9 replies to this topic

[wengared]

I've decided to make a fruit beer out of a wheat i have in primary, will add it to the secondary, question is these are store bought berries from the freezer section, not really knowing how they were processed i don't want to take a chance on contamination. so go SO2 on them for 24 hours or heat them up or soak in vodka overnight.? any experience here. Thanks

[Noontime]

I've decided to make a fruit beer out of a wheat i have in primary, will add it to the secondary, question is these are store bought berries from the freezer section, not really knowing how they were processed i don't want to take a chance on contamination. so go SO2 on them for 24 hours or heat them up or soak in vodka overnight.? any experience here. Thanks

I'm not sure how different it would be from wine, but personally I'd stay away from the vodka and just boil them. I thnk that will get you more out of the fruit anyway (since it's not going through primary fermentation).Just my 2 cents

[DaBearSox]

Check in the canned fruit section at your GStore. You can usually find fruit in just water. Then the bowling has already been done for you.

[CarlosM]

bi wouldnt say boil them because then your getting rid of most the aromatics and cooking them. From what I heard youre supposed to blanch them a few times.

[jammer]

I wouldnt even boil them. Freezing them for so long should pretty much kill any bad things. From what i can remember from my only two batches of wine ive ever made, they recomment freezing all fruit first. Something about it breaking down easier or somethign like that. Last time i made a raspberry wheat, i just used a large can of the Oregon Fruit raspberry pureee. Expensive, but it made a GREAT beer.

[Noontime]

bi wouldnt say boil them because then your getting rid of most the aromatics and cooking them. From what I heard youre supposed to blanch them a few times.

I agree...enough to get rid of anything that's on the surface of the fruit but your not making soup either. I would think the risk is pretty samll so you could probably do without anything as jammerama said, but I wouldn't take the chance. Is there any reason you don't want to put it in the primary? Depending on the beer you're making there might be enough residual sugars to accentuate the fruit flavor and it might have a chance to get more integrated.Good luck, I'm sure it will be delicious.

[stellarbrew]

I think if you boil them, you will set the pectin in the fruit, creating a permanent and destabilizing haze, which is generally undesirable. I've heard the recommendation made to bring the fruit just up to 160 F and hold for 15 minutes to sanitize, without ever boiling. Freezing first is great because it ruptures the cell walls in the fruit from the water expanding when it freezes. This makes the juices easier to extract.

[MolBasser]

You should be fine without any treatment using frozen fruit.A) freezing kills pretty much all the bugs that your concerned with. The alcohol level and pH in the beer is pretty protective at this point (secondary) also.BrewBasser

[wengared]

You should be fine without any treatment using frozen fruit.A) freezing kills pretty much all the bugs that your concerned with. The alcohol level and pH in the beer is pretty protective at this point (secondary) also.BrewBasser

thanks for the help.

[cbbrown40]

You should be fine without any treatment using frozen fruit.A) freezing kills pretty much all the bugs that your concerned with. The alcohol level and pH in the beer is pretty protective at this point (secondary) also.BrewBasser

+1 I do all of my fruit beers by making a puree and freezing that for at least 48 hrs. Then I add to secondary