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Lambic Digest V1 #024
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lambic-digest Tuesday, 14 October 1997 Volume 01 : Number 024
Re: brett and head retention
Off the deep end.
Eating crow and more brettt stuff
Strange Strains
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Conn Copas <conn.copas at dsto.defence.GOV.AU>
Date: Mon, 13 Oct 1997 11:52:06 +0930 (CST)
Subject: Re: brett and head retention
Jim writes:
>I'll have to do some bottle conditioning wiht this yeast. But again brett has
>the enyzmatic ability to degrade all the dextrins in the beer. And how does
>what a yeast does have anything to do with a lingering head. I thought the
>beer foam was related to proteins. Historically silliness?
It's not the first time I have heard the claim made that yeast strain can
affect head retention, but I don't have much to offer in the way of theoretical
support. Apart from protein degradation (which Rob suggested tentatively),
another possibility is lipid production and, given that lambics are technically
autolysed, that factor could assume greater importance. On the other hand, my
experience is that the influence of unsaturated lipids from the wort swamps
any influence from the yeast. That is, bright worts in general have good foam
retention, and the beers made from those worts have comparatively good heads
at early stages of maturation.
------------------------------
From: Jim Liddil <jliddil at azcc.arizona.edu>
Date: Mon, 13 Oct 1997 15:41:37 -0700
Subject: Off the deep end.
As a little introduction here is the intro from Lambic by JX Guinard, a
book published by an arm of the AOB.
Lambic is the only beer of its kind in the world. It is made by spontaneous
fermentation of a wort produced from 40 percent unmalted wheat and 60
percent barley
malt.=20
Lambic is brewed mostly within ten miles of the city of Brussels, <snip>.
Production is concentrated in the western districts of Brussels,
spreading out into the nearby farming villages collectively known as
Payottenland.
Lambics of different ages are then blended and bottled to
make gueuze.
A secondary fermentation takes place in the bottle, as in the m=E9thode
Champenoise used to make champagne. For this fermentation to occur and to
produce the
right flavor and amount of carbon dioxide, the brewer must skillfully blend
his
lambics to achieve the right amount of fermentable extract in the bottle.
It takes at
least a year in the bottle to make a good gueuze (6 to 8 percent alcohol by
volume). Some
breweries and caf=E9s offer sweetened young (fox) lambic called lambic doux
fresh out
of the cask. A few breweries also produce a version of lambic that has been
aged
for three years in wood and one year in the bottle. This version, called=
vieux
lambic (old lambic), is devoid of carbon dioxide and is sour and very dry.
The GABF Descriptions. =20
Belgian-Style Lambic Unblended, naturally fermented lambic is intensely
estery,
sour and acetic flavored. Low in CO2, these hazy beers are brewed with
unmalted wheat and
malted barley. They are very low in hop bitterness. Cloudiness is
acceptable. These beers are quite dry and light bodied.
Belgian-Style Gueuze Lambic These unflavored blended and secondary fermented
lambic beers may be very dry or mildly sweet and are characterized by
intensely fruity-estery, sour and acidic flavors. These pale beers are
brewed with unmalted wheat, malted barley, and stale, aged hops. They are
very low in hop bitterness. Cloudiness is acceptable. These beers are quite
dry and light bodied.=20
>From Peter Crombecq's Belgian Beer Pages:
The traditional lambic is a sour beer of 100% spontaneous fermentation with=
at
least 30% of wheat used as a basic ingredient. Young lambic is slightly
sour, old lambic has greater acidity. The name lambic covers blends with
sweet low or high fermentation beer, so that there is no clarity where this
style is
concerned. Lambic, too, is fast disappearing.
Geuze is made of 100% lambic beer which undergoes additional fermentation on
the bottle. The taste ranges from sour over sourish-bitterish to bitterish.
There is no trace of sweetness in the taste. Traditional geuze is
disappearing.
*******
This information is provided to support the following views. Use the page
down key as needed. :-) As you may recall the 1997 Gold medal winner was a
Lambic Gueuze and the Silver was a Lambic. In my view anything simply
called Lambic is made in Belgium and is made from 100% spontaneously
fermented wort. Anything else should be referred to by another name. Also
note that gueuze is a bottled beer and refermented in the bottle. Thus the
Gold medal winner is completely mislabeled and gives merit to the recent
column by Alan Moen in BT. The Gold medal "thing" was not made by
spontaneous fermentation and it was served from a keg. So it can not be
called a gueuze either. =20
And I find the GABF description odd. "Belgian Style Lambic and Gueuze
Lambic" As if there is "Arizona Style Lambic" And the gueuze description
says nothing about refermentation in the bottle. This all leads to a
slippery slope. We already have Jim Kock and his Cranberry (tm) Lambic
(tm). Now the AOB and the Papazian Empire are opening the door for more of
this blasphemy. =20
Then I asked:
=20
>Can anyone comment on the "lambic" beers that won a gold and silver at the
GABF
>in the Belgian Specialty category. I think calling these beers lambics is
>blasphemy but maybe Cleveland and Fremont are now part of the Senne
Valley. :-)
From: Southern Draft Brew News <brewnews at mindspring.com>
Date: Tue, 07 Oct 1997 03:12:04 -0400
Subject: Re: Lambic at the GABF
>The 2 guerze that were entered both received medals. No, they weren't made
>in Belgium. But both were good to excellent examples of U.S. made lambics.
>Some discussion ensued at the judging table as to the authenticity of these
>2 beers, but I sleep at night with a clear conscience with my decisions :-)
I would remind you that a gueuze is a beer refermented in the bottle. You
may say I'm being overly anal but it goes to the heart of my arguement. =20
>From my discussions with both of the brewers following the award ceremony,
>it sounds like both have enough product remaining to enter the beers in the
>next few GABF's, if they choose to (if they don't drink it all themselves
>first). If they do, maybe next year they will be even better examples.
This suggests to me that they are not selling this beer. The easy way out
is to say they are letting it age. Then why take it to the GABF to start
with if it is not ready? I would suggest that they are not selling the
beer to the general public because the beer is only marginal. The various
judges comments on this forum seem to coo berate this opinion. At the GABF
you can get away with serving anything since many people are there to try
all the stuff for one low price. =20
=20
Then John Isenhour wrote:
Jim asks:
>> Can anyone comment on the "lambic" beers that won
>The brewer who won the gold was trained in the lambic style by myself, and=
I=20
>consulted heavily on brewing that particular batch. IMHO it was way young,=
=20
>not very complex nor sour, but it has potential. Its in oak barrels=20
>and should only get better, time will tell. (However, I dont tell ALL my=
=20
>secrets, as is in proper alignment with belgian brewing tradition:)
Based on the various comments here and via private e-mail it sounds like
you really did not tell them much or they did not listen.
=20
>I would not dare to call any of this lambic but this is due to the name=20
>of the catagory, blame GABF.
So call it something else. It's a principal issue. Has American brewing
all slid down the slope of money and awards?=20
Is the GABF getting like the AHA Nationals where it seems that because
there are gold silver and bronze medals we should give them out, regardless
of the true and actual quality of the beers? Again based on the various
comments here it seems to me that these misnamed, sub 30 point beers should
not have won anything and no gold or silver should have been given at all.
So call me extreme I don't see anybody else taking a stand.
Jim
------------------------------
From: Jim Liddil <JLIDDIL at AZCC.Arizona.EDU>
Date: Tue, 14 Oct 1997 8:09:22 -0700 (MST)
Subject: Eating crow and more brettt stuff
Rob wrote:
> Hello all,
> a few more bits of info. (and a bit of bait)
> firstly, Guiness do not use Brettanomyces in thier brewery.
Well maybe not for the vast majority of their beer. But Until I see otherwise
I think the mythical wood vats at St James Gate have more in the wood than
lactic acid bacteria.
> Secondly, B. anomalus is (or was) the single most important factor in producing
> British Stock Ales. (for reasons I'll go into if anyone cares)
After having reviewed some literature I'm not convinced that B. anomalus is the
only brett strain of importance. In a historical context what was call B.
claussenii Custers is likely one of the strains. It seems strains that ferment
cellobiose are a good candidate since this is a component of oak.
In J. appl. bact 29 (2) pp 244
Gilliland (who was at the St james gate brewery) only mentions yeasts of the
Brettanomyces genus. Also it would appear that lactic acid bacteria are
another important component.
And I'm going to agree that for at least a few beers brett is still important.
Greene King being one. I find it odd that with all the literature on brett in
strong beers, that Ray Daniels only gives it passing mention in his book and
the Zymrugy article.
> Thirdly, I think we are all missing the point with B Brux and B. Lam.
> In Verachterts simbiotic paper, he notes the continuous presence of
> b anomalus throughout fermentation. The others are merely blips in the
> readings. I suspect that B anomalus is the most important of that
> species present. Certainly the x (15?) year old cantillon Mike Sharp
> and I tasted bore evidence to that. B. Anomalus when cultured in sealed vessels
> produces a superb head on beer, without too much acetification (cf BB and BL)
> Cheers,
> Rob
Again I disagree with the basic premise of yeast strain ahving anything to do
with head formation and carbonation. CO2 is all the same. And I think the
acetification issue is largely strain independent. I think it is an issue of
air expsure. When ever brett of any type is put into an aerobic environment it
will produce acetic acid. But I have not seen any controlled experiments to
prove me right or wrong wrt to actual bottle conditioning experiments.
Rob further writes:
> to using non Sacch bugs in English beers is the secondary fermentation
> and condition which is induced (by B. anomalus). I'm still checking back
> on some obscure literature which may tell me what the overall effect was.
>
"they produced a pleasant flavour in beers of orignal gravity about 1075"
But it could take 2 years or more. Or you can find the British patent for
using the brett and lactic bacteria in a closed packed vessel.
As an aside the heavy beer at rodenbach is only 13.5 P
I wrote in response to Rob:
> >
> > >I wouldn't mind getting a bit of lactic "tang" like Guiness, but I'm not
> > >sure how I would control the Ped.'s growth.
> > Brett (Jim: see below) will give a lactic acidity
>
> I have never read about brettanomyces of any type producing lactic acid. Acetic
> yes, lactic no. Baloney is my impolite response.
>
I'll have to eat Crow Baloney. In Van Oevlen's dissertaion he did measure
lactic acid in pure cultures of brett. But the highest he measrued was 500 ppm
and the taste threshold for lactic acid is about 400 ppm. Also in Beer and
Wine Production (ACS Book) in the chapter on Dekkera and Brett they did
experiments using french Colombard juice and innoculated it with brett and
found no measurable lactic acid. I know it's not wort. Also none of the other
refercnes I have talks about lactic acid. Acetic acid seems to be the more
important charcteristic, no that lactic is not. And finally I think the lacitc
acidity in guiness and beer of old and rodenbach is a product of lactic acid
bacteria. Gilliland mentions L. pastorianus as the key player, though I don't
know if it is still classified as such.
So it would seem that As many have mentioned a real relationship between
English beers and Rodenbach. Make a 1075 beer and ferment it and add some
lactic bacteria and brett. Make sure it is not over attneuated when you do
this. I guess a low innoculum of ale yeast might ensure this along wiht no
oxygenation. Another experiment> :-)
Jim
------------------------------
From: Paul Niebergall <pnieb at burnsmcd.com>
Date: Tue, 14 Oct 1997 13:09:49 -0500
Subject: Strange Strains
Hi All,
I know this probably comes up here all the time, but can someone please
explain to me (again) the following:
Most of the recipies, books, and articles that I have read seem to
recommend pitching an ale yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae), followed
by Brettanomyces and Pediococcus cultures. I assume these cultures
can be pitched all at once or an elaborate pitching schedule can be
developed. Some recipies go straight to the Brettanomyces culture and
apparently skip the Saccharomyces cerevisiae culture altogether. My
question are as follows:
Is it all right to go straight to the Brettanomyces and skip the
Saccharomyces cerevisiae?
If using Saccharomyces cerevisiae first, will there be plenty of food left
over for the Brettanomyces to eat after the Saccharomyces cerevisiae
has done its work?
***And now for the questions you probably get all the time:***
What is in the Wyeast 3278 (Belgian Lambic Blend)? Is it Brettanomyces
and Pediococcus cultures mixed (the pamplet seems to allude to this)?
Does it have any Saccharomyces cerevisiae?
(As you may have surmized, I any thinking of going with the Wyeast
3278. I am just trying to figure out if I need to pitch a starter of
Saccharomyces cerevisiae prior to or with the Wyeast 3278 blend - IF
using Saccharomyces cerevisiae I will probably use Wyeast 1056 or
some similar nuetral strain).
TIA
Paul Niebergall
Kansas City, MO
(pnieb at burnsmcd.com)
------------------------------
End of lambic-digest V1 #24
***************************
