Fruit in Boil?

[CiderJoe]

I'm going to make a Raspberry Stout, and we want to use raspberry. These will be fresh raspberrys, not syrup or extract or anything like that. I've been told I should boil them with the hops and all, but I'm not sure at what point in the boil. Any recommendations?

Thanks, Cider

[Otis_The_Drunk]

NO! STOP! Never put fruit in the boil.

Put them in secondary.
Putting them in the boil sets the pectin and also would make for an astrengent beer.
When putting the fruit in secondary you would be using the fruit to it's full potential. You get both the fruit flavor and aroma.

[CiderJoe]

Thanks Otis.

I've been slowly finding this out from various sources. I did find one recipe that said I could put them in at Flame Out and let them steep there for 15-20 minutes. I'm not so concerned about the pectin induced chill-haze (doing a stout), but the tannins do worry me. So Í'm thinking I could put them in the copper at between 90 and 95º C, Kill all the bad guys, and let them steep for 20 minutes before running off the the wort chiller. Any other thoughts or opinions on this method. I'm trying to avoid putting them in the Fermenter.

Thanks, Cider

[Otis_The_Drunk]

You could put them in at flame out and it would serve to pasteurize your fruit, but I have found that fruit left in Primary fermentation loses it's aroma. You'll get the taste of the fruit in your beer, but you won't smell it.

[CiderJoe]

What temperature brings out the tannins? We're going to let the hot wort cool down to 90 degrees Celcius and then put half the raspberries in to steep for 20 minutes, then half way through run-off put the other half of the raspberries in. This isn't my beer, and I don't necessarily agree with the, but the person who's beer this is really didn't want to put the berries in the fermenter. Considered the risk to great since we're brewing 180 gallons.

Thanks,
Cider

[Mill Rat]

Originally posted by CiderJoe
we're brewing 180 gallons.

Thirsty?

Seriously, if you want to have more than a subtle fruit presence and avoid contamination risks, pasteurize the fruit and put it into your secondary (or into your primary after the initial fermentation subsides.

Pasteurize the fruit by breaking it up with with a coarse grinding or crushing, heating to about 85 C for fifteen minutes, and then cooling it in a closed container. This will kill of spoiling bacteria without setting the pectin. Add to the just-fermented beer. You'll start another fermentation with the fruit sugars, and the alcohol present from the malt sugar fermentation will suppress the few nasties that might have made it through.

[CiderJoe]

Yeah, actually I'm working at a small micro-brewery in England at the moment, and we've never done a fruit beer before. So I been trying to figure out how to do it. My boss wanted to boil the fruit, which I was not down with, so we comprimised and have put it in after flame out and are running it through at chiller at the moment.

We've tasted the unfermented beer, and it has raspberry taste, but I think we over hopped. Hopefully it will mellow as it ferments. It's going to be Cask Conditioned, so hopefully after 10 days in the fermenter and another week or 2 in the cask, it'll have mellowed out.

[Mill Rat]

Originally posted by CiderJoe
Yeah, actually I'm working at a small micro-brewery in England at the moment, and we've never done a fruit beer before. So I been trying to figure out how to do it. My boss wanted to boil the fruit, which I was not down with, so we comprimised and have put it in after flame out and are running it through at chiller at the moment.

We've tasted the unfermented beer, and it has raspberry taste, but I think we over hopped. Hopefully it will mellow as it ferments. It's going to be Cask Conditioned, so hopefully after 10 days in the fermenter and another week or 2 in the cask, it'll have mellowed out.

My bold prediction: The hops will mellow a little. The fruit you taste now will float off in with the fermentation CO2. You'll be lucky to taste more than a hint of the fruit. Since you're tapping in under a month, there will be a little flavor left, but only about 10% of what you're tasting now. It'll still be good beer, just not much of a fruit beer. I hope to be proven wrong, though. Good luck.

[CiderJoe]

I hope so too. If it turns out well, I'll post another reply to let you know.

Thanks, Cider

[Mill Rat]

Originally posted by CiderJoe
I hope so too. If it turns out well, I'll post another reply to let you know.

Thanks, Cider

Post another reply regardless when you see how it turns out. We're glad to help as much as we can, and just plain curious, too.

[CiderJoe]

It's getting close.Started at about 1052.5 and it's at 1019 or so presently. Will stop it at 1012.5 roughly. I can tell you the smell coming from the fermenter is really nice. It's just said that most of the aroma will be gone when we cask it.

Cider

[Mill Rat]

You have no idea the envy you inspire when you write "cask it."

[CiderJoe]

OK, mission accomplished!

The Stout came out black as night, and smooth, as well as a raspberry taste that seems to grow as you drink it. Tasted great out of the fermenter. We put it in cask almost 2 weeks ago, and we put a cask up the otehr day and had some. Seemed to be more raspberry taste than I would have thought. This is one that will definitely be brewed again. A fruit beer that you can have more than just one of.

I know we would have gotten more taste by putting the fruit int he fermenter, but I'm not sure I'd want more.

Cider

[corkybstewart]

Can you mail a small cask of that over here. Please

[Mill Rat]

If your experience is anything like mine has been, this is the peak of the raspberry flavor. It will mellow (read fade) from here on out. Glad you're happy with your brew!

[CiderJoe]

I did bring back some bottles to share with friends, as I'm visiting the states for a few days. But a Pin would be a bit much.

I am happy with it. Hopefully it won't be around long enough to fade. I'm hoping they've sold it all by now. We got 20 firkins and 1 pin out of the batch, well and a partial firkin to drink ourselves.

Now, I'm just wondering how the lager I tried to do is going. I'll start a new thread for that.

Cheers,
Cider

[Mill Rat]

CiderJoe,

Does the topic of this thread

http://www.realbeer.com/discussions/showthread.php?s=&threadid=11783

sound at all familiar?

[CiderJoe]

Umm...just a little. We drank those beers the other night. He's got 5 more to go thru. Hopefully those will get equally great reviews. Though he his a friend, so maybe he's a bit biases. I certainly won't hold that against him.

Cider

[Mad Scientist]

Sorry to revive this old thread, but could we get the recipe that you used? If you can just post the full recipe, I can scale it back.

[CiderJoe]

I don't have it with me at the moment. On vacation. Remind me next week when I'm back home. I've got it on the computer there.

Cider

[zoom6zoom]

One suggestion I found on one of the mead boards was to freeze your fruit before using it. The freezing helps break down the cell walls, resulting in better utilization of the fruit.

[barleyburps]

back in 2004, I made a blackberry ale with old frozen blackberries my mom had in her freezer for coblers, but never used. Some of the containers dated back to 1997, so she was going to throw them out. I added the berries at the end of boil. It turned out a decent beer for about a year, after a year and a half, the flavor profile started getting less enjoyable. Was never really a fresh blackberry taste to begin with. The next time I do a fruit beer, I will do a secondary fermentation/aging with the fruit. I actually still have a little left in the keg, but haven't tasted it since february of 2006. At that time, I pretty much decided when I needed the keg, It would get dumped. My notes from when it was still in its prime, described it as kind of a "cooked berry flavor with a waxy aftertaste." Drinkable, but not worthy of trying to repeat. . . .

Net produce of the batch was ~16 gallons with an opening gravity of 13 brix. And I used 9lb of partially thawed blackberries.

[Mad Scientist]

Originally posted by zoom6zoom
One suggestion I found on one of the mead boards was to freeze your fruit before using it. The freezing helps break down the cell walls, resulting in better utilization of the fruit.

I might note that after freezing; putting everything through a blender, then carefully pasturizing works very well,

[CiderJoe]

Sorry it took me so long, but you were supposed to remind me!

Anyhow, here it is Raspberry Stout for 5 BBL's (180 Imperial Gallons)

MASH - Grain Bill

Maris Otter - 150 KG - approx. 79.3% of grain bill
Crystal - 15 KG - 8% (sorry don't know what SRM we used, shouldn't matter, but go with something like 40 SRM)
Amber - 10 KG - 5.3%
Chocolate - 10 KG - 5.3%
Black - 4 KG - 2.1%

We also used 425 mL of AMS for water treatment (acidity) in the hot liquor tank as well as 285 gams of DWB (burton salts of some sort) and 70 grams of Table Salt in the Mash.

Single Infusion Mash - 65 degrees Celcius for 1 Hour.

BOIL - Hops

Challenger - 1000 grams - 60 Minutes
Pioneer - 250 grams - 15 Min.
Proflocs (Irish Moss basically) - 6 tablets - 15 Min.
First Gold - 200 grams - 5 Min.

RASPBERRIES - 15 KG

We froze them. Some were pureed, but that got annoying. We added them to the wort after the boil. We let the thaw as much as possible, just set them out that morning and added them when the wort temp dropped alittle. It was still above 90 degrees Celcius when we added them ( 8 KG at first). We let them steep for 5 minutes and started our run-off. Half way through, we added the other 7 Kilos. The wort was still plenty hot enough to pasturize the fruit. We weren't worried about tannins since it's a stout and pitch black. The taste was fantastic.

We drank quite a bit as we were casking the beer. It was really smooth out of the fermenter. The Coffee and Chocolate malts blended really well withteh fruit. I plan on making this one at home soon enough. Just need to find fresh raspberries! Let me know how your's turns out.

Cider

[Mad Scientist]

Thanks!