I woke up today and thought, “I want to brew something crazy.”

One of the weirdest things I could think to brew with is squid ink. As someone who lives in the US, squid ink does not make a regular appearance on any menus I’m familiar with.

What better style to pair a briny, umami-laden adjunct than with a salty Gose?

What is a Gose?

A Gose (go-suh) is a salty beer and hails from Goslar, Germany. It is an ale that is typically brewed with at least 50% of the grain bill being malted wheat. Gose has a unique flavor profile, which includes salt and sourness (from bacteria, lactobacillus) along with other adjuncts like coriander. Generally speaking, the coriander should add lemony and spicy characteristics that overshadow any hop additions.

It is tart but also hits the spot on a hot summer day. There is little to no hop flavor that is detectable in this style, so make sure to go light on hop additions. The style has an interesting history, with The German Beer Institute claiming it is over 1,000 years old. Its name is derived from the river Gose. Often, you will find fruit additions in commercial examples, and I plan to stick to this newer tradition!

How to use Squid Ink

I’ll be totally honest. You are on a ride with me! I have never used this ingredient before, and I cannot find much on the topic anywhere. I purchased both actual squid ink from cuttlefish, and squid ink pasta. I believe the pasta is going to do well in the mash and impart a nice black color.

Yeah, you read that right. We are using squid ink to make a totally blackened Gose. The plan is to mash with the pasta before allowing the Lactobacillus to do its thing and sour the wort. To successfully do this, I am going to need to perform a heck of a glucan rest, because I can only imagine how gummy this mash will be with 50% wheat AND 18 oz of pasta.

If the pasta doesn’t quite get the color dark enough, I will be adding 5 ml of straight squid ink until I reach a seriously dark SRM.

Planning the Brew

If you have not yet ventured to Milk The Funk’s wiki page and you like brewing sours, you need to! This group advanced sour beer knowledge so much that everyone from homebrewers to pros use it as a primary guide. These guys took the science of brewing with bugs far beyond what anyone else has been able to accomplish. So, we will be using their wiki pretty regularly in this write up!

First, I need to plan the mash. This is because I will be kettle souring this brew. Kettle souring is hugely beneficial because it means that the brewer can prevent contamination of cold side equipment due to souring in the kettle, then boiling to kill off the bacteria before the wort touches a fermenter.

Here’s the deal:

• Mash as usual, adding pasta. (Mash Schedule in Recipe Below)
• Raise temp to 212F for 15 minutes to kill off any spoilage organisms
• Chill wort to 85F
• Lower wort pH to 4.2 using food grade lactic acid
• Pitch Lactobacillus
• Purge headspace in kettle with CO2 to create a protective blanket
• Cover kettle with plastic wrap
• Insulate kettle and hold at 85F for 12-36 hours or until I reach a pH of 3.2-3.4
• Boil for about 20 minutes to kill off any remaining Lactobacillus, adding hops, adjuncts and nutrients as desired
• Chill and pitch yeast

What is Kettle Souring?

This is a fantastic method of souring for brewers who are averse to the idea of cross-contaminating cold side equipment. The benefit here is that by souring in the kettle, you can boil the wort and kill off all bacteria before pitching a Saccharomyces strain.

Of course, there are some drawbacks.

You would need to keep your kettle running at 90F – 120F (depending on Lactobacillus strain) for anywhere from 12 to 36 hours, or until a pH of 3.4 to 3.6 is achieved. Kettle souring also can be somewhat one dimensional. What I mean by that is the sourness and lactic notes will not have much depth, but this does work well when you are using fruit additions to make things a little more complex.

Traditional German Gose is not nearly as sour as Americans have made their Gose interpretations to be. Many American Gose is nothing more than a Berliner Weisse that has spices (like coriander) and fruit added. We will be aiming for a more traditional Gose profile.

If you want a more Americanized Gose, consider souring down as low as 3.2 pH.

Why Pre-Acidify the Wort?

There are several benefits to pre-acidifying wort when kettle souring. There are also benefits to pre-acidifying wort for many other styles and brewing methods, but that’s not our focus today.

1. Discourages growth of microbes that may spoil the wort or cause infection
2. Helps with head retention by preventing the destruction of foam proteins
3. May result in achieving a pH that is .1 – .3 points lower post souring

In short, acidifying wort makes the wort less habitable for strains of yeast and bacteria that are NOT in scope or could harm your brew, preserves proteins that promote head retention and often helps achieve a lower overall pH after you have allowed Lactobacillus to sour the wort.

What Lactobacillus strain should I use?

This decision all comes down to the finished beer characteristics you are looking for.

1. Levilactobacillus brevis is known to be very tolerant to hops, so if you are aiming for more than 15 IBUs, consider this strain.
2. Lactiplantibacillus plantarum is known to be a very clean strain that produces a clean lactic sourness. This is ideal for a Gose and is known to be consistent. Even 2 IBUs is known to stall activity, so no hopping till souring is done!
3. Lactobacillus Delbrueckii also produces a nice clean lactic sourness.

With this in mind, we will be using a blend of Levilactobacillus brevis and Lactiplantibacillus plantarum

Do I need a starter for Lactobacillus?

Yes. You will also need one for your saccharomyces.

Making a Lactobacillus starter is slightly different from making a starter for your typical Saccharomyces. We need to consider temperature, nitrogen sources and pH buffers. We will also employ a mixture of wort and apple juice in our starter. Why, you ask? Read on:

• Chalk is used as a pH buffer to neutralize lactic acid, so the Lactobacillus does not sour itself to death in the starter. High cell density would be the problem here.
• Nitrogen sources are needed for metabolism and growth, much like yeast. We will use yeast nutrient in this case, with Diammonium Phosphate being the primary source of nitrogen.
• Apple Juice is used because in testing, a mixture of 90% wort and 10% apple juice produced much higher counts of bacteria.

Eureka Brewing is a fantastic resource, and I have taken a lot of knowledge from their blog. This brewer has a day job in a lab, so I do trust their results. They found that MRS-Bouillon was the best medium, but a mixture of 90% wort with a gravity of 10 degrees Plato or 1.040 SG, 10% apple juice, 20g of Chalk per liter of starter and 1g yeast nutrient came very close at #2 out of 7 mediums.

But isn’t Chalk really hard to get into solution? Normally, yes. The starter should look fairly ‘milky’ and as acid is produced by the bacteria, the chalk will inevitably slowly go into solution.

When done cultivating the starter, decant off the supernatant and leave the chalk in the Erlenmeyer flask.

The Recipe

Malt: A traditional Gose calls for 50% wheat, so we will do just that. The other 50% will come from German Pilsner malt.

Yeast and Bacteria: Wyeast 1007 (German Ale) and OYL-605 Lactobacillus Blend (Omega) will be used.

Adjuncts/Spices: Coriander and Lime Zest

Water: Everything I have read suggests going easy on sulphates, due to clashes with sodium. So we will focus on Chlorides and Calcium.

Hops: Good old Hallertau Mittelfruh! We only need about 10 – 15 IBUs worth. If you go above this, consider using L. Brevis instead.

Brew day and Results Coming Soon!