100 Bottles of Beer - Enjoying the Fruits of Our Labor

Well, here we are, once again and, before those of you who read the last installment ask; yes, my last brew was disaster free with no spillage or breakage, thank you very much. I will tell you all about it when we get there. But, for now, we are back on track and I am going to talk about fruit beers as promised.

Those of you that have been with me since the beginning will recall back in part 5 I did a cherry stout which did not turn out too well. Also, you may remember an Apricot Amber in part 9 which was made with apricot flavoring. This edition will be dedicated to beers made with fresh/frozen whole fruits.

The first two of these came from More Homebrew Favorites by Karl Lutzen and Mark Stevens. You may recall we have visited several recipes from their first compilation, Homebrew Favorites, and also from their web site, Cat's Meow.

The first of these two is called Ripcord Raspberry Ale and is credited to Jerry Narowski of Derby, CT. My only changes are slightly increasing both the honey and the raspberries and using different yeast.

Ripcord Raspberry Ale

1 lb 60L British Crystal malt

3.3 lb M&F light LME

3.3 lb M&F amber LME

1 lb 6 oz light clover honey

1 oz Northern Brewer whole cone hops (45 min)

1 oz Cascade whole cone hops (20 min)

1 oz Fuggles whole cone hops (5 min)

½ oz Fuggles hop pellets (5 min)

1 tsp Irish Moss (15 min)

30 oz Frozen raspberries

White Labs WLP008 East Coast Ale Yeast

Priming: ½ cup corn sugar & 1/3 cup DME

Heat one gallon cold water to 150F, add milled crystal malt, cover, remove from heat, and let steep for 20 minutes. Strain the wort into the brew kettle and sparge with ½ gallon boiling water.

Add LME and honey and bring to boil. Let boil for 15 minutes before beginning to add hops and Irish moss at times indicated for total 60 minute boil.

While boiling the wort, add raspberry in a grain bag to one gallon boiled water which has cooled to 160F. Cover and let steep until end of wort boil.

Remove the hop bags from the wort and squeeze out as much wort as possible. Crush the raspberries in the bag in the water they have been stepping in. When the wort has cooled to 160F, strain the raspberry tea into the kettle, squeezing as much juice from the bag as possible. Pour the wort into the carboy with cold water, topping to 5 ½ gallons with more cold water. Pitch yeast when cooled.

After 12 days in the primary and 9 days in the secondary, this was ready to bottle. I used mounded measures of the priming sugars so it was actually a little more than I listed.

This started off tasting a little winey. The hops were very subtle with some tartness from the berries. There was a hint of raspberry in the aftertaste. The color was amber with just a hint of red and minimal chill haze.

It did age very well. The winey flavor went away; both the hops and raspberry flavors became more pronounced and were in a nice tart balance. The chill haze disappeared and the color darkened to red-amber. Overall, very good stuff! I did not take any gravity readings but the targets were OG 1.054 and FG .015 would give an ABV of 5%

Our next fruit beer is Blackberry Porter and is credited to Bryan Schwab of Panama City, FL. The original recipe oddly listed the malt quantities in cups. I took a guess and converted to pounds. I also decreased the amount of gypsum as 2 Tb seemed like way too much and added the Irish Moss.

Blackberry Porter

1 lb 40L American crystal malt

1 lb Belgian Special-B malt

2 oz British chocolate malt

6.6 lb M&F light DME

2 tsp Gypsum

1 tsp Irish Moss (15 min)

1 in Brewer's Licorice

8 oz Malto-Dextrin

2 oz Liberty hop pellets (15 min)

5 lb Frozen blackberries

12 grams Munton's Ale Yeast

Priming: ½ cup corn sugar & 1/3 cup DME

This procedure was nearly identical to the Raspberry Ale adding the Brewer's Licorice along with the DME and adding the Irish Moss, Malto-Dextrin, and hops in the final 15 minutes of a 60 minute boil.

It was bottled after six days in the primary and 15 days in the secondary. It came out dark red with low but adequate carbonation. Berry flavor and tartness were very obvious but still tasted like beer. The hop flavor was very mild. Overall, I felt it was a good, drinkable beer, just not great. The target gravities were OG 1.076 and FG 1.024 for about 6.8% ABV.

Our third fruit beer is an attempt to replicate Strawberry Daze Ale from Glenwood Canyon Brew Pub in Glenwood Springs, CO. This was a seasonal ale they produced in conjunction with the city's Strawberry Festival. Currently, their website makes no mention of it so, I do not know if they still produce it or not. I decided to make a batch because Debbie, who does not like beer, liked this one. I based my recipe on the Ripcord Raspberry recipe.

Strawberry Springs Ale

1 lb 40L German Light Crystal malt

6 lb M&F Extra Light DME

1 lb M&F Light DME

1 lb 8 oz light clover honey

1 oz Cascade hop pellets (60 min)

1 oz Fuggles hop pellets (5 min)

1 tsp Irish Moss

6 lb Fresh Strawberries

White Labs WLP008 East Coast Ale Yeast

Priming: ½ cup corn sugar & ¼ cup DME

This procedure was identical to the Raspberry Ale with the exception of having to first clean and quarter the fresh strawberries.

I bottled after 15 days in the primary and 18 days in the secondary. This was excessively long but the cloudiness just would not settle out.

After three weeks in the bottle it was still completely flat. I waited another week and it was still flat. OK, my yeast must have died during the long wait in the secondary and the summer heat.

I sanitized the top of each bottle before removing the cap and removed a measured amount of beer by dipping in a filler tube, covering the top and withdrawing the filled tube. I then added a measured amount (about 2" in the filler tube) of re-hydrated EDME yeast to each bottle and recapped. I inverted the bottles in the case to mix the yeast in and left them for four weeks.

Hey! No longer flat! It was less carbonated than I wanted but was OK. It was not bad, had an acidic strawberry fruit tartness. Unfortunately, Debbie did not like it because it was too bitter compared with the original from Glenwood Canyon. I did not measure any gravity or make any further notes on this one so we will have to leave it there.

Well, there you have it, three somewhat similar yet different fruit beers. I have made one more beer containing fruit, raspberries, although I do not consider it a fruit beer. This utopian effort pushes the boundaries of what beer can be and will be left for another edition of our story. There, chew on that teaser for a while.

OK, that's three more down, 28 beers left to pass around.

Until next time...Keep on Brewin'

To be continued...

References:

Karl F. Lutzen & Mark Stevens, More Homebrew Favorites, 1997