lab analysis

careful lab analysis has revealed (okay, suggested) the nature and source of the contaminant that made bottles of Life's Trail Ale into gushers.

this, i think, is really, really cool.

we drank one last night, and it tasted different than the others. this is not entirely surprising, after all, if the bottles were contaminated, the contaminant would slowly grow and grow and grow and become more strong a contributor to flavor over time. and this is just what happened.

but now, because of my lab experiments, i think i can ID the contaminant. the flavor that is swinging into dominance in the LTA is the flavor equivalent of the smell that i cultured in my little 40ml starter of the Thingus I grew on the closeted petri dish! The yeast-like-stuff that i cultured off the petri dish, that i grew in a starter, that i dumped down teh sink when it began to smell like pee -- that's the same stuff, i think, that contaminated LTA.

our own house yeast.

and i'm able to ID it because i've gone overboard and done petri dish yeast experiments. cool!