The Wine Thread

[landhoney]

Originally Posted by TheRiddick

Another way is to go a beer supply and ask them for brett cultures, mix them with any wine of your choice, guys there should be able to give you instructions on how to innoculate a bottle of wine with brett, cheap and efficient. That might be your best bet at tasting same wine with and without brett (buy a cheap bottle of clean wine, say, a Fetzer/Beringer/Sebastiani red).

Interesting idea, I like it. Easy to do a side by side comparison as well, but you forgot the waiting part, especially in a relatively (compared to unfermented beer) dry wine it will probably take at least a few weeks to show up in the taste, correct? I really have no idea as this method is pretty unique.

Also, if you go this route make sure the mixed culture does not contain Lactobacillus or Pediococcus, many of the mixed cultures that contain Brett for beer brewing contain one or both of these as well as a normal yeast strain. They sell the individual Brett strains on their own, but I think most all of the mixed cultures have Sacc, Lacto, and/or Pedio (Lambic Blend, Roeselare, Berliner Weisse, etc.)

[rizzle]

Originally Posted by mosesbotbol

Beaucastel CdP or Pegau CdP tend to have it. Your luck, you'll score a perfect bottle without Brett showing, lol...

Imagine a barn yard taste similar to the same smell in a new box of cigars...

Originally Posted by TheRiddick

There are no "perfect" bottles when it comes to Pegau and Beau, they simply may have "less" brett to show if properly stored in colder cellars, but they all have brett. Another good candidate is older Jaboulet (prior to mid to late '90s).

Best way is to decant these, brett gets nasty when mixed with air and "warmer" temps. Above wines are not cheap, BTW.

Another way is to go a beer supply and ask them for brett cultures, mix them with any wine of your choice, guys there should be able to give you instructions on how to innoculate a bottle of wine with brett, cheap and efficient. That might be your best bet at tasting same wine with and without brett (buy a cheap bottle of clean wine, say, a Fetzer/Beringer/Sebastiani red).

Originally Posted by landhoney

Interesting idea, I like it. Easy to do a side by side comparison as well, but you forgot the waiting part, especially in a relatively (compared to unfermented beer) dry wine it will probably take at least a few weeks to show up in the taste, correct? I really have no idea as this method is pretty unique.

Also, if you go this route make sure the mixed culture does not contain Lactobacillus or Pediococcus, many of the mixed cultures that contain Brett for beer brewing contain one or both of these as well as a normal yeast strain. They sell the individual Brett strains on their own, but I think most all of the mixed cultures have Sacc, Lacto, and/or Pedio (Lambic Blend, Roeselare, Berliner Weisse, etc.)

Man, y'all are getting all scientific with me now. I think I'd rather buy one than put on my Thomas Dolby hat and try to innoculate it myself, especially after reading the stuff Seth wrote...that cillus and coccus stuff sounds bad.

How "not cheap" is not cheap, Greg?

And thanks for the replies guys, I know it may sound like an odd request, but I'd like to know what this stuff is I keep hearing you guys talk about.

[landhoney]

Originally Posted by rizzle

Man, y'all are getting all scientific with me now. I think I'd rather buy one than put on my Thomas Dolby hat and try to innoculate it myself, especially after reading the stuff Seth wrote...that cillus and coccus stuff sounds bad.

How "not cheap" is not cheap, Greg?

And thanks for the replies guys, I know it may sound like an odd request, but I'd like to know what this stuff is I keep hearing you guys talk about.

Well its sounds bad....for wine....not beers...not some beers at least. Lacto and Pedio are mostly responsible for the sour taste in sour/wild ales (like Berliner Wessie, Lambics, Flanders Ales) which to people like myself are amongst the best beers in the world.

I have a pretty good idea of what is out there in terms of homebrew cultures, and a lot of the mixed ones out there have these bacteria in them, and if you were to use them it would affect the taste of the wine (sourness, etc) and you would not just get the pure Brett character you're looking for. But it's easy to get several individual Brett strains to use, Wyeast Lab has the following:

Brettanomyces bruxellensis
Brettanomyces lambicus

These are two different strains of Brett...and just Brett, nothing else so you could get a pure result.