strawberry ale question

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dbreienrk1

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I brewed a strawberry ale last week and I transferred it to the secondary today. It had 7 days in the primary so primary fermentation should have completed...I think.

I added the 6lbs of pureed strawberrys and there is some violent fermentation occurring right now. I mean full on blow-off-tube-clogging fermentation. I basically want to know if this is normal...so is it normal? And is it actually fermentation?

5gal batch 1 hour boil OG 1.064
6lbs pilsner dme
1lbs wheat dme
1lbs carapils grain (steeped 30 min @ 155)
1oz centinneal (60 min)
1oz saaz (15 min)
1oz saaz (4 min)
Irish moss and yeast nutrient (15 min)
Wyeast 1252
6lbs strawberrys
 
It is completely normal. You added a bunch of sugar (in the strawberries) so the yeast is fermenting it.

Also personally I do not recommend pureed strawberries, although if you are fermenting in a carboy you may not have a choice. In my experience, it is nearly impossible to avoid getting little bits of strawberry in your beer with pureed strawberries.

I recommend using a bucket for secondary, washing, halving and freezing the strawberries in a sanitized container, and then putting them in a paint strainer or hops bag and racking onto them in the bucket. It is all around a lot easier to deal with them in a self-contained bag like that.
 
Damn...never thought about the puree getting transferred to the bottle...
 
You might want to rack it to a tertiary after a while and give it a good long while to settle out before bottling.
 
Will cold crashing it cause the strawberry particles to fall out of suspension?
 
If you add gelatin, that would probably help drag the seeds and particles out.
 
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