Zot ve Jester

[Kp2]

Thanks for everyone help this morning. It's been a sharp learning curve, but hay ho.
For those who haven't been following, heres a link :
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=32983
Did it work ? Fantastic......
It all started last Saturday. Checked the yeast slope, looks clean. (These are big picture, another job to sort out).

This is a reculter of Moinette Organic ale. What ? it's a farm house yeast used in session type beers. As you would expect, a rich red wine complex which should be slow to clear.
Now it brew Tuesday. The starter looks fine to me, shaken.

Not shaken:

So by 6:00pm I've got me boiling water ready. The kitchen is clear, no signs of the wife. Looking like I could be done and dusted by 12:00am. Poured the water to a cool box (hot box ?) to get to temperture(74c). Mean while I sort the Malts out. So far I cann't belive it going so well.
Then with in the next 15mins three phone calls.
First call,The wife, could you just pick me up? What? The water got to 82c, I am about to strike the grains and it's a best part of a 10 miles round trip.
Second call, a mate, I have your camara, dam, now that's a problem real problem.
Third call, local bee keeper, wonts a garden job done and honey containers back. Ok he got a point. The gardening supports the brewing and the honey will be making mead very soon.
So I hold the temperture at 74c ish intil I get the call to pick-up. Crash the malts in and de-lump the lot. Bang on 66c. Now I am late pick the wife up. Got me timer, 1hr 30min. Back in 15min, stir the mash, back out to the bee keeper. Typical,"Cup of tea?" I reply with out thinking, and end up talking about beer, honey and mead. Nipped back, stir the mash. O sugar, Camara, got 40 min on the timer. Get there, "Cup of tea?"What, cann't belive I said yes agian. Get back and desided It was a very thick mash at 15l to 5.3kg. Not to mention I'am now at 1hr an 40min. Sod it,it's a long mash day at 1hr50min. Final temperture is 62c. nice. It was a close one, even for me. Reckon I've got room for 400ml of liquid.(18L pot)

Start sproging

and finaly get my maxium literage on the boil.

Time is now 10:00pm. This is going to take a bit longer. I been cooking tea as well. But the wife is pleased to have been fed and now has the TV to herself. So it time for a beer, plus another for testing. Now I got time to show you the incubator:

And the contol box:

All of a sudden timing has become an issue, to many beers. But here's final hops herbs and moss. I had to use my gardening seed for coriander mass and I only had 1g at that. I will double check next time:

Time has reached late now, the wife gone to bed and all is quite. So on with the cold break. And this is what I got in reture:

Strained the lot and got what I was after 1.052 but at 20.5l not 22l. O well.

Right now it's very late 1:50am ish and it a school night. So I pitch the yeast and give it a hug before bed time. The washing up can wait.......
By lunch time (that day) we have lift off:

The result will follow. For the time being here what I re-call. The colour is on the pale side, smells maltly, and the yeast is working. Either way I have beer, Ace..One last picture, because I can:

Catch you all on the up-date where the beer has blowen up the incubator, rouge yeast has taken over, beer falls to clear and I drink it before it due date. kp2 over and out.

[Manx Guy]

Hi,

Looks like a good brewday desapite the interuptions!

Some great photos!
Did you construct those reinforces wooden shelves in your brewfridge yourself?
This is something I have considered doing... How did you get on?

Looking forward to seeing how this turns out!



Guy

[lancsSteve]

NICE! Good to see someone having a punt at something more exotic! Did rather like Zot when i tried it in Bruges earlier in the year - though Silly and Moinette took it for me... How easy was yeast to reculture? Any tips? I've got 3 bottles of Moinette (blonde / brown / saison) which I want to reculture from, and a poperings hommel bier planning on starters and then keeping some of the trub from end of fermentation and putting it in sterilised jars rather than slopes... (how easy/hard are slopes to do?) Also have some oude geuze in the cellar - waiting a year or two for them though!

Posted some thoughts on other thread as I'm about to laucnh myself into a lot more belgian stye brewing as it's perfect time of year now for high fermentation temsp (25-30 is good), wild yeasts flying around (part of it - if one goes sour keep it a LONG time and blend it back in with future brews!) and general radical brewing experimentation. Have some mixed belgian ale yeast in fridge and 3 bottles of moinette to try and reculture from...

Gonna make me some candi sugar first then make a wee plan...

Radical Brewing is a MUST READ the 'belgians are easy' chapter is really inspiring.

Good luck with it - bottle it and lay some down a good long time though and you should get rewarded.

[Kp2]

Guy, The reinforces wooden shelves are Sapele hardwood from West Africa. Well the wood came from my old lab at work. Nice bit of timber. The unit can now hold One King keg and just about 40x500ml bottles. No problems with the weight as yet.

Steve, Very easy to reculture. Sent the bottle to me (full) and I will extract the yeast, only joking. Nothing wrong in liquid cultures. But you do have to look after them ie feed them.

This is what I do and it's where most people will say " You did what ?" I had a bottle of the Moinette saison. With the bit in the bottom, I popped it in the fridge for day or too (increase yeast growth even at 4c). Flamed a wire loop, dipped it in to the remaining beer sludge and smeared it on to an agar slope. Leave on the side with top on, warmish temp intill you have reasonable growth. Then stored at 4c intil needed.

Why are slopes are by far the better media to work with ?
All the food a yeast needs is in the agar.
Autoclave (boil) the bottles and agar. Then set the agar in the bottles at an angle with the top lose. Then tighten the tops and store. If it's infected, you will see growth with-in a few days. Set temp 20c apx.
Very little space is needed so no troble using the frigde.
I currently have six yeast strains. Most have been 1st gen transfer for almost a year to date, (bring the old yeast on to a second slope, the frist is your working yeast, second is stored).
I tend to stay away from re-pitching from my brews as the yeast profile will change from batch to batch.

But I had to give the moinette a go. The reason was I was brewing Saison Dupont, wyeast abbey 1214 and Maple syripe / brew sugar primming, and it was pants. Bit like cider with an orange and wood alcohol taste/scent.

As for laying some down , um don't think it will happen. Currently tring to stay away from an muchin octoberfeast due for Jan.

[lancsSteve]

Made up some invert / candi demerera today which should be a nicer colourant... Trying to reculture the saison from bottle starting in 50ml of wort and will step up if that works... Else belgian blend from whitelabs is in the fridge...

Now to recipe formulation - was chatting about Zot with a mate just last night!

[Kp2]

Snap, I was going to have a go at the Candi but I couldn't get any Citric acid. Thought about using lemon juice, but how much ? Ended up not doing anything.
50ml is about the volume I used full stop. But It's each to thier own on that one.
What sort of formulation are you looking to use ?

[lancsSteve]

1tsp lemon juice per cup of sugar. Beet sugar is normal but most opinion seems to be if added 15 minutes from end as a syrup then the acidity and boil will invert the sugar anyway. Might make a little more now though as it's kinda fun

[Kp2]

Right it's one week and It's Tuesday brew day. The Zot / Jester needed to moved over to a secondary unit. SG 1.035.

As you can see its got a fair way to go yet. As for the yeast, look below, easy with a picture:

Typical example of a top working ale yeast.

So I am very pleased. It smells malty and fruity. Taste is sweet, malty and a hint of orange. Followed with a low level of bittering after taste.
I am going to stick with the plan and cold crash the yeast now. So I've set the temperture to -1c rising to +1c. Giving it 24-48hr and then re-racking and adding a Belgium lager yeast. Bless them, they been working their little socks off in the fridge. And they look ready to pitch. More soon, kp2

[lancsSteve]

Sounds interesting/risky/exciting... Will be v. interested to see how this works out! How will lager yeast cope with going in to less oxygenated reasonably alcoholic environment I wonder?

I've got me a LOAD of candi sugar made up and 2 BIG starters of wyeast belgian abbey + whitelabs belgian ale blend and planning a double and a tripple/blonde for Friday... This has inspired me to do another brewday thread...

[bellebouche]

Excellent write up of the brewday - evocative and funny! I could have been there.

Also, heroic effort on culturing the Moinette yeast. Full marks! Hope this brew works out well.

[Kp2]

Good morning all and here’s the latest update:

The second racking was incubated at -1c rising to +1c for 24hr. I quickly decided that I would change this. So the following day I set the incubator to -4c rising to -2c. Why? Well I wanted to make sure that I killed all the yeastie. Yep I can here you all screaming now. It took all day Saturday to defrost a 20L beer Ice cube and raise the temperature to 10c. Anyway, I racked again to remove any waste material. It was a bit of shame really. The yeast pancake looked good and clean. How do I make the images fit the page ? The pancake is on the right hand side...

And here’s a bit homebrew pro n. I like the way the light falls on the leafs.

Anyway I digress; the SG was reading about 1.035. And more to the point it tasted great. A bit sweet with good scents but very cold. Then I dumped the Belgium Lager yeast in (10+c).

This yeast has been going good for about a year now. A new yeast starter was made using the original wort and loaded with the brew lab yeast. As per normal, at room temperature for a few days. Followed by storing in it the fridge intill needed.

As for the oxygen level. Yep, spot on, this could be problem. All a can say is the little blighters keep going when under huge PIS and in a Co2 enriched environment. I am expect the yeast strain to pick up in about 72hrs at 22c, falling to 20c. At which point I will drop it to 10c. This should give the lager yeast a chance to get going and then overwhelm any ale yeast strains.

As for the candi. I had a quick pop at that too. Managed to make burnt jam. Let me explain. Use white cane sugar and lemon juice. And just heat the lot up. “Got you, easy”. Well I got thinking. Why not try using raspberries (Acid like) and unrefined sugar. This would a good heavy sugar to use in a Belgium brew. Ha, popped the raspberries into soon and burnt them. Binned.

Anyway once the lazy toads get going I will post again.

[Kp2]

Well what can I say. It been a while since I last poted on this beer. Why ? because it's been pants. Yep, the Belgium Lager yeast has failed to do anything. Well that's not 100% ture. They have manged to eat about 20g/l of sugar in Five weeks. Moved from 1.035 - 1.030. And I am not conviced that some of this sugar has just fallen out of the beer and stuck to the barrel. What reackon ?

So whats happened. I expect most of you are think the same as me by now. Low oxygen, to cold and to smaller pitch rate. I knew it might be a problem, but was willing to wait that bit of extra time. But not that long. So how to sort it ? Here's what I did.

I would take a sample of the Wort / beer and re-pitched the Belgium Lager yeast. That was the plan. The one problem was all the yeast strains are at 4c and would take to long to bread up. And cann't be as ed to wait any longer. Need the room to start lagering another beer. So with a few honey Piller's beers on board I started about sorting this pickle out. And then, low and behold it comes to me. I am not a great fan of re-culturing from my own beer, but answer is sat right in front of me. I'll re-culter me own brew, and start my own yeast strain. Think I will call it "Terminal SG ~ Afla squad". This beer, hexagon, is honey Pills made with the same yeast. Yep, not to much to photograph here, seem to of drank most it. Its just to get the brain matter going you understand.

And a few more images, or tools of the trade.

The "Jester" on the left looks quite dark. Must be all that sugar ratling around. The wire loop is used to move the yeasts on to the argar sloops. Just pop it over a flame to clean it. And the yeast sample in the half pint glass. And final the resulting re-starter is born (below). No fireworks or light show. Looks the same as before, well perhaps a bit dirty looking.

I will give a few days at room temp. Then I'll raise the mother load to 16c and releast my army of sugar munchers to finish to job good and proper. I'll be back, if anything ever happens. kp2, over and.....zzzzzzzzzz

[lancsSteve]

Hmm - my guesses would be all yeast related. Lager yeasts have a harder time anyway - working slower at lower temperatures. All the adivce I;vew read and followed on using lager yeasts is to: 1 / aerate well, 2/ pitch high, 3/ be patient.

Your approach seemed to go against this with low pitching, no aeration and already a fair alcohol level in the beer. To have dropped it by 5 points is pretty good - that would be great as a finishing/bottling strain to prime it but not a secondary.

I *really* wouldn't expect anything much to drop it much further now TBH. So may be one to both chalk up to experience (leave the primary yeast to finish it off and only use a secondary yeast for bottling - I've done this on my belgian ales and it works wonders though have re-used primary to date but would use a neutral bottling strain in the future). However all is not lost - you could brew a super-dry simple beer now with a similar profile ferment it down as low as you can using neutral yeast (nottingham or us-o5 maybe?) and then blend the two together. My mate did this with his stout that stuck at 1.030 and it works fairly well.

I successfully re-cultured the moinette saison yeast and my mate (he of the stout blending) made a fantastic saison with it: pale marris otter, a little flaked wheat and a little candi sugar with styrians allowing the yeast to shine through after primary was over. Fermented at 32C - hottest week of the year with a brewbelt on all the time!! Now maturing after priming and bottling... Gone form no belgians to LOADS all of a sudden!

[Kp2]

Quick update, it's of again. This is only because I bumped the temperature up to 22c. It’s been going steady since last Thursday. So I am going to test tonight and bottle with in the week. Figures crossed. Either way this must be the longest fermentation time ever.

Lancssteve ~
You are right on all accounts as regards Aeration and Pitch rate. I going to put a bit on the section on yeast called “Failing to apply Darwin law and pitch rates”. It’s my line of thinking and why I do tend to go the other way. But I am patient and I will see this brew to the end. On the other hand, at the rate I am going with the sampling with friends and multi racking. There’s not going to be much left.

What I’ve really been trying to do is control the beer profile by using the “spicing” method seen in German wheat beers. “Spicing” is where you take up to a third of the wort and reintroduce it at a later date. But I wanted to avoid making two beers and then blending them.

Good on you with the re-culture, we need to see more of this sort of thing. It’s akin to growing your veg seed. In the long run you could end up with yeast strain named after you. I would call it “Dave” or perhaps “Jim”.

My saison dupont was naff. Only because I’ve not had the courage to take the temperature up to 30+c. O, and I primmed with maple syrup. O’dear.

Can you really have to may Belgians brews?

[lancsSteve]

Quick update, it's of again. This is only because I bumped the temperature up to 22c. It’s been going steady since last Thursday. So I am going to test tonight and bottle with in the week. Figures crossed. Either way this must be the longest fermentation time ever.

Excellent - the levels of tolerance and forgiveness in brewing continue to astound me!!!

What I’ve really been trying to do is control the beer profile by using the “spicing” method seen in German wheat beers. “Spicing” is where you take up to a third of the wort and reintroduce it at a later date. But I wanted to avoid making two beers and then blending them.

I tend to hold a bit back to use for either future yeast starters or to make a new 'starter' to add for bottling - there's an excellent site with info and calculations on using speisse and kreausen at http://www.braukaiser.com/wiki/index.ph ... raeusening

Quick update, it's of again. This is only because I bumped the temperature up to 22c. It’s been going steady since last Thursday. So I am going to test tonight and bottle with in the week. Figures crossed. Either way this must be the longest fermentation time ever.

Excellent - the levels of tolerance and forgiveness in brewing continue to astound me!!!

My saison dupont was naff. Only because I’ve not had the courage to take the temperature up to 30+c. O, and I primmed with maple syrup. O’dear.

Can you really have to may Belgians brews?

If the taste at end of pprimary was anything to go by this one will be a blinder... Fermenting silly hot is the way clearly! Too many belgians? Nah, not if they're different enough, and if they're not different enough they;re not very Belgian!