Concord Grapes in sour beer

jmich24 · Oct 9, 2014

I have a ton of ripe Concord Grapes growing in my back yard.

Instead of adding my normal 10 pounds of tart cherries to my beer I thought Concord Grapes might be a nice substitute.
Anyone have experience with grapes?
Would I still use 2 pounds per gallon?
Leave the beer on the grapes for 4-8 weeks?
TIA

Sleepyemt · Oct 9, 2014

I've got something similar going on, except I have Riesling grapes that I'm using. I'm going .5 to 1 lb per gallon, but Riesling has more flavor coming through. Also my base beer is a saison...

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dougdecinces · Oct 9, 2014

I'm sure they would make a good sour beer, but I would be afraid of tannins from the skins and seeds. I'd either juice them or only leave the beer on the fruit for a few days. I have about 5 lbs of V. riparia that I plan on doing this with. I think I'm just going to crush the fruit and leave the beer on it for 3 days. Hopefully that's enough time to extract flavor without tannins.

Sleepyemt · Oct 10, 2014

I think tannins add to it, I don't think it's a bad thing...

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GTG · Oct 10, 2014

Look at the Mad Fermentationist's blog. I've messaged him specifically about this. He's left grapes in for months, skins and all. I have a bunch of muscat and muscadine grapes I'm planning on using like this as well.

Dirty25 · Oct 10, 2014

Cantillon makes two grape Lambics. One is a red grape and one is a white grape. Bother are excellent. I believe they age them on fruit for around 2 months.

Failing_Ales · Oct 10, 2014

We have done several batches on grapes that turned out great. We used about 2 lbs/gallon for 3 months before bottling. I thought the tannins were complementary.

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Majafoo · Oct 11, 2014

That's funny, I actually just half an hour ago racked a sour red ale onto 10# of concords (coronation). We'll see in 3 months how it turns out!

Concord Grapes in sour beer

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Concord Grapes in sour beer

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