Ok... so I'd like to make a sourdough ale. I'm not really interested in why I shouldn't make this beer. I don't care if it's an intolerable, satanic, gut-purging concoction that blasphemes the very concept of beer. I just wanna do it. I'm just interested in what it will be like, how it well will it ferment, how lactic will it become, and what other ingredients should I use.

I've made a nice sourdough starter according to Peter Reinhart's The Bread Baker's Apprentice starting out with whole rye berries that I turned into flour, beginning with an acidified water using pineappple juice. The starter is definitely active and can be quite lactic depending on how long ago I refreshed it. According to the book, the dominant yeast should be S. exiguus which can't ferment maltose. Ah interesting...

There's a lot of different ways I could approach it... just make a simple pale ale based and toss the culture in. Or I could use a bunch of wheat, rye... or oat... or various sugars... I don't have any experience making sour beers so I'm looking for some guidance in that area.

I'm guessing there's going to be at least some S. cerevisiae (beer/bread yeast), and definitely some lactobaccillus and who knows what else in the starter. Since the exiguus can't do jack with maltose, I was thinking of giving it some other sugars to chew on, to allow it to have some fun too.

Amazingly, there is very little information about making a sourdough "beverage" online. I've found a couple people asking about it, and a recipe with extract, and sour mashing from the Cat's Meow, but that doesn't satisfy my curiousity.

Any ideas? Who wants to play?