B192734

Recipes 

Which would give a cleaner fruit flavor, putting more fruit in the primary, or the secondary? I am going to put fruit in both, but was wondering which give more flavor.

fatbloke

Recipes 

You'd be surprised how much fruit flavour is blown out of an airlock......

Apparently, if you put most, if not all, of the fruit in secondary, or even just steep the fruit in the batch after the ferment has finished. You tend to get a fruitier tasting mix.

Obviously when putting fruit into secondary, it's dependant on the yeast as well. Some yeasts, like K1V-1116, are better at retaining the fruitier flavours than others (it's one of the reasons I don't like using EC-1118, it gives too much of a "champagne characteristic").

Of course, if you have the room and reasonable sized fermenters, you can put some into primary, as it will have nutrient and fermentable properties, then the main part of the fruit into the secondary for the actual fruit flavouring (and colouring) it'd probably give what you seem to be aiming for.

Don't forget, doing it that way, also often gives a brew that's drinkable much earlier than it otherwise might be......

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malkore

Recipes 

another vote for secondary on the fruit.

active fermentation really takes out a lot of the aromatics, which leads ot a loss of flavor.

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Malkore
Primary: English Mild
On tap: Pale Ale, Lancelot's Wheat, English Brown Ale, Steam Beer, HoovNuts IPA
Bottled: MOAM, Braggot, Raspberry Melomel, Merlot, Apfelwein, Pyment, Sweet mead, Cabernet
Gal in 2009: 27, Gal in 2010: 34, Gal in 2011: 13, Gal in 2012: 10

MedsenFey

Recipes 

I like the complexity and changes you get with fruit in the primary. I find the best way to preserve the aromatics is to ferment very cool, and use lots more fruit.

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gratus fermentatio

Recipes 

Fruit in secondary/tertiary will give you a more true fruit flavour, much closer to the actual fruit than you'll get in primary alone. I like to add fruit to both as this gives me some added depth & complexity of flavour. Regards, GF.

B192734

Recipes 

I split it up and so far I have about 1/2 and 1/2 to go into the primary/secondary. I may pick up a little more for the secondary, but may not need to. We'll see how it looks. So far it smells great, but has a long way to go...