Brett

Get advice on making beer from raw ingredients (malt, hops, water and yeast)
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wilfh
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Brett

Post by wilfh » Wed Jul 17, 2013 6:59 pm

Was reading a blog about Brett in a ipa(shut up about Barclay Perkins I think ) that mentioned that Brett had was originally isolated from an ipa. This sounds interesting as I was under the understanding in my limit experience admittedly that low lightly hopped beers worked best with the Brett flavours.
Anyone tried a veritable hop bomb with brett And if so what were the results like?

Eadweard
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Re: Brett

Post by Eadweard » Wed Jul 17, 2013 9:18 pm

It was originally isolated from an English stock ale, but would have grown in IPAs too, which evolved from stock ales.

Gadds did a version of their East Kent IPA with added Brett C and I thought it worked, in fact I must see if I can get more of it...

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seymour
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Re: Brett

Post by seymour » Wed Jul 17, 2013 9:51 pm

Eadweard wrote:It was originally isolated from an English stock ale, but would have grown in IPAs too, which evolved from stock ales...
That's what I've read too. Brettanomyces claussenii was isolated from English stock ale at the Carlsberg brewery/lab in Denmark in 1904 by N. Hjelte Claussen, in their search to identify spoilage agents. Another famous brett strain is English too: NCYC 362, Brettanomyces bruxellensis, isolated from an anonymized UK brewery's stout in 1952.

Belter

Re: Brett

Post by Belter » Wed Jul 17, 2013 9:58 pm

Hence the title 'Brettano' myces

super_simian
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Re: Brett

Post by super_simian » Thu Jul 18, 2013 4:48 pm

The British fungus.

hopsinjoor

Re: Brett

Post by hopsinjoor » Fri Jul 19, 2013 3:58 am

It's a fun yeast to brew with, takes it's sweet time to brew anything up, but the results can be pretty fantastic, I just drank a bottle of a hoppy red rye ale brewed only with brett. Lovely.

It's fun to experiment with, but be ready to clean the bejesus out of everything if you don't want cross-contamination. Brett can create a bio-film on surfaces, so just sanitising doesn't clean it, you need to actually scrub it out.

Worth it though, if you fancy experimenting.

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seymour
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Re: Brett

Post by seymour » Fri Jul 19, 2013 2:26 pm

hopsinjoor wrote:It's a fun yeast to brew with, takes it's sweet time to brew anything up, but the results can be pretty fantastic, I just drank a bottle of a hoppy red rye ale brewed only with brett. Lovely...
Oh god that sounds glorious. Was it your own? Would you consider sharing the recipe?

I'm especially interested in hop selection. It seems to me most strong New World hops would conflict with the subtleties of brett, but that perhaps a high level of perfumey, earthy, peppery noble hops would be more complimentary?

hopsinjoor

Re: Brett

Post by hopsinjoor » Fri Jul 19, 2013 3:14 pm

Yeah, it was my recipe, and I'd be happy to share. The first beer I properly brewed with brett was a second runnings pale, low gravity, with lots of hops. Nice, this was a little bigger, and a little more specific to what I fancied brewing at the time.

Gyle # 0016, Ryan Brett (say it out loud, it'll make sense).

20 litre batch size brew date 05/05/2013.

6000g Marris Otter (88.11%)
220g Caramunich (3.23%)
260g Rye (3.82%)
330 Crystal (60-75L) (4.85%)

17 litres Mash for 1 hour, then 14.1 litres sparge, total liquor 31.1 litres.

Columbus 39g 16.5% @60 60.7 IBU
Marynka 29g 8.0% @40 13.2 IBU
Chinook 15g 10.3% @20 8.8 IBU
Willamette 15g 5.7% @20 4.9 IBU
Chinook 15g 10.3% @15 7.2 IBU
Willamette 15g 5.7% @15 4.0 IBU
Chinook 15g 10.3% @10 5.3 IBU
Willamette 15g 5.7% @10 2.9 IBU
Chinook 25g 10.3% @5 4.8 IBU
Willamette 25g 5.7% @5 2.7 IBU
Chinook 30g 10.3% @0 0 IBU
Willamette 30g 5.7% @0 0 IBU
Triskel 25g 7.3% @0 0.0 IBU
Triskel 75g 7.3% @dryhop 0.0 IBU
Marynka 75g 8.0% @dryhop 0.0 IBU

Mash Water Treatment
Gypsum 4.3g
Calcium Chloride 2.5g
Sparge Water Treatment
Gypsum 3.5g
Calcium Chloride 2.0g

Brew took until the 18th to be certain and finished, to racked off trub and then dry hopped.

Cold Conditioned on the 22nd, then bottled on the 26th.

Got 68% system efficiency, so I got an OG of 1.071, and an FG of 1.009 with an ABV of 8.1%

Mash was held at 64 degrees for 1 hour, sparge at 80 degrees. 1 hour boil.
Last edited by hopsinjoor on Sat Jul 20, 2013 6:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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seymour
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Re: Brett

Post by seymour » Fri Jul 19, 2013 4:29 pm

Oh hell yeah, that is a truly creative recipe, seemingly custom-made to my taste buds. I hope this doesn't sound condescending: but I'm very impressed and inspired. Peppery rye with spicy brett? Great idea. Some marshmallowy-candy-sweetness from CaraMunich, toffee and dried fruit and caramel from the Crystal? Great ideas. Crazy cool mix of hops: I love the fruitiness of Chinook to begin with (sorry, Barley Water, I just do, I don't pickup the alleged harshness at all), and considering Marynka is a spicier descendent of peppery Saaz, Willamette is a spicier descendent of woodsy Fuggles, and Triskel is a spicier descendent of perfumey Spalt, it looks like you've got a perfect blend of Old World and New World going on there, particularly with some "Burtonizing" salts to really make 'em pop-out. Great colour, big maltiness, big hoppy balance, big spiciness, big bizarre fermentation aspects, big alcohol...

I guarantee I'd stop for a pint on my way home tonight, more except I wouldn't be safe to drive, so I'd fill a growler to go. Way to go, Mate. Thanks for sharing.
hopsinjoor wrote:It's fun to experiment with, but be ready to clean the bejesus out of everything if you don't want cross-contamination. Brett can create a bio-film on surfaces, so just sanitising doesn't clean it, you need to actually scrub it out...
Who cares?! If this beer tastes as good as I think, don't scrub anything, just keep brewing this recipe the rest of your life. :)

hopsinjoor

Re: Brett

Post by hopsinjoor » Sat Jul 20, 2013 6:21 pm

You've pretty much got it nailed for how it tastes, I was going for big sweet, spicey, caramelly, and peppery from the malts, and to compliment it I went for pretty big fruity and spicy hops. I Burtonised the water as I was treating it as an IPA style from the water treatment side, due to the large amount of hops that I wanted to be big (especially as the brett can leave a "ghost hop" thing going on if you don't use enough).

It's something I will definitely brew again, it's got pretty much every flavour working well, with not much in the way of any over dominating at all. I'm just growing another brett starter so that I can. The reason I have to keep doing starters is because I end up using so much brett when I brew a beer, and then wonder what it would taste like aged on brett.

hopsinjoor

Re: Brett

Post by hopsinjoor » Sat Jul 20, 2013 6:23 pm

I've edited the recipe post a little, the strike temperature was 73 degrees C, for a mash of 64 degrees. Not a mash of 73 degrees C. Sorry for the mistake.

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