Guinness sour mash with mixed grain

[BrewDorg]

I just got a custom grain kit from geterbrewed for a dry Irish stout (a la Guinness, but not quite). I was planned to steep 200g Maris Otter in mash temp water for ~3 days to sour it, then add into the fermenter to give it the Guinness sour mash twang (I will boil this first of course). However, I completely forgot that the custom grain kit would come all crushed and mixed together, so I can't steep the Maris Otter on its own (my own fault entirely).

Question is, should I just take out 200g of the whole mix to sour or is there some other procedure I could follow? Does anyone here have experience with brewing a dry Irish stout with a portion of soured mash? I don't necessarily want this to be exactly like Guinness but something along that line.

[Drum]

Not really an answer for you, but I read something somewhere about pouring a can of actual guinness into a bowl and letting it sit in open air for a few days to sour, then boil and add to your brew, Cant remember where I read it or if it works but could be another option to look into

[BrewDorg]

Sound, I've looked that up since and could be an option.

The other option I'm going to consider is pulling ~700ml (4%) of my pre-boil wort and souring that. Some people on other forums claim to have had success that way.

[imark]

Not sure that Guinness do sour mashes but in any case sour mashing with just grains as your inoculation can be hit and miss. My advice is to buy some lactic acid and you can add a little bit to a pint to see if it gives you the results you're hoping for. It'll be simpler and if you don't like the results you've still got the rest of the brew in a drinkable state.

[BrewDorg]

Yet another possibility. I already have the lactic acid for my water adjustments, so could easily include it.

Found this useful article that appears to confirm that Guinness use lactic acid these days as opposed to blending portions of soured mash. Also interesting that it looks like they mash the roasted grains separately to avoid astringency (which I also can't do now ).

https://www.fivebladesbrewing.com/guinness-secrets-revealed/

[cruiscinlan]

Yet another possibility. I already have the lactic acid for my water adjustments, so could easily include it.

Found this useful article that appears to confirm that Guinness use lactic acid these days as opposed to blending portions of soured mash. Also interesting that it looks like they mash the roasted grains separately to avoid astringency (which I also can't do now ).

https://www.fivebladesbrewing.com/guinness-secrets-revealed/

If you take a look in the recipe thread I've put up links to this in recreating historic irish recipes.  Also your man only says that he thinks they add it. 

I've heard the contrary from sources within Diageo i.e. that a soured extract/porter is still made and blended as about 3% of the mix.

[irish_goat]

One of our BrewCon speakers,Dr Gearoid Cahill, is a former Master Brewer at St. Jame's Gate. You could try asking him next weekend, although there might be a chance that it counts as a trade secret and he won't be allowed to say. Either way, I'm sure he'd be able to tell you how to go about achieving the sour twang.

[irish_goat]

Better still, submit it as a question for him.

http://www.nationalhomebrewclub.ie/forum/index.php/topic,15480.0.html

[cruiscinlan]

One of our BrewCon speakers,Dr Gearoid Cahill, is a former Master Brewer at St. Jame's Gate. You could try asking him next weekend, although there might be a chance that it counts as a trade secret and he won't be allowed to say. Either way, I'm sure he'd be able to tell you how to go about achieving the sour twang.

I'm afraid that many of us have tried that in the past and although I understand why Diageo don't want to/won't discuss current production techniques they also refuse all and any research into what was made in the past not only at the main brewery in St. James' Gate, but also in every regional brewery they bought. 

This despite the fact that chemical analysis showing abv., acidity etc. over time in research conducted by their main competitors in the UK and is publicly available.

[irish_goat]

Mmm, have heard that before actually. Well, he might still give advice on the techniques involved anyway.

[BrewDorg]

@cruiscinlan I've also seen that 3% figure on other forums, I must take a look at the thread you mentioned now. I'd like to avoid the lactic route if I'm honest but we shall see.

@irish_goat BrewCon won't be happening for me unfortunately. The trip to Dublin is one expense I can't stretch to this month. If someone else wants to ask though, feel free to do so on my behalf  As mentioned though, he probably won't be allowed to divulge anything!

[Leann ull]

Look what popped into my inbox tonight


BeerSmith Home Brewing News

Soured Beer in Homebrewing

The use of soured beer is an ancient technique used to add character to many beer styles.   One of my personal favorites, the Irish Stout, often includes a small addition of soured wort.  Sour beer dates back to the ancient times, as the discovery of beer likely occurred when someone left some wet grains out and they started fermenting.  It has also been widely used in Belgian beers, where in many cases entire batches are left to sour in open vats, producing many sour styles such as Lambic and Flanders.  Flanders brown is often made with blended sour and unsoured beer.  I won't cover Lambics in great detail here, as the methods used for Lambics vary considerably, but also often include blending soured wort with unsoured beer.

Brewing with sour beer at home involves taking a portion of the wort from your mash (or for extract brewers, a portion from the boil) and setting it aside and either adding souring yeasts such as Lactobacillus or letting it sour naturally.Personally I recommend getting some Lactobacillus culture such as Wyeast Labs #4335 "Lactobacillus Delbrueckii" as natural yeasts and bacteria can often go awry.  For Lambics, Wyeast #3112 "Brettanomyces Bruxellensis" or Brewtek's "Brettanomyces Lambicus" are often used with other yeasts as part of the main fermentation or part of the fermentation.  The spoiled wort is then pasteurized by heating it and added back into the original beer to give a slightly sour character to the beer.This will add character and a lactic sourness to the beer, which is desirable for many styles.

The Sour Mash Method

If you are brewing an all grain batch, a portion of the runnings from your mash tun should be collected and set aside in a separate container.For something like an Irish Stout, I typically would set aside 1/2 quarts of wort from the middle runnings of the mash and set it aside for a 5 gallon batch.  A good rule of thumb is that your spoiled wort should only make up about 3-4% of your total finished volume for stouts, and up to 25% of your volume for a Flanders Brown Ale, though I recommend starting with less and blending to taste.  If you use too much you will end up with excessively sour beer.

For extract brewers, you can draw a portion of the wort near the beginning of the boil, ideally after you add your extract but before adding the hops, as hops themselves can have an antibiotic effect.

Once you have collected your wort, simply set it aside in a small closed container and continue to brew the remainder of your batch in the normal way.For the sour portion I prefer to simply add a small amount of Lactobacillus bacteria strain to the wort, apply an airlock, and let it sour in a cool, dark location.

The soured wort will quickly get a sour smell, and likely a disgusting film over the top.After a few days it should be thoroughly infested and largely fermented.At this point, carefully siphon or skim and pour the liquid, attempting to leave as much of the scum and sediment behind as possible.

Place the soured wort in a pan and heat it to 170F and hold it there for at least 30 minutes.This will pasteurize the soured wort to kill off the bacteria and yeast without destroying the sour lactic acid flavor you want in your beer.

Rapidly cool the sour portion, being careful at this point to handle it with sanitized equipment.Siphon or very gently pour the soured wort into your already fermenting main batch, and continue fermenting, aging and bottling the beer as you normally would.

Done properly, the sour mash method will produce a slight, but not overly pronounced sour edge to your beer.In styles such as classic Irish Stout, the sourness helps to enhance the overall flavor mix of stout roast barley and English hops.  For Flanders, this provides the classic sour twang.  This technique can also be used to sour some more sophisticated Belgian styles, though brewing a complex beast like a Lambic is beyond the scope of this particular article.

I hope you enjoy adding a bit of sour twang to your next homebrew.

As a reminder - you can get many of these articles collected in printed form by purchasing my book "Home Brewing with BeerSmith" from Amazon!

Brad Smith
BeerSmith.com

[BrewDorg]

Great timing for that piece I don't want to add lacto to the soured part though, so here's my plan baed on what I've rwad about so far.

1. Collect ~700ml (3% of my 23L fermenter volume) of pre-boil wort from my mash tun.
2. Leave this at room temperature for 3-4 days (until primary fermentation has finished up maybe)
3. Boil this wort for 15-30 mins
4. Add wort to fermenter

Hopefully this will add a very subtle twang to the final beer. I'm happy to leave off the lacto as I'd imagine that would be more appropriate for a funkier style like a Flanders. I really only want this to be minimal to give the stout some complexity.

[imark]

In all likelihood it is the lactobacillus that will create the lactic acid that you seem to be after. So adding lactic acid directly would give you far greater control over the amount in your beer.
Bear in mind that you want anaerobic environment for lactobacillus to produce this and the correct temperature maintained.
Someone on here did what you propose to do previously with poor results (if I remember correctly). But there's no harm experimenting. Good luck and let us know how you get on.

[BrewDorg]

I'd be wary of spoiling a whole batch at the same time though...

What is the best way to determine how much lactic acid to add? I have 10ml syringes for the acid so measuring volumes somewhat accurately should be no problem. I understand that it might be less than 1ml per bottle (batch is 40 bottles) I need to add though, so figuring out those volumes is my issue. If I pull a sample before bottling, add my drop of acid and think it's ok at that point, isn't it possible that it could be totally different after 2 weeks bottle conditioning? That's my only hang up right now with adding lactic acid directly. I haven't been able to find a solid resource on this yet.