Strawberry Blonde - Taste...

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k2zr2

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Quick question.

Unfortunately I'm not near my recipe however I do have a question. I made a Blonde ale last year, brewed it 3 times with consistent results. This time around, I decided to add 4lbs of frozen strawberries to the secondary.

I went to keg it this weekend, siphoned a small taste sample out prior to kegging and it has a very, very fruit wine taste. Not really what I was shooting for, it's really bitter and I don't care for it much.

So, I transferred it to a carboy and placed it in the fridge. I'm hoping it will mellow out a bit. I have 2 weeks until I have people coming over and I am hoping that it will mellow out in that time.

I guess my question is, what did I do wrong? I followed the same recipe from previous batches that taste great, racked that from the primary into the secondary which had 4lbs of frozen strawberries in it. 1 week Primary, 2 weeks Secondary. Please tell me 2 more weeks will help.

As a back up plan, I have Strawberry extract that I got from a local brew shop. It smells a bit candy like, but it's better than the way it tastes now.

(This is really my first batch that I'm not happy with so really no big deal. I'm just wondering if this is what to expect when using real fruit in beer.)
 
So the problem is that you made a strawberry blonde, and it tastes like tart strawberries?? that would be because the yeast consumed the sugars and left the tart flavor behind. I personally like the tart flavor you get when using real fruit. I find a tart strawberry blonde to be far more refreshing on a summer day than a sweet fruit beer.

Carbonate it and see how you like it, you can always add a little splenda to the keg to sweeten it up if it still isnt to your liking.
 
I would stay away from the extract, I find that they make the beer taste like cough syrup.
(give a bottle of Sam Adams Cherry Wheat a try so you know what I am talking about)
 
azscoob said:
I would stay away from the extract, I find that they make the beer taste like cough syrup.
(give a bottle of Sam Adams Cherry Wheat a try so you know what I am talking about)
Click to expand...

This is exactly what I was trying to avoid.

However, your post above this makes sense... I will carb it up and see if that helps. If not, I may pull a pint and add some splenda to see if that helps.

The strawberry extract smells just like cough syrup. That's the whole reason I went with real fruit in the first place.
 
If not splenda (I hate the stuff), then another non fermentable sweetener might help- like lactose.

The sugars from the stawberries are fermentable, so that is probably what happened. The sugars fermented out, leaving tart fruit flavor behind.

As Azscoob said, it might taste much better when carbonated!
 
I did a raspberry beer last year that was the same way, uncarbonated samples tasted really winey and it still tasted kind of winey after a couple weeks in the bottle but the flavors seemed to meld as time went on and after probably 4 weeks in the bottle it either lost the winey taste or I got used to it but it turned out to be something I really liked and I drank it pretty fast. I origionally made it for SWMBO but then she got pregnant before it was ready and never got to drink any of it which means I probably drank over 30 of the 50 bottles from that batch myself. Turned into a great lawnmower beer. Anyway that was kind of a longwinded way for me to say it might not taste like you want it to yet but it'll probably get better.
 
So, this thread has been dormant for a long time...but wondering if I could get some advice. I'll be doing a blonde ale later this month:

Bonkers Blonde Ale (5.3% ABV)
Recommended Yeast: Safale US-05
Extract:
6 lbs Pilsner LME
1 lb Wheat DME
1 lb Munich Malt (8L)
0.75 oz Vanguard (45 min)
1 oz Sterling (15 min)

I was thinking of making this a Strawberry Blonde. I would love to know how the brew in the original discussion turned out once it was carbed. I'll be doing a 5 gallon batch and bottling it (I don't have kegging capability). I want to impart a little strawberry background note and a little color is okay, but not necessary. I thought 4lbs of strawberries sounded a little high for what I'm after. I was thinking maybe 2lbs frozen, whole strawberries. Would puree be better? I thought whole would be more subtle and easier to rack. I normally use corn sugar for priming...would that be okay here or would there be a better choice for this style? General opinions are welcome as well. If this just sounds like a rotten plan, I could just skip the secondary or rack into separate secondary carboys and try something else....
The basic recipe is being offered at my HBS for 1/2 price one day this month, so I don't want to tamper with that part of the recipe.
 
mattmmille said:
So, this thread has been dormant for a long time...but wondering if I could get some advice. I'll be doing a blonde ale later this month:

Bonkers Blonde Ale (5.3% ABV)
Recommended Yeast: Safale US-05
Extract:
6 lbs Pilsner LME
1 lb Wheat DME
1 lb Munich Malt (8L)
0.75 oz Vanguard (45 min)
1 oz Sterling (15 min)

I was thinking of making this a Strawberry Blonde. I would love to know how the brew in the original discussion turned out once it was carbed. I'll be doing a 5 gallon batch and bottling it (I don't have kegging capability). I want to impart a little strawberry background note and a little color is okay, but not necessary. I thought 4lbs of strawberries sounded a little high for what I'm after. I was thinking maybe 2lbs frozen, whole strawberries. Would puree be better? I thought whole would be more subtle and easier to rack. I normally use corn sugar for priming...would that be okay here or would there be a better choice for this style? General opinions are welcome as well. If this just sounds like a rotten plan, I could just skip the secondary or rack into separate secondary carboys and try something else....
The basic recipe is being offered at my HBS for 1/2 price one day this month, so I don't want to tamper with that part of the recipe.
Click to expand...

I made an APA a month or so ago with 2oz Belma @ 5 minutes and 4 oz Belma for a 30 minute hop stand and dry hopped with another 2oz of Belma. It's not one tiny bit bitter and it smells and tastes like Strawberries. Might not be a bad way to go if you're looking to get some strawberry notes in your Blonde. Maybe cut out the 5 minute addition and just do the hop stand. It's worth noting that Belma is a very subtle hop. Using 6oz of Belma won't give you any where near the amount flavor and aroma you would get form using 6oz of, say, Citra.
 
pegasus_brew said:
I made an APA a month or so ago with 2oz Belma @ 5 minutes and 4 oz Belma for a 30 minute hop stand and dry hopped with another 2oz of Belma. It's not one tiny bit bitter and it smells and tastes like Strawberries. Might not be a bad way to go if you're looking to get some strawberry notes in your Blonde. Maybe cut out the 5 minute addition and just do the hop stand. It's worth noting that Belma is a very subtle hop. Using 6oz of Belma won't give you any where near the amount flavor and aroma you would get form using 6oz of, say, Citra.
Click to expand...

I'll add that to my research chores...thanks!!!
 
So, I went with the recipe "as is" this first time, except I used Denny's Favorite #50 yeast (Smack Pak) and I added 6 lbs frozen, whole strawberries after flameout at about 170F. My OG wound up really low...I think it was because I didn't figure my water properly and made too much. So, the next day, I took a gallon of the wort and boiled it with 3 lbs DME for 15 minutes, cooled and added it back. That was supposed to put it in the 1.053 range, but it only made it to 1.040...but I can live with that. I had good action in the blow off. But, after 8 days, I'm still only down to an SG of 1.024 and I'm wondering if I should rack it and/or pitch more yeast? Because of my excess brew volume, I have about 1-1/2 gallons in a 2 gallon fermentation bucket at the same reading. Temperature in the house is about 70F. What do you all think?
 

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