Category Archives: Wild Ale

L’enfant Terrible


Posted by Aschwin de Wolf

The label of De Dochter van de Korenaar’s L’enfant Terrible informs me that this is a “special, gueuze-style ale brewed with wild yeast.” I am not completely sure what distinguishes a “gueuze-style” beer from an ordinary gueuze but perhaps it is intended to convey that this beer was produced outside the traditional Pajottenland region in Belgium. The bottle also recommends to serve this beer “very cold!” which is a rather unorthodox recommendation for a beer that is supposed to resemble a traditional gueuze. As a general rule, gueuze should be served not too cold, and straight lambic is often served at cellar temperature. Some reviewers have noted that this beer starts smelling quite odd when its warms up to room temperature.

L’enfant Terrible has the same base as their lightly smoked amber ale Bravoure but has undergone wild fermentation in wine barrels. I followed their advice and served and consumed the beer very cold. A vigorous pour produced an amber-colored beer with a lot of foam. At such low temperatures the beer reveals little aroma, but I detected some funky, floral, spicy, and caramel notes. This beer is tart, but not nearly as tart as a traditional gueuze. Tasting reveals bread, spice and, most of all, grapefruit; a very strong grapefruit note here. Unlike other reviewers, I did not get the smokey character. The finish is off-dry, slightly bitter, and short. But what sets this strange beer apart from the rest is the EXTREME carbonation. I have had my share of bottle-fermented beers with strong carbonation, but this beer dwarfs most, if not all, of them with its tongue-scraping character. The low temperature in conjunction with such harsh carbonation makes it hard to detect any subtle notes. I purchased this beer more than a year ago and I wonder how much ongoing fermentation in the bottle (and more carbonation) can still be expected here.

I find this an odd beer to review. It is great to see more Belgian brewers outside of the Pajottenland experimenting with wild yeast. Aside from the strange “very cold” serving recommendation and excessive carbonation, I liked it quite a bit. But from a reviewer’s perspective, I am a little perplexed as to how this brew could win the silver medical in the Gueuze category at the European Beer Star competition.


Mikkeller Yeast Series: Brettanomyces


Posted by Aschwin de Wolf

Admittedly, I was a little hesitant about this beer because Mikkeler seems to show little restraint in what it releases to the market. But this “educational” beer designed solely to showcase the Brettanomyces yeast was too tempting to leave untouched and I was not disappointed at all. The base for this beer (and all the others in the yeast series) is a strong pale ale, and it was brewed and bottled by Mikkeler at the Proef Brouwerij in Belgium.

Brettanomyces pours a dark orange / amber with a good two finger head. For an 8% beer I find the aroma quite crisp and restrained with notes of musty tropical fruit, green apple, and hops. I am not sure about the brettanomyces strain(s) used for this beer, but I suspect it may have been one of the milder strains (Claussenii?) – not of the barnyard, band-aid variety. The beer is mildly tart and has a nice European hop character to balance out the malt and yeast expression. Not terribly complex, but that is a good thing in this beer, I think. The finish is dry and pleasantly bitter. Not too cloying or sweet, inviting one to take another sip. Carbonation is quite high, which could be the result of the higher attenuation induced by the brett during bottle fermentation.

Brettanomyces is too strong to be an easy-drinking session beer. But considering the alcohol percentage, I found it quite smooth and light. Although this beer was designed to showcase the brettanomyces yeast, I think it would not have been nearly as refined without the generous amounts of hops. I can see how this beer could be disappointing to people who want more fireworks from the brett, but simply judged as a balanced beer, I think it is a good effort.


Anchorage brews with brettanomyces


Posted by Aschwin de Wolf

When I ventured into the low-temperature walk-in beer section in my local Whole Foods recently, my eye caught no fewer than three bottles from Anchorage Brewing that all said “with brettanomyces:” a Saison (Love Buzz), a Wit Bier (Whiteout), and a double IPA (Bitter Monk). As a matter of fact, Anchorage Brewing aims to brew all barrel-aged, brettanomyces-influenced beers. Since I have let loose all kinds of brettanomyces on my own home brews, I was quite interested to experience the effect of on these different beer styles.

I first tried the Saison, which clocks in at no less than 8% alcohol and 40 IBU, which is not trivial for the style. While the label mentions rose hips, peppercorns,  fresh orange peels, and Pinot Noir barrel aging, I did not seem to get a lot of this. The beer pours a beautiful cloudy, dark orange and has pronounced notes of brettanomyces, grass, lemon and a faint biscuit sweetness. The hops definitely make their presence known and carry the beer towards a long, off-dry, bitter finish. As it warms up, the (sticky) sweetness becomes a little more pronounced, but the brett and hops keep it in check. This is not a session beer but I would not call it a sipper either. I was expecting a little more complexity and I could see people mistaking this for a Brett-enhanced IPA instead. Dialing down the alcohol and letting the herbs shine may lead to further improvement.

The next Anchorage beer I tried was Whiteout. Whiteout pours a very light cloudy yellow. The first thing that entered my mind when I smelled it was “lambic.” Whether it was the contribution of the lemony Sorachi Ace hops, the wheat, or some other fermentation product, the aroma evoked a good, earthy, Belgian Gueuze, with a hefty dose of barnyard and spice. This beer tastes as great as it smells; dry, crisp, minty, and tart with a long bitter finish. The coriander contributes a nice herbal note and the Chardonnay barrel aging adds some buttery smoothness. As the beer warms up, the Belgian yeast expresses itself without throwing around too many esters. Mouthfeel is on the lighter side and the beer is very effervescent. As a crisp 6.5% alcohol beer, this is a very drinkable beer.

The third beer I drank was their Brett-enhanced Belgian-style double IPA. I do not recall tasting a double IPA with secondary brettanomyces fermentation before so I was quite curious about this one. Bitter Monk pours an opaque dark orange and leaves quite a bit of lacing during consumption. As would be expected from a double IPA, the nose reveals major hops – plus some funk from the brett. I am not a big fan of  (American) citrus hop varieties but that is not the brewer’s fault. I also detect green apples, banana, and grassy notes. For a high gravity beer, the sweetness is not too oppressive and it seems that the brett consumed some additional sugar. The beer tastes relatively dry for the style and ends on a long bitter note. Carbonation is quite low but I tend to like it that way. For a double IPA this beer is quite drinkable, even crisp. It is not as complex as the Whiteout beer, or perhaps it is under the surface, as the 100 IBU hops ensure a beer dominated by hops. For someone who is not a big fan of the double IPA style, this is not bad at all.

So how does the brettanomyces contribute to these three beer styles? I am inclined to say: Brettanomyces giveth and Brettanomyces taketh away. It seemed that in the case of the Saison, something might have been lost. In the case of the white beer, it produced a stellar, fascinating beer. As for the Belgian double IPA, a hop bomb remains a hop bomb, but it seemed to confer a crisper, drier character and some unmistakable earthiness. So Whiteout is the clear winner for me. Of all three brews, it allowed the other ingredients and barrel-aging to shine. Yet again, it reinforced my preference to keep the alcohol down in such beers. And I may have to get some of these Sorachi Ace hops!


Wild Yeast


Posted by Aschwin de Wolf

Chris White and Jamil Zainasheff’s Yeast: The Practical Guide to Beer Fermentation is a thorough review of the subject of yeast, with the practical (home)brewer in mind. It is mostly a treatment of commercial brewer’s yeast but there are some interesting observations about wild yeast, too. The authors define wild yeast as yeast “that is not in the brewer’s control.” For example, commercial Brettanomcyes is not wild yeast but native strains of Saccharomyces that (unintentionally) are introduced during cooling of the wort or barrel aging would be. Of course, today’s commercial strains of Brettanomyces may still have a lot in common with yeasts that are found in the wild, but one could imagine a scenario where the use of Brettanomyces becomes so popular that commercial yeast sellers increasingly select these strains for certain properties. As a consequence, wild yeast is not characterized by its aroma and flavor properties (such as tartness or funkiness) but by its involvement in (ambient) spontaneous fermentation.

There are a number of distinct traits that have been retained in wild yeast. Wild yeasts are usually diploid, form spores, and are still capable of mating. Commercial yeast, in contrast, has lost this ability because mainstream brewers desire consistent characteristics from their yeast. Wild yeast usually has low flocculation, which can produce higher attenuation because the yeasts will not quickly drop or rise in the wort. In commercial yeast, however, such a property is not desirable for many beer styles, where a quick and clean beer is the goal.  Unlike wild yeasts, which have evolved to compete against each other, commercial yeast can often co-exist and ferment at similar rates.

The book also includes sections on Brettanomyces and capturing wild yeast. Although the name Dekkera is often used interchangeably with Brettanomyces, it is only Brettanomyces that is of the non-spore forming type. One of the intriguing things about Brettanomyces, much to the chagrin of wine makers, is that it produces the enzyme Beta-glucosidase, which can convert the wood sugar cellobiose into glucose, a phenomenon that is more prevalent in new barrels that have higher concentrations of cellobiose. Brettanomyces is quite sensitive to oxygen, with moderate concentrations most favorable to its growth, and lower and higher concentrations, unfavorable. Increased oxygen produces more acetic acid as a fermentation product.

Instead of inoculating wort with commercial Brett, some (home)brewers aim to capture real wild yeast for fermentation. There is no shortage of methods for doing this, including ambient exposure of the wort, fermentation in “infected” barrels, the use of wild fruit and herbs to start fermentation, or using dregs from the bottles of traditional lambic brewers. Of course, such methods usually introduce souring bacteria as well, and the art is to discover and perfect a method that leads to consistent, favorable outcomes. Because many brewers prefer not to waste multiple batches of wort on spontaneous fermentation experiments, and the yeast captured in the wild may not be sufficient to start a healthy fermentation, one approach is to create ambient spontaneous starters (there is a lot of information about creating conventional starters in the book). At this stage, such efforts are still largely the work of some adventurous (home)brewers, and documentation of such efforts is still in its early stages (the Mad Fermentationist blog is an excellent resource). In the case of spontaneous starters it is important to avoid sampling at an early stage, where aerobic conditions, higher pH, and low alcohol still permit the presence of dangerous pathogens.

Because the book is mostly written for brewers who have control over their yeast and fermentation, a lot of information is not completely applicable to brewers who use spontaneous fermentation or incorporate spontaneous fermentation. But there is some information that is interesting for “wild” brewers as well. For example, proper wort aeration is important for healthy yeast growth but brewers who use barrels for (primary) fermentation may have problems in getting enough dissolved oxygen at the start of fermentation. The authors report on a New Belgium method where olive oil was added to the wort to supply the sterols that yeast cell membranes require for proper structure and function. One also wonders how the use of coolships (with their large surface to volume ratio) influences initial wort aeration. Temperature is another topic that affects conventional brewers as well as those using wild yeast. As far as I am aware, traditional lambic brewing does not necessarily exclude temperature control, but I think it is safe to assume that most fermenting lambic wort is subject to substantial seasonal and overnight temperature changes that would be contra-indicated for conventional brewers (Cantillon’s Jean-Pierre Van Roy once looked horrified when I asked him about active temperature control). It would be quite helpful to quantify and characterize the effect of ambient temperature fluctuations on wild yeast and bacterial growth, fermentation, and flavor.

Much of the information on yeast growth, handling, storage, and labs is not applicable to spontaneous fermentation but some of the techniques (such as wild yeast tests and forced fermentation) can be used by adventurous brewers to study wild yeast and the conditions that influence spontaneous fermentation. Ultimately, there is an increasing need for an extensive book treatment on (home)brewing with non-conventional and wild yeast. Modifying or ignoring (!) procedures for brewing with domesticated yeast will only take you so far, and the homebrew recipes that can be found in some classic lambic and wild beer books give little guidance about expected fermentation behavior and troubleshooting. Of course, no matter how much our knowledge about spontaneous fermentation grows, beer that is produced in this way will always have more variability than beer that is produced with domesticated yeast under highly controlled conditions. But this is also one of its strengths, and like authentic wine, can lead to surprising results. Many readers of this blog will agree that the best beer in this world remains a product of spontaneous fermentation. If you brew conventional beer in addition to wild beer, Yeast is an invaluable resource.


Avery Brabant


Posted by Aschwin de Wolf

During a recent business trip I located a bottle of Avery’s Brabant. Brabant is a dark wild ale that was fermented with two strains of brettanomyces and aged for 8 months in Zinfandel barrels. The beer was bottled on February 10, 2009, limited to 694 cases and has an alcohol percentage of 8.65. The recommended serving temperature is between 45 and 55 Fahrenheit but we poured it a little colder to follow its evolution as the beer warmed up.

The color is mysterious, with dark orange overtones and resembling molasses.  No light passing through here. The smell is complex and evokes bananas, liquorice, prunes and chocolate. The brett is certainly there but, overall, the aroma is fairly clean. When the beer warms up, the roasted and vanilla notes are more pronounced – the vanilla presumably from the oak barrels. The beer is mildly tart but there is also a pleasant bitterness among the dark fruit notes that keeps the generous malt bill in check. Brabant finishes long and dry. Mouth feel is surprisingly thick, even a little syrupy, and creamy smooth. Carbonation is almost non-existent and may rank among the lowest I have encountered in an American wild ale – but it works quite well in this brew.

On paper I should not have cared for this beer because of its high gravity and new oak aging, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. The roasted and black malts blend quite well with the brettanomyces strains and the vanilla notes add something to the beer instead of suffocating it (as happens in many New World wines and “barrel-aged beers”). Unlike some other high alcohol wild ales, Avery’s Old Jubilation-derived Brabant clearly aims at the darker side of the beer spectrum. I think that the inclusion of dark and roasted malts is what makes this beer succeed where many other high gravity wild ales fail to convince.

As a lover of (imperial) stouts I have always been intrigued by the idea of a wild ale with roasted malts, but so far I have not been too impressed by the sour stouts I have sampled. The combination of roasted malts and souring bacteria does not seem to work for me. In Brabant, the brett-induced tartness is more subtle and integrated and this beer has actually made me more optimistic about my own stout that is currently in secondary fermentation with Brettanomyces Bruxellensis. After all, in the past, most stouts were wild!