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So the general theme with brewing sour beers seems to be a long wait before consumption.

Are there any options for brewing a sour/sour like beer without having to wait 1+ years before it's ready to drink? I'd love to brew a sour, but right now I don't have the space or patience to wait that long.

Steve T from Noblel Grape brewed up a pseudo sour and it was very good. I think he used lactic acid and acid malt in it. You may want to stop by NG on quinpool and chat with him on it. His time frame on it was short but a real sour is gonna take anywhere from 4 months to 2 years.

Sour mash!

I will be attempting this very soon. I made recipe last night that I'm going to brew twice, once with a sour mash. I'm still researching methods, and there are a few. Basically you do a normal mash, reduce the temperature, pitch a handful of uncrushed grains (vehicle for lactobacillus, etc), and let it sit for a couple days. You may not want to sour the whole mash. I'm thinking of doing 1/3 or so and blending it back in.

Patrice at Acadie-Broue told me he just leaves his mash for 12-24 hours. Then proceeds as normal for his berliner weisse with a brett inoculation during primary. I doubt he lets it sit for years, he doesn't have the space from what I understand. It was damn good, although I can't comment on accuracy to style, I have only had a couple of them in my time.

Graham.C wrote:Patrice at Acadie-Broue told me he just leaves his mash for 12-24 hours. Then proceeds as normal for his berliner weisse with a brett inoculation during primary. I doubt he lets it sit for years, he doesn't have the space from what I understand. It was damn good, although I can't comment on accuracy to style, I have only had a couple of them in my time.

a berliner only needs 3-4 months of aging and it's good to go. A full on gueze or kriek is an entirly different story. Steve's was a Kriek style with cherry in it, it was very tart.