Grape juice in a sour?

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I found a couple of cans of frozen grape juice concentrate in the freezer. Wondered how they would go in a sour.

I have about 25 single gallon fermenters with Lambic or Flanders style beers maturing.

Any thoughts of what what would be the result if I removed 12 ozs from a well developed sour and added a can of grape juice concentrate.

I'd use an Imperial gallon carboy (1.2 US gallons). The sugar content of the concentrate is equal to almost 0.5 lbs of sugar. Effective gravity would be increased from roughly 1.056 (where most of my sours start) to about 1.074.

Any thoughts? a good experiment, or a waste of a good sour?
 
I really enjoyed the Vine from Cascade which is a blend of sours with white wine grapes although AFAIK they don't use any brett

i don't think it would be a wasted experiment but could also depend on the flavor/quality of the grape juice concentrate
 
i say go for it. i've never had a sour made with grape but would love to hear how it turns out.

idea: try adding some trub/yeast cake if you can. depending how old your lambic is, there might not be that much brett & bugs in suspension. it might take a while for them to deal with the sugars from the grape.
 
I enjoyed Avery's Muscat D'amour, though its not really a sour but a brett beer. Cantillon Saint Lamvinus was really good.

I dont see any reason not to do it...
 
Are there any preservatives in the concentrate? If so, you could end up killing the yeast and bacteria and be left with a Lindeman's type sweet fruity beer.
 
With the amount of time it takes to make a sour, I would only use the best fruits. No concentrated grape juice. Just my opinion
 
IIRC Allagash also has a line of funky/sour beers with grape juice, so, it can be done -- adds some depth and complexity, it's pretty tasty.

That being said, I think inflictor-of-grimness has a point, you don't wanna throw any old crap into your beer. That isn't to say that concentrate is always a mistake; a lot of folks freeze their fresh fruit to break open cell walls and whatnot before putting them in beer. But, if it's something like Welsh's, full of corn syrup and artificial flavors/colors and second-rate fruit, I'd keep it out of my sour, even if I had 24 more gallons where it came from.
 
A couple of my favorite sour beers use grapes: Cantillon St. Lamvinus and Vigneronne, Captain Lawrence Rosso e Marrone and Cuvee de Castleton, and Casacde Sang Royal.

I've made a Syrah lambic with 18 pounds of grapes in 2 year old lambic to about 5 gallons total volume. It's scored in the high 30's and low 40's in competitions. The only negative comments have been about the amount of grape skin tannins contributing bitterness, which people that aren't wine drinkers are not accustomed to.

I've also blended grape must with lambic at different ratios. I find that in general, you want probably 25% of the volume in wine because much more than that, the wine dilutes the fruit flavor and it tastes pretty muddy without the bright acidity for balance. I think you'll run into the same problem with grape concentrate meant for juice. It'll be two sweet and not sour enough ruining the delicateness of the beer.
 
soonami said:
A couple of my favorite sour beers use grapes: Cantillon St. Lamvinus and Vigneronne, Captain Lawrence Rosso e Marrone and Cuvee de Castleton, and Casacde Sang Royal.

I've made a Syrah lambic with 18 pounds of grapes in 2 year old lambic to about 5 gallons total volume. It's scored in the high 30's and low 40's in competitions. The only negative comments have been about the amount of grape skin tannins contributing bitterness, which people that aren't wine drinkers are not accustomed to.

I've also blended grape must with lambic at different ratios. I find that in general, you want probably 25% of the volume in wine because much more than that, the wine dilutes the fruit flavor and it tastes pretty muddy without the bright acidity for balance. I think you'll run into the same problem with grape concentrate meant for juice. It'll be two sweet and not sour enough ruining the delicateness of the beer.
Click to expand...

Wow 18lbs in 5 gallons? I just added 2lbs of fresh crushed cab franc grapes/juice to two gallons of a Flanders red. I have another 4.5lbs in the freezer, think I should add more?
 

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