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Overshot kettle sour pH prior to lacto

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  • Overshot kettle sour pH prior to lacto

    Trying my first kettle sour today and overshot my initial pH drop (food grade phosphoric acid 75%) following the manufacturer recommendation.

    I ended up with a pre-sour pH of about 3.36. I'm hoping perhaps there might be a delay in the reaction with the wort and the P acid but I'm probably dreaming that pH will come back up.

    I went ahead and pitched lacto, hoping to at least get rid of the chemical sour vs. lacto sour but we shall see. It's an experiment.

    I have two questions for y'all.

    1) I am planning to boil then ferment with S05 dry yeast - is there a pH that will kill this yeast? I'm sure it will at least be inhibited.
    2) I have a similar finished beer on hand I can blend with but I'm wondering if it makes sense to blend prior to boiling, after souring, or whether to go ahead and ferment out the gose and then blend the finished beers?

    Thoughts? ideas? flames?

    Chris
    _______________________
    Chris Burcher, Wolf Hills
    Abingdon, VA

  • #2
    Why not let the lacto do all the work? Skip the lactic acid addition completely. It works well and we get the pH we need. ~3.4

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    • #3
      Too late now! I only pre acidified because I have read that others do so to avoid other spoiler organisms. But next time, after this experience, I think I'll do just that!
      _______________________
      Chris Burcher, Wolf Hills
      Abingdon, VA

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      • #4
        The problem you will see is that lacto will only work down to about 3.2-3.3 pH, so you're already getting to the point where the bacteria will slow down what it is doing. You could try to neutralize some of the pH with an alkaline salt, sodium bicarb or chalk perhaps, though without knowing your water chemistry, that could have some negative effects too. Might just be worth it do dump and start over.

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        • #5
          Originally posted by burcher View Post
          Trying my first kettle sour today and overshot my initial pH drop (food grade phosphoric acid 75%) following the manufacturer recommendation.

          I ended up with a pre-sour pH of about 3.36. I'm hoping perhaps there might be a delay in the reaction with the wort and the P acid but I'm probably dreaming that pH will come back up.

          I went ahead and pitched lacto, hoping to at least get rid of the chemical sour vs. lacto sour but we shall see. It's an experiment.

          I have two questions for y'all.

          1) I am planning to boil then ferment with S05 dry yeast - is there a pH that will kill this yeast? I'm sure it will at least be inhibited.
          2) I have a similar finished beer on hand I can blend with but I'm wondering if it makes sense to blend prior to boiling, after souring, or whether to go ahead and ferment out the gose and then blend the finished beers?

          Thoughts? ideas? flames?

          Chris
          Sounds like a dumper to me. Artificial (lactic or phosphoric) acidification always tastes a little off.

          Sent from my ONEPLUS A3010 using Tapatalk

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          • #6
            add fruit. something strong flavored and preferably sweet that will balance the acid. you can save it. wont be an award winner, but could turn out totally drinkable. not sure of your batch size but you could do anything from frozen costco fruit to aseptic buckets from bsg/countrymalt, etc.

            or keep it around and age it, using it as a blender for future batches that dont quite get sour enough.

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            • #7
              Looking at your questions:

              1 - I work with sour beer a lot and from my experience, that level of acid may have kind of a slow start, but should ferment fully. One thing to be aware of when fermenting with that pH level - you can't harvest that yeast. It's totally spent after working through that acid level.

              2 - If it were me I would let it ferment and then see how you feel. You could always use it to back blend with a different beer, or like another user said, you could add fruit.

              Lacto bacteria generally won't do too well in that kind of environment, but I hope it works out! Keep us posted!

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