28C Wild Specialty Beer
Wild Sour — House Culture
Grain bill
| Gladfield Pilsner Malt | 2.5 kg | 50% |
| Gladfield Wheat Malt | 2.5 kg | 50% |
Adjuncts
| Whirlfloc | 1 tablet @ 10 min |
| Yeast Nutrient | 4 g @ 10 min |
| Dextrose | 60 g |
Hop schedule
| Hop | 60 min |
|---|---|
| Pacific Gem | 10g |
Yeast
| Matt's house wild culture (multi-source dregs + Brett, 2025/26) | ~1L stepped-up culture pitched 2026-02-02 |
Water additions
| Calcium Chloride | 1.5 g |
Tasting notes
2026-05-11
About This Beer
The second of two parallel brews on the same gueuze-style base wort. The wort was brewed on 2026-01-11, cubed, and on 2026-02-02 pitched into a 30L all-rounder in my upstairs room (the “upstairs wild workshop”) onto a house wild culture I grew up from various bottle dregs over the preceding three months.
The sibling brew on 2026-01-06 went onto Paul Fantham’s 5 Magics trub — see the Paul Fantham Collab entry.
The Wort
Identical recipe to the collab brew: 50/50 Gladfield Pilsner and Wheat, 10g Pacific Gem at 60 min, OG ~1.048.
| Value | |
|---|---|
| Mash | 16L at 67 °C, 60 min |
| Mash-out | 76 °C, 10 min |
| Sparge | 15L at 76 °C |
| Boil | 90 min, 10g Pacific Gem at 60 min |
| Estimated OG | 1.048 |
| Into cube | 22.5L |
The House Culture — Three Months of Step-ups
Unlike the collab brew (which went onto active second-generation trub), this batch was pitched onto a culture that I built from scratch out of bottle dregs and small wort additions, stepped up over roughly three months from November 2025 through January 2026.
The microflora came from just two bottle-dregs additions — 2 Bites (Nov 4) and Rua / CLM (Dec 6). Every other entry in the timeline below is a wort step-up using whatever clean wort I had available — DME starter wort for most, but a couple of step-ups used leftover wort from other brews (the last runnings of Phill funky as the initial pitch substrate, and a Flanders Red + Dusty Zombies leftover-wort blend in mid-December). No yeast or slurry from Phill funky, Flanders Red, or Dusty Zombies was added — only their wort.
| Date | Step |
|---|---|
| 2025-11-04 | Garage Project 2 Bites dregs (microflora) pitched into ~300mL wort (last runnings of Phill funky) — full ferment |
| 2025-11-21 | Crash cool, tip off beer, repitch onto 30g DME / 500mL + pinch yeast nutrient |
| 2025-11-29 | Crash cool, pour off (tasted clean), repitch onto 60g DME / 1L |
| 2025-12-06 | Added Rua / CLM bottle dregs (microflora), 60g DME / 1L |
| 2025-12-10 | Step-up wort: ~250mL leftover Flanders Red wort + leftover Dusty Zombies wort + 250mL DME starter (15g DME) — wort substrate only, no DZ/Flanders yeast added |
| 2025-12-19 | Transferred new wort onto existing yeast cake (lineage unchanged) |
| 2025-12-27 | Split into 2× 250mL starters (one for me, one for my dad) |
| 2025-12-31 → 2026-01-30 | Five further step-ups in 1–1.5L volumes on DME starter wort, building activity |
| 2026-01-26 | Sample: SG 1.001, pH 3.7 |
| ~2026-02-02 | Final starter — 60g dextrose dissolved into ~1L culture as a quick-fermenting sugar boost immediately before pitch |
Pitch and Fermentation — 2026-02-02
The ~1L culture (with the dextrose-boosted starter) was pitched into the 22.5L cubed wort in a 30L all-rounder. Fermentation kicked off within 48 hours — decent yeast foam, steady bubbler. Days 4–5 the yeast layer broke up into the larger CO₂ foam; day 6 no surface activity but heavy gas through the bubbler every ~4 seconds; day 7 the bubbler began slowing.
Reading log
| Date | Days | SG | pH | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-02-14 | 12 | 1.008 | 3.9 | Sweaty socks aroma, tasting ok, not very sour |
| 2026-02-21 | 19 | — | — | Strong blue cheese aroma/flavour (suspected Brettanomyces lambicus); pellicle began to form, not yet covering top |
| 2026-03-28 | 54 | 1.004 | 4.0 | Disappointing pH — no drop from Feb. Flavour more balanced, less cheese/socks; some action over the month |
| 2026-05-11 | 98 | 1.002 | 3.8 | Flavour/aroma improving, fruity, still funky, not particularly sour yet |
The cheese-to-fruity-funk transition over February–March is consistent with early Brett activity settling down. The pH stalling at 3.8–4.0 is the more interesting story — much slower acid production than expected. The culture has clearly worked through the sugars (SG 1.002) but the souring power is modest.
What’s Next
Still in the fermenter alongside the Foeder Pale Sour Cube 2 / 5 Magics + Muscat brew, in the upstairs room. Continuing to track gravity and pH over the coming months. Decision on packaging depends on whether the souring picks up — a possible option is to top-up with a more acidifying culture or blend at packaging.
Compared to the Collab
Same wort, same brew day to within a week. The two brews diverged entirely on culture choice:
| Collab (2026-01-06) | House (this brew) | |
|---|---|---|
| Culture | Paul’s 5 Magics 2nd-gen trub | House dregs, ~3 months of step-ups |
| Primary | ~2 weeks | Slow, ongoing |
| Latest pH | ~3.0–3.3 | 3.8 |
| Latest SG | Packaged | 1.002 |
| Status | Kegged 2026-02-21, aging in fridge | Still in fermenter |
The collab brew is a clean demonstration that active second-generation wild trub is a vastly faster path to a finished sour than building a culture from dregs. The dregs path is more interesting and personal, but slower and less aggressive on acid.
Lineage
- Parallel sibling on Paul’s culture: Paul Fantham Collab — 5 Magics
- Future: a portion of the house culture may be pitched into Owen’s split-fermentation experiment Wild Sour — Split Fermentation