary
fermentation for this one? I wouldn't be surprised.
=Spencer in Ann Arbor, MI
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 6 Dec 1994 09:59:12 -0800
From: Michael Sharp <msharp at Synopsys.COM>
Subject: Re: Lambic Digest #503 (December 06, 1994)
Marc Hugentobler <MARHUG at TELECOM.USU.EDU> writes:
> right at this very moment I am culturing wyeast's brett. brux.
> strain.
...
> That afternoon( roughly 8 hours later) the
> cultures(all three simultaneously) were bustling with big brimming
> heads like regular sach. Now from what I've read brett. should not be
> cranking like this. So what'ya think--three simultaneous erroneous
> innoculations or not?
_ASSUMING_ that you really where amazing anal, autoclaved the media, etc.
I'd be wondering if you started with Brettanomyces. I certainly don't
have a strain that grows this fast, nor have I heard of one. I've also
never seen one generate a foamy head.
--Mike
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 6 Dec 1994 11:56:24 -0800 (PST)
From: Jeremy Ballard Bergsman <jeremybb at leland.Stanford.EDU>
Subject: A bit of Celis info
Since there has been a renewal of talk about candi sugar I decided to post
a few notes I made on a recent visit to the Celis brewery in Austin, TX.
1 They use almost exclusively malt from Briess.
2 They had lots of 50 pound bags of "Imperial Sugar" which also had the
words "Pure cane" on them. Nothing about candi sugar, but they could
have been.
3 The raspberry beer is described as a Belgian-style fruit beer. I asked
the tour guide what this meant and she said it was like a lambic, which
of course it isn't for those who haven't had it. (It is sour however.)
4 Pierre brought 3 cultures of yeast from Belgium when he started Celis,
these are all they use. The tour guide didn't seem to understand the
distinction between yeast and bacteria.
5 The brewery uses 4 hop types total among all their beers. Goldings is
new and was brought in for the raspberry. Others are Saaz, Willamette
and Cascade. Two of these are also used in the raspberry along with
the Goldings; I think it is the latter two, I'll look it up if people
care.
Jeremy Bergsman
jeremybb at leland.stanford.edu
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 6 Dec 1994 15:59:26 -0700 (MST)
From: Jim Liddil <JLIDDIL at AZCC.Arizona.EDU>
Subject: Survey, Judging Brett Character, cultures.....
I wrote:
%
% % On a another topic, I am trying to get an idea of the number of people out who
% % have actually made a plambic at least once in their life. Please respond via
% % private e-mail and I will summerize the numbers. I am attempting something for
% % one of the beer mags.
%
Well to date I have gotten 30 replies and I can add about 5 to that for people
who brew but did not respond. So about 10% of the readership has brewed
lambic. Hmmm.
Mike wrote:
% I've suspected for quite some time that very few people reading this
% digest are correctly identifying 'brettanomyces character'.
Well apparently very few people even brew the stuff, but you knew that.
% I also feel that there is at least some level of misunderstanding with
% respect to the characteristics imparted by lactic and acetic acid
% (not to mention all the others). To this end, witness the recent debate on
% Cantillon being acetic/lactic/whatever. [my vote is acetic. lactic tends
% to be very palate drying to me]
I tend to agree, but again it depends on the individual bottle. People need to
do the doctor beer thing with coors and add lactic and acetic acid along and in
combination. 5000 ppm lactic acid is a good top end.
%
% I would like to open up the general topic of how to prepare a Dr. Beer like
% kit for the sensory training of judges. I know that I myself have problems
% identifying the source of some of the funky flavors and especially aromas.
% I'm fairly certain that I am not alone in this category. Sheri & I are
% planning to start with the various organic acids and to look at the
% references in Guinard for the isolation of the tetrahydropyridines that are
% likely responsible for the horsey character (p.40). Where to go from there I
% haven't a clue. Comments?
Acetic, lactic acids, 2-nonenol, tetrahhydropyridines, Any and all of these.
Pure brett and pedio beers. I don't see a problem with using pure chemcials to
prepare standards, they are in the beers anyway. Deosn't matter whether they
come from a yeast or chemical plant IMHO. I guess we can work on this in
January. Time to dig out the Aldrich catalog.
Dan wrote:
%
% Eric Toft, Pierre Celis and Pierre Rajotte all insist that Belgian
% beers should be fermented very warm (>20-23C). Pierre R. took a
% lot of heat for this when his book came out, mostly because the
% available yeast strains did some really nasty things when fermented
% warm. I still have some of those experiments in my cellar if someone
% wants to come over and have same banana-brain-damage-beer.
% Consequently, the collective wisdom suggested that they should be
% fermented cool.
%
% Now we have available a number of strains that ferment poorly when
% cool. Hoegaarden certainly, Brugge and others to a lesser extent. Is it
% possible that these yeasts were MENT to be fermented warm and as such
% are typical of the strains that both Eric and the Pierres have been
% referring to all along?
I found an interesting reference in Wallerstien Comm. (no yeast list though)
which talks aboutbrewing at Chimay, Rochefort and Westmalle. Says the beers
quite often reach 25 C and sometimes 30 C during fermentation.
This article is from 1969. After
the main fermentation the beer is cooled to 10-15 C and stored from "two to
many weeks"
Todd quotes the ACS book on flavors etc.
% cider
% clove-like
% smokey
% medicinal
% mousey
% horsey
% wet wool
% burnt beans
% rodent-cage litter
I can really relate to the rodent reference. I work with the mouse strain
DBA/2J and they are the first thing I now think of when I drink a Cantillion or
I had a Boon gueze that had very strong "lab mouse" character.
% Can anyone comment on the type/quality of malt used. Does shitty,
% high-protein malt and a long boil produce sufficient amounts of lysine to
% give a nice level of horsey bouquet and flavor?
Lysine is one of the essential nutrients for yeast as I recall. Dan?
As has been written the long mahs cycle with lots of wheat should give lots of
free amino acids. Also I will have to check but either wheat or barley are
high in lysine. I think corn has even more.
Rob wrote:
%
% 1. Aerobic culture on glucose containing substrates produces CO2, ethanol and
% acetic acid. The acetic acid is formed from the alcohol not the sugar. At
pH 6.4
% only acetic acid is formed from the alcohol, whereas at pH 4.35 and 3.77
some of
% the acid is further oxidised to CO2.
And that is why the primary fermentation has to be over for the most part
before any acidity develops. This is a slow process.
%
% 2. Brett. Claussenii (as well as B. Brux.) shows a definite negative Pasteur
% effect, that is, when a glucose broth culture is inoculated with cells
% previously grown aerobically, the cells under the more anaerobic conditions at
% the bottom of the flask are unable to carry on more than a very slight anaerobic
% fermentation and an aerobic fermentation only in proportion to the dissolved
% oxygen. As the oxygen is depleted, the fermentation ceases. However, the cells
% become more and more adapted to anaerobic conditions (with successive
% generations) and normal anaerobic fermentation resumes. Cells previously grown
% anaerobically do not show this (negative Pasteur effect).
But the important thing to know is how fast can the cells up regulate the
receptors and enzymes so they can begin to ferment anaerobically. is it
realy generations. Alot has been done since 1940
%
% 3. Objectionable odours are produced in the early stages of Stock ale
% maturation.
so what is your point?
%
% 4. (from Henrici, A.T.Bact. Rev. 5, 97, 1937) Brettanomyces will ferment normal
% beer wort to completion in six months, producing about 10 percent alcohol.
%
% What I conclude is that the culture history and the medium acidity/aerobicity
% are as important (if not more) than the strain of Brett. being used, and to
% discount a Brett. because a single trial run produced the "wrong" flavour is
% unwise. Also, the reference to objectionable odours in young Stock ales must
% surely be of relevance to our pursuits.
Within a single fermentation the cells will go through numerous generations.
Either they are going to up regulate or they aren't. Either the ability to
produce the right flavor is genetically coded into the yeast or it is not.
%
% A related observation I made was the definate "off" flavour of one of a pair of
% splits of Wets gueuze (with the same batch number on the label). One was a
% typical Wets product, mild acidity, light fruitiness, and a barely present horse
% (pony?). The other had a defective cork (it hadn't swollen tightly in the neck
% and pretty much "fell" out). This one was flat (no surprise), highly turbid, a
% much darker (almost orange) colour, and both smelled and tasted like scrumpy. By
% scrumpy I mean the turbid almost flat hard cider produced in Somerset England
% (by wild fermentation, known to involve Brett. Brux.). There were also other
% nuances in the taste that I found almost nauseating. On rubbing some in my hands
% (a great way of amplifying the horsey/wet-blanket smells) it was evident that a
% considerable mousy component was also present. So, what was wrong with this
% bottle? Well, the jury is still out (and the plates still growing) but I think
% it was an extreme case of aerobic fermentation by Brett.
the other possibility is just plain old oxidation or the growth of undesirable
acetobacter or other lactobaccilus. Or it could be oxidative yeasts such as
cryptococcus or candida.
Lee wrote:
% Having said all I want to about that, I was wondering if we could get a
% little discussion going in actually selecting, storing and manipulating
% Brett and other traditional Lambic cultures. I have quite a collection
% of yeasts (21) but don't have a clue how to feed and care for my Lambic
% friends. Also, is it considered bad taste to actually ask a person for a
% slant (or however they are stored) of their cultures? I don't care if
% someone asks me about my yeasts but judging from some of the comments
% I've seen here I wonder if they aren't kept in the brewers safe somewhere?
Someday an article will be written :-) I am not going to go into details as I
could go on ad nauseum. E-mail me if your really have specific questions.
Phil wrote:
% From: "Phillip Seitz" <p00644 at psilink.com>
% Subject: Boon '86 framboise
%
% Their complaint, which has some merit, is that beer is filled with
% chemical and staling flavors (and Philippe Perpete, who's doing staling
% research, was particularly vocal concerning the latter). I have to
% admit that they're right, although I think all of these are pretty mild
% and that certain oxydation-related coffee flavors can add some
% interest. However, I was a bit surprised at how vocal the reaction was.
And what was Don Feinbergs reaction to all this?
Todd wrote:
% Well, I think that we are coming to the realization that "Brett
% character" is potentially very complex. I am not even completely
% convinced that horsey (ahem, glandular or feral) is actually a desired
% attribute, historically speaking. Okay, I can't quote any sources
% because I don't have any, but I have seen gueuze refered to as the
% "champagne of Brussels" and Jackson cannot help himself but to constantly
% bring up the association. He also frequently equates dry lambics with
% fino sherry. A turn-of-the-century American beer-writer calls lambic a
% barley wine. Indeed, what other beer approximates the final gravity
% of wine so closely? If wine or champagne from barley and wheat is more
% the desired outcome, then aren't we really looking for more delicate
% features like fruity and floral?
And because this is so complex it really requires one to work with a group of
individuals and sit down and discuss what you taste. My own tasting group in
our club has had great success doing this. Of course it helps to have a
veteranarian microbiologist in the group.
% 2-acetyl-3,4,5,6-tetrahydropyridine is more specifically the compound
% thought to produce the "feral" component of lambics. Pyridines can be
% somewhat nasty compounds. Would any of the resident toxicologists care
% to give us a run down on this compound? :-)
Haven't found out much yet. Of course if the EPA found out about lmabic they
would ban it. :-)
%
% The turbid mash is probably important for producing Brett character in
% that it results in higher extraction of polyphenols from husks (does it
% not?) in addition to starch. Brettanomyces has the ability to convert
% these to even more aromatic compounds such as 4-vinyl guaiacol and
% 4-ethyl phenol. The latter produces that oh so oaky aspect that the
% barrel owners seek (when it is at the right concentration). Higher
% amounts make it smoky and medicinal. I think that many of the oxidative
% yeasts (like Candida lamibica and others) increase this aspect, as well.
% Some strains of S. cerevisiae can also produce these (the wheat beer
% yeast and bakers yeast, too).
I think, therefore I am :-) So you are saying lambic is a complex chemical
soup :-) The turbid mash produces lots of extra nutrients in general that can
not be consumed by anything other than brett or lacotbacillus. and anything
else that can grow in such an environment then depends on these organisms to
produce usable food and nutrients along with decaying yeasts and bacteria.
Rob in a blashemous post says:
% Subject: Pedio shouldnt be in lambic
%
% Hello all,
% I'm going to be decidedly argumentative here to winde people up enough to comment
% :)
%
% I think lambics shouldn't have any Pedio component. In fact, I feel Lambics
% should only have Sacch and Brett. flavours. How's that for a start? Well, OK,
% you can discount it as thoughtless rantings by someone who doesn't know any
% better. So, here is my rational. It is based on an historical, personal and
% legistical perspective.
I will first of discount this a thoughtless ranting :-)
% 1. Historical.
% The whole lambic brewing process is identical to the brewing methods of the 18th
% and 19th Century British brewers. Almost.
Wrong. Not even almost. Ingrediants are different and one uses cultured yeast
the other does not. Also the fermentation times are way different. I suggest
you read "History of the British Brewing Industry" or something like that. It
is a newer book. showed up in our library for no apparent reason.
The differences - transfer to
% secondary vessels in the UK, and return of turbid wort over use of extra sparge
% water (Belgian vs. British) - can be attributed to meanness. This meanness can
% be further rationalised in terms of the salesbase and turnover of the breweries
% - UK breweries were typically huge compared with Brabant breweries and served
% more customers (therefore with a smaller cost margin).
So what does this have to do with whether pedio should be in the beer?
% 2. Personal
% The careful (read: massproduction) or newer (read: Boon) lambic brewers can
% produce an excellent product showing very little hardness (read: Pedio).
Based on what has coem from Leuven I think a lot of "hardness" has to do with
brett and not pedio. Also the hardness can be caused by either early or late
acetobacter growth.
You may
% argue, the older breweries are brewing a more traditional product. Well, Wets
% isn't (it also produces a very mild product). Neither is La Becasse ( though I
% must admit I don't know how old it is). I will read into this that the larger
% (richer) brewers decided (because they had to) that lambic infected with Pedio
% should be the "proper" lambic, and essentially decimated the consumer base by
% doing so - thus driving the small brewers out of business.
As other notes, pedio is everywhere. And once you have it you can not get rid
of it. It adapts to the surroundings. And again I would argue that pedio is
NOT the main player in the flavor profile of beers like Cantillion.
% 3. Legistical
% Ask any brewer of non-lambic beers what he fears most and the answer will be
% unanimous: Pediococcus. This insidious bacteria can hardly be removed from a
% large scale brewery once present, and any improper methods (such as cooling in
% open tubs) will only exacerbate the situation, since the whole building needs to
% be sterilised to remove it. He will also tell you that despite the fact that the
% microbiologists tell him it is a fastidious and slow developer, that once
% present in the brewery, it will be found in all beers produced.
% An industry which can't even afford to buy new barrels (contrast Britain) can't
% afford to throw them out if they get a Pedio infection. The best they can
% attempt is 19th Century "sterilisation" - abrasion of sediment with chains and
% cleansing with steam or hot water (cf. Accum 1821). These processes at best
% ameliorate the problem, they certainly do not solve it. Hence, once (inevitably)
% Pedio got in on the act it was there to stay.
But I bet pedio has been around for ever. And many pedio strains don't make
normal beer into lambic or are readily detectable. I know of an instance where
no one detected that pedio was in the yeast. Pilsner Urquell cools in large
open tubs :-) Of course maybe belgians jsut don't care to much about bacterial
problems. Look at the bugs you cna find in the sediment of almost any bottle
conditioned beer from there. :-)
%
% That is the essential content of my rant. I hope it will produce comments (and
% constructive flames), particularly from those who feel they are just lurkers -
% this forum certainly benefits at least as much from the comments the "experts"
% hand out as from the "foolish" comments supplied by "people who don't know".
And which group do you fall into (g)
Todd wrote:
% 6. Who's to say that other breweries don't have Pedio problems?
Or yeast producers.
Scott wrote:
% Gueze Boon has a definite lactic character. Not as hard as Cantillon,
% but I'd guesstimate that the pH is in the range of 3.5-3.7. I doubt
% that one can make a beer that acidic without lactic acid bacteria.
% See my later posting my my pLambic with fruits for further comments.
%
I think you might be able to do it with brett. Also don't forget the othe
lactic acid bacteria, lactobaccilu, or which there seems to be a fair amount in
cantillion and boon bottles.
Marc wrote:
%
% Hello fellow lambic brewers,
% I am seriously excited to see all the discussion of brett. going on
% in the digest lately. It is an area in which I am lacking. In fact
% right at this very moment I am culturing wyeast's brett. brux.
% strain.
That afternoon( roughly 8 hours later) the
% cultures(all three simultaneously) were bustling with big brimming
% heads like regular sach. Now from what I've read brett. should not be
% cranking like this. So what'ya think--three simultaneous erroneous
% innoculations or not?
Do we know for usre that the Wyeast "brett" is a brettanomyces? This is this
weeks project when the package arrives :-) You could have a contamination
problem. also if there is enough oxygen it could undergo vigorous activity
depending on the behavior of the individual strain. Anyone else have
experience with this strain? I guess that is it for today.
Jim
------------------------------
End of Lambic Digest
************************
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