Brew #36, Maverick Wild Rye Saison, February 20, 2016

Again, for no reason in particular, sour/funky beers get a Top Gun name.  For this one, the LT Pete Mitchell gets the nod.  Except for the strain of Brett, this is brewed per this Crafted Pours recipe. Here's my first step into the wild world of Brett. As I write this, this one is still in the secondary, so I don't know how it tastes yet.

Recipe
Batch Size Target (Actual): 5 gal (5 gal)
OG Target (Actual): 1.084 (1.079)
FG Target (Actual) : 1.021 (??)
Brew House Efficiency Target (Actual) : 69% (61%)
IBUs: 57
Color: 6.7 SRM
Style: Saison
Recipe Type: All Grain
Boil Time: 90 minutes

Water:
Carbon filtered York water

Grains:
4 lb Rye Malt
12 lb US 2-row
12 oz Flaked Oats
12 oz Flaked Rye
12 oz Rice Hulls

Hops:
0.5 oz Mosaic @ 60 min
1 oz Nelson Sauvin @ 15 min
1 oz Mosaic @ 10 min

Yeast:
WLP565 Belgian Saison I (primary)
WLP650 Brettanomyces Bruxellensis (secondary)

Brewing Notes

2/17/16 - Yeast Starter:
7c Water, 7oz extra light DME, 1/2 tsp yeast nutrient, boiled 10 min, chilled, added 2 drops of fermcap, and pitched WLP 565.  Fermented on Stir plate.  Cold crashed and decanted overnight 2/19 into 2/20

2/20/15 - Brew Day:

• Sanitized (star san) my cold side equipment in the big mouth bubbler primary.
• Heated 22.75 quarts of water with pH 5.2 buffer to 166 F in 8 gallon stainless HLT on outdoor propane burner.
• Mashed in in 10 gal Igloo cooler, paddled until everything was well mixed and there were no dough balls.  Mash in temp was 151-152F
• 75 minute mash rest
• 0 minutes: temperature was 151-152F
• 15 minutes: paddled, temperature was 149-152F
• 30 minutes: paddled, temperature was 148-150F
• 45 minutes: paddled, temperature was 148-149F
• 75 minutes, did not measure temperature. Began vorlauf
• Stuck Vorlauf: I opened the valve and noting came out. Unstuck by blowing in the tube.  Make sure if you do this that A) nobody who is unfamiliar that beer is boiled after this step sees you, and B) the discharge end of the tube is above the top of the fluid level in the mash.  Otherwise you could get a mouth full of hot wort. This never really got clear and it got stuck a couple more times, but eventually it would run consistently (although slow).
• Fly sparged with my new process (see #35) until I had 7.25 gallons pre-boil. This needed almost all of the 6 gallons I had heated to 195F. pre-boil gravity was 1.059 which was right on target.
• Brought to boil - 90 minute boil time
• Added:
  0.5 oz Mosaic @ 60 min
  1 oz Nelson Sauvin @ 15 min
  1 oz Mosaic @ 10 min
• Chilled with Immersion wort chiller to 72F
• Siphoned to BMB
• Took a Brix reading of 19.4%, calcuated to 1.079.Volume was 5 gal.
• Pitched the decanted starter of 565

2/20 -2/25/16 - Primary Fermentation:
Siphoned to 5 gal glass carboy on 2/25 immediately after the majority of the Krausen had fallen. Brix was 9.4% which calculated to 1.012, 8.9% abv.  I had wanted to get this on the Brett before the Saison yeast was completely finished but it looks like even after 5 days I was too late.  Pitched the vial of WLP650 Brett B into the secondary and put the secondary in the opposite corner of the dining room.

2/25/16 - present - Secondary Fermentation:
The beer has shown little bits of foam and bubbles on top since about a week in the secondary.  I haven't tasted yet.

6/12/16 update: I drew a sample and took a gravity measurement of 1.008 @ 74F, corrected to 1.010, which makes it 9.1%.  I definitely tasted some Brett funk, absolutely no tartness (not to be expected). It has lost a lot of the alcohol heat it had going into the secondary.  I think I'll let this one go a little longer, maybe get a professional opinion from my brother next time he's in town.