Blackberry Sour

[peterpiper]

One of the most critical factors is pitching rate, Philly Sour is really sensitive to pitch rate which is why people have problems with reusing it. Just going from 1bn cells/litre to 2bn cells/litre can increase the final pH by 0.2-0.3.

See the suigeneris blogs I linked to over in the main HBT thread :
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/thread...xperience-to-share.682096/page-7#post-9085562

Thanks, lots of detail there.
I used 1 pack Philly Sour in a 22l batch, not sure what that is in cells/litre.
OG 1.047, ferment 25C. After 9 days PH 3.2

 

[peterpiper]

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[peterpiper]

First (proper) tasting of Blackcurrant Sour, based on ClownPrince's recipe.

Lovely colour, a very refreshing summer beer.

OG: 1.047 (before blackcurrant & lactose additions), FG: 1.007, target 1.009
ABV 6.3%
PH 3.2 @ day 9

21 litre batch
Yeast: 1 pack Philly Sour.
Ferment: 25°C for 9 days

Malts (4 kg)
2 kg (40.8%) — BESTMALZ BEST Pilsen — Grain — 3.5 EBC
2 kg (40.8%) — Weyermann Wheat Malt, Pale — Grain — 3.9 EBC

Other
500 g (10.2%) — Sugar, Table (Sucrose) — Sugar — 2 EBC — Primary
Blackcurrants, boiled, crushed & cooled: 1kg at start of ferment; 500g at day 7.
500 g (8.2%) — Milk Sugar (Lactose) — Sugar — 0 EBC — End of ferment

Hops (10 g)
10 g (11 IBU) — Northdown 8.5% — Boil — 60 min


Recipe called for 400g lactose. This upped to 500g. But still a little tart, and I wouldn't want more than one pint!
This could just be from using blackcurrants, which are fairly tart, to start with.

Next year, I'll try aiming for a bit more body, to balance the acidity. With more dextrins, from either a higher mash temperature, or adding some Cara malt.
Alternative might be to reduce the acidity (up the PH), by reducing the initial % of blackcurrants (with higher % later), or reducing the amount of Sucrose.

 

[ClownPrince]

First (proper) tasting of Blackcurrant Sour, based on ClownPrince's recipe.

Lovely colour, a very refreshing summer beer.

OG: 1.047 (before blackcurrant & lactose additions), FG: 1.007, target 1.009
ABV 6.3%
PH 3.2 @ day 9

21 litre batch
Yeast: 1 pack Philly Sour.
Ferment: 25°C for 9 days

Malts (4 kg)
2 kg (40.8%) — BESTMALZ BEST Pilsen — Grain — 3.5 EBC
2 kg (40.8%) — Weyermann Wheat Malt, Pale — Grain — 3.9 EBC

Other
500 g (10.2%) — Sugar, Table (Sucrose) — Sugar — 2 EBC — Primary
Blackcurrants, boiled, crushed & cooled: 1kg at start of ferment; 500g at day 7.
500 g (8.2%) — Milk Sugar (Lactose) — Sugar — 0 EBC — End of ferment

Hops (10 g)
10 g (11 IBU) — Northdown 8.5% — Boil — 60 min


Recipe called for 400g lactose. This upped to 500g. But still a little tart, and I wouldn't want more than one pint!
This could just be from using blackcurrants, which are fairly tart, to start with.

Next year, I'll try aiming for a bit more body, to balance the acidity. With more dextrins, from either a higher mash temperature, or adding some Cara malt.
Alternative might be to reduce the acidity (up the PH), by reducing the initial % of blackcurrants (with higher % later), or reducing the amount of Sucrose.

Looks stunning, feels a bit surreal someone brewed a beer based on my recipe. I've actually made the blackberry sour again since. I substituted a kilo of the Pilsner Malt for Vienna and it added a sizeable amount more body to it as well as lowering the abv slightly.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

Recipe called for 400g lactose. This upped to 500g. But still a little tart, and I wouldn't want more than one pint!

That's OK, some beers are just like that, they don't all have to be session beers.

But personally I'd be looking to reduce lactose not increase it, I find there are few beers that are improved by lactose but it gets used as some kind of universal band-aid for poor brewing.

Next year, I'll try aiming for a bit more body, to balance the acidity. With more dextrins, from either a higher mash temperature, or adding some Cara malt.
Alternative might be to reduce the acidity (up the PH), by reducing the initial % of blackcurrants (with higher % later), or reducing the amount of Sucrose.

Strikes me that all of your problems could be fixed by having less optimal conditions for the Philly Sour, so that it attenuates less (sweeter, more body) and produces less acid. So I'd be looking at doing a starter, which would strip out sterols, and increase your cell count both of which will be less optimal for the yeast. And don't oxygenate the wort.

 

[peterpiper]

......
But personally I'd be looking to reduce lactose not increase it, I find there are few beers that are improved by lactose but it gets used as some kind of universal band-aid for poor brewing.

Strikes me that all of your problems could be fixed by having less optimal conditions for the Philly Sour, so that it attenuates less (sweeter, more body) and produces less acid. So I'd be looking at doing a starter, which would strip out sterols, and increase your cell count both of which will be less optimal for the yeast. And don't oxygenate the wort.

Forgot to mention in post, that I didn't fancy even the suggested 400g of lactose. So tried post ferment additions, starting from 200g, but that was way too tart.

Struggled, at the time, to find alternative tested recipes, for a Philly fruit sour. And ClownPrince's looked fine as a starting point for experimenting.
I'll happily add lactose, rather than throw a test batch away.

Since came across Raspberry sour recipe with higher grain proportion. But it notes that, more body and sweetness would help, and suggests lactose!


Info from lallemandbrewing/ Philly sour webinar
Majority of lactic acid is produced over the first 5 days.
Brewhouse turns, work fine and don’t affect final PH. Provided that second turn is added while yeast is in the acid producing phase (within 24 hours to be certain).
So delaying, in starter by a day or two, mightn’t help.

Overpitching can reduce final acidity. But for their highest pitch rate example, they say “this might” reduce acidity by 24%.
Underpitching, at 0.1 g/l, can give a 58% reduction.
But you'd definately need a second yeast, from day 4, for ethanol production.

lallemandbrewing/philly-sour-faq-2
Higher levels of glucose in the wort, either from lower mash temperatures or glucose added as an adjunct, will increase lactic acid levels.

Co-pitching with small amounts of another brewing strain will reduce the amount of lactic acid produced due to competition for sugars (in the lab, 10% Nottingham cut the lactic acid level by about 50%)
But the webinar, says “don’t co-pitch”.

“Philly Sour should NOT be used as the fermenting strain during bottle conditioning”. They don’t explain why, but it could be it’s not reliable, because it’s high flocculation might leave little in suspension. This is given as the likely reason for stuck fermentations, at lower temperatures.
I'd not noticed that warning. So bottle conditioned as normal (no added yeast), but with no problems. Maybe botteling at day 9, or raising some yeast sediment before priming, helped.

Couldn’t see any mention, of sterols (nutrients) affecting lactic acid production. Have you seen this in relation to Philly Sour?
Also not clear how having a starter, would affect wort nutrient levels. Or is idea to stress the yeast while in the starter?

Next time, after a higher temperature mash, I'd make any glucose addition on day 5. So it produces mostly ethanol (along with any sweet fruits). But I suspect my blackcurrants contain fairly little sugar, so are probably still fine, going in at start.
A partial mash, with DME addition on day 5, could be another fix.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

But it notes that, more body and sweetness would help, and suggests lactose!

As I say, it's become a lazy substitute for good brewing...

Couldn’t see any mention, of sterols (nutrients) affecting lactic acid production. Have you seen this in relation to Philly Sour?

Sterols are not about nutrients other than oxygen. The reason yeast need oxygen in fermentation is not to "breathe" but as a chemical building block for sterols, which are key chemicals for building new cell membrane and hence yeast growth. Normally dry yeast are grown in conditions which mean they are jammed full of sterols, enough for around 3 of the 3-4 cell divisions of a typical beer fermentation. Which is why dry yeast don't really need oxygenation (which is great if other elements of your wort like the hops, don't want to be exposed to oxygen).

But putting dry yeast through a starter, particularly one without aeration, means that it goes through cell division without adding much sterol to the total biomass, so the average sterols per cell declines to the level you see in liquid yeast.

The suigeneris experiments I referred to above were done with "liquid" Philly Sour and found that less oxygenation means less acid and less attenuation. Which is what you want.