Homebrew Recipe: Das Funken Weisse - Quick Sour Wheat Beer

Sorry to the four people who read this for the lack of posting over the last month. It's been a pretty crazy month. I went to Italy for a week in May and then there's work.... either way here's what I've been up to.

Back in mid April I brewed a sour wheat beer. Like most of my grists it was painfully simple, half Weyermann Pilsner and half American White Wheat. I did a small mash hop addition with some Willamette and a pretty low mash temp. Here's the fun part though, this thing was sour and ready to drink in a month (from the keg mind you). I started by pitching lactobacillus first and let it ride for 24 hours. Then I went in with a vial of WLP670 (American Farmhouse) and a smack pack of 3068. At one month it was dry, fruity, a touch funky and perfectly soured.

This could be bad info (I'm not a scientist) but from what I've read lactobacillus does poorly in the presence of alcohol, hence my pitching the lacto first. I kept it reasonably warm (76F) while it was all lacto, then about four hours before pitching the rest of my yeast I cooled it down to 68F. I suppose you could compare this beer somewhat to a Berliner Weisse in the sense that it's tart and sour and half wheat. But there's some other stuff happening too, a bit of spice and banana from the 3068, and some subtle brett character from the WLP670. Not to mention I threw two ounces of Citra hops into the keg. The result? A moderate strength, sour, funky, grapefruity and great beer.

Now granted I did make a great sour beer quickly, but I did keg it. I highly doubt the beer was completely done working, if you plan on bottling this you would probably want to give it a few months to ride out the last few gravity points.

Das Funken Weisse

OG - 1.046
Brewhouse Efficiency - 75%
IBUs - 6.8
Mash Type - Single Infusion
Mash Temp - 148F

Malts and Fermentables

4lbs. Weyermann Bohemian Pilsner Malt

4lbs. American White Wheat

Hops

Willamette 5.5%AAU Mash hop - .5oz. - 60 minutes 

Citra 10.5%AAU - Keg Hop - 2.0oz

Yeast and critters

Whitelabs WLP670 American Farmhouse

Whitelabs Lactobacillus Delbrueckii

Wyeast 3068 Weihenstephan

I'll post a full tasting of this soon. But if you're looking to homebrew a sour beer quickly you may try this and see how it works out for you.