First Year Lambic Tasting

About a year ago, I brewed my first sour beer – a simple lambic – so I could get the practice of brewing this style category of beer. Seeing that there are a good number of sour beer styles, picking one and trying out the process would put me in a good position to brew other sour styles in the future.

In this video, Mike and I take a taste of lambic to see if it is ready to bottle or if it needs more time to age.

Lambic Recap

Here’s some information to get you up to speed: I got tips from a few famous homebrewers (Jamil and Piatz) to get my lambic recipe together. I used extract and finally found a use of the 4 or 5 year old Cascade hops that sat in my fridge, taking up space.

The original bucket that I bought back in 2005 served as my fermentation vessel. Even though I read in so many place that plastic was not good for sour beers because they let in too much oxygen, I decided to ignore that advice and fermented in it anyway.

To ferment, I used a packet of Safale-05 and WYeast Roeselare blend. I added them at the same time. Again, maybe I should have added the clean yeast first and then added the sour blend a week later. For my first time, I guess I was looking to cut corners keep it simple.

I found a nice little corner in my basement to store it for a year and tried to forget about it. I didn’t open it up until the six month mark. At that time, I took a sample and knew that it wasn’t done yet but it was on target.

Happy Birthday, Lambic!

In my basement, the bucket sat and fermented pretty much undisturbed. For that part of the process, I give myself high marks. I have learned in (almost) ten years of homebrewing that patience can be learned. Because the bucket was left untouched, it wasn’t moved to anywhere warmer in the basement. During the winter months, that corner of the cellar could get a little cold. On the coldest of days, it could get down to 48 degrees Fahrenheit. Tasting it near the 1 year anniversary and deeming it not quite done, I wonder if the colder months slowed down the process.

Moving Forward

On the weekend before Fourth of July, I plan to brew another lambic and rack the one that is in the bucket to a glass carboy for it to age for longer. In about three months, I will sample it again and see if it is ready for bottling. If it’s not ready, I will add the dregs of a commercial lambic to get the sourness up. The newly brewed lambic wort will be added to the bucket, right on top of the remnants, to start the process again. I bought another packet of the sour blend from Wyeast to hedge my bets and supplement the year old bugs. This time next year, we should be talking about blending the lambics and hopefully experimenting with some secondary fermentation on fruits like cherries or raspberries.

That’s the update. Hope you enjoyed it. Sour beers are the next frontier for these Brew Dudes.

If you have questions/comments, please leave them below.

Brew On!