This is the most drawn out, and perhaps convoluted beer I’ve made to date. It’s only been bottle conditioning for five months, but it was brewed in 2016. It was a turbid mashed wort made up of Pilsner, malted and raw wheat similar to a Lambic style grist and I racked it onto the yeast cake from a spontaneously fermented cider. After a few days without activity, I accepted that my fears that these yeasts would not be able to ferment maltose and picked the US-05 I had in the fridge. Over the next few weeks I added bottle dregs from a few sour beers I was drinking and left it to sit for over a year. It developed a nice clean acidity but lacked in character otherwise owing to the rather neutral primary fermentation.
My choices were to fruit, or to add honey. I decided to go with honey, and added 800g of orange blossom honey which bumped the theoretical OG up from 1.045 to 1.065.
Anyway, onto the task at hand here: tasting this creation. Thankfully, the end product is palatable. It pours full gold, with a fizzy head that dissipated to lacing fairly quickly. Not surprising, given the acidity. The aroma is largely floral, with rose and chamomile type notes, and an acidic, citrusy bite. Acidity is the first thing you notice when taking a sip, with sweet lemon and tart white peach flavours. It’s otherwise quite clean but with a bit of a lingering lactic acid thing on the finish I can’t quite place, but often experience with sour beers. The honey is also noticable on the finish, with a floral mead-like quality.