Cranberry Beer

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alex_wilkosz

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I am an extract brewer wondering if anyone has a good Cranberry Beer recipe!

Thanks! Trying to find something the SWMBO would like that is not a regular beer

I looked in the threads and didnt find much info and was wondering if anyone could help me out here
 
Most wine and LHBS will have extract bottles that are supposed ot be used to give that extra fruit kick to wines. a half a bottle of raspberry extract to any well balanced beer will give it a nice fruity taste. But if the beer is already acidic this might over do it. I would go with just and ounce in a light american ale or amber. Stouts and porters, give it a bump up. I used apple in an amber and it was outstanding.
 
I have tried adding cranberry juice (100%, not cocktail) in varying amounts from 5% to 33% in the primary, and this was not particularly good. I think I will try racking onto actual cranberries in secondary and see what that's like.
 
I have tried adding cranberry juice (100%, not cocktail) in varying amounts from 5% to 33% in the primary, and this was not particularly good. I think I will try racking onto actual cranberries in secondary and see what that's like.

Would you crush/puree the whole cranberries or drop in whole? I'm contemplating a Cranberry Kolsch and am stuck on how/when to introduce the cranberries... I'm also wondering if some sort of sweetening agent needs to be introduced as cranberries arent really all that sweet on their own...
 
I tried cranberries once, in a Dubbel. Put the cranberries in a pot with a bit of water, heated it up, and quasi-pureed them with an immersion blender. I dumped this into the secondary.

The end product was...okay. Not my best. Even with two big bags of cranberries, you don't get much cranberry flavor, it just adds a strange tartness to the beer.

You can try the concentrated cranberry flavoring. I believe AHS carries it still. That might get better results without the tart notes.
 
The end product was...okay. Not my best. Even with two big bags of cranberries, you don't get much cranberry flavor, it just adds a strange tartness to the beer.

eh. maybe cranberries just aren't meant to go in beer.......

+1 to both

I just racked the Cranberry Zinger from BYO to a keg, and it is not tasting too hot. Tart and I'm not sure what else, it just doesn't taste very good. Maybe age will help, but I'm not overly hopeful. I added my cranberries after processing them into a rough relish and chucked them into secondary.
 
I have the BYO cranberry zinger on tap right now. It is definitely tart, but with enough carbonization, it has a creaminess that counters the tartness. It's supposed to be highly carbed, but I only have it on 10PSI since it shares the same pressure with other beers, but I am guessing that the creaminess would come out even more with higher carbing.

It also mellowed out over the last few weeks.
 
I made an extract cranberry beer last Christmas that is one of the best beers I've ever done (granted, that doesn't mean too much coming from a noob). I dumped two pounds of whole cranberries into the wort after I took it off the heat and left them in until I racked to secondary a week later (fast! hey, it was like my fourth batch ever -- what did I know?). I thought I'd screwed myself by not crushing the berries, but actually I think that saved it -- I got a rose-colored, somewhat fruity beer but not too tart. A month later I brought a bunch to a family Christmas in Maine and it was a huge hit. I went back to Maine for another family get-together seven months later and there were a couple hidden in the pantry -- not surprisingly, it was even better than before.
 
Would you crush/puree the whole cranberries or drop in whole?

I was going to put them in a freezer [bag] and put through a couple of freeze/thaw cycles to bust them up a bit, then maybe squish the bag before adding to secondary.
 
I am an extract brewer wondering if anyone has a good Cranberry Beer recipe!

Thanks! Trying to find something the SWMBO would like that is not a regular beer

I looked in the threads and didnt find much info and was wondering if anyone could help me out here

I posted something a while back that had traces from my memory of a Cranberry beer recipe I made that turned out nice.

Would you crush/puree the whole cranberries or drop in whole? I'm contemplating a Cranberry Kolsch and am stuck on how/when to introduce the cranberries... I'm also wondering if some sort of sweetening agent needs to be introduced as cranberries arent really all that sweet on their own...

I think the flavor is pretty minimal, so I pureed to increase the contact area. Also add either in secondary (after heating pureed cranberries to 160F for a bit to kill the bugs) or after shutoff and wort has cooled below 180F or so(don't want to make jellied cranberries in your wort). I think sweetening is a mistake - I believe the tartness/acidity you taste from cranberries is the main flavor they contribute and adding sugar will neutralize that, leaving little or no contribution from the fruit. I would personally add cranberries to a beer that would benefit from tartness yet is clean enough on its own that you will pick up the subtle flavor of cranberries, which is how I came up with a Cranberry Belgian Wit.
 
Ive made a cranberry ale every xmas for the past 5 years and ive found that darker stronger ales are better than lighter beers, it seems to give a dry flavor to a strong sweetish recipe and the beer is much improved by it, the beer i make is based on 12 pounds pale malt, 6 oz choc malt 3/4 pound crystal malt, 1/2 pound of amber malt, 4 0z hops fuggles, 4ltrs cranberry juice, 2lb dark sugar, i normaly keg my brew but this i bottle in 1 pint bottles, needs about 2-3 months in the bottle, this is for 5 galls and if a good infusion is made you should end up with an O.G of 1065, the first cranberry ale i made was a bout 1085 but found this to strong.
 
I did a cranberry wheat out of the Brooklyn BeerShop's Beer Making Book. I used frozen Cranberries and I doubled them for the recipe. It was a hit at my last party so you should search that out if you are still interested.
 
I recently had Harpoon's seasonal cranberry ale. They put a slight but obvious cranberry taste on top of clean, sweet amber ale. It was definitely good for cranberry ale. It balances the cran tartness with sweet amber.

Last year I brewed a fall/winter pomegranate on wheat ale, and it was good after I let the bitterness die down for a couple of months (from the excessive white rind). But with cranberries this year, which are not very sweet to begin with, I'm searching for a better answer. Probably more to do with cran prep than with brewing tricks.
 
Leinenkgals makes a decent Cranberry Ginger Wheat beer. From reading on here, the ginger may settle down the cranberry tartness. It's not a horrible beer and the SWMBO loves it. I was thinking it would be a bit better if it was a little maltier. I can find a cranberry recipe and a ginger recipe but not a cranberry ginger recipe. It might get the SWMBO to accept my "hobby" a little more if I can get this right. Any suggested recipes? If not, I'll just find a decent Wheat Lager, and add 2 oz ground ginger at the start of the boil and add some amount of cranberry extract before bottling.

I wonder if the cranberry extract has any fermentable that would require a reduction in bottling sugar? and how much of the extract should I use?
 
After reading this thread, I added 2 lbs of frozen cranberries to wort at flame out. Let it sit through primary, then removed at secondary. Just bottled it. Nice hint of tart, not overwhelming. Will post again when I start sampling in a few weeks.
 
My cranberry beer turned out pretty good. 2 lbs at flame out seemed to be a good amount. It had nice tart taste, but not over powering. Lots of people who are not big beer drinkers liked it. Also, it went great with holiday dinner. Is a do-over for next years holiday. Thanks for the tips.
 
I have tried adding cranberry juice (100%, not cocktail) in varying amounts from 5% to 33% in the primary, and this was not particularly good. I think I will try racking onto actual cranberries in secondary and see what that's like.

I'm going to try a few 5% recipes with 100% juice soon. I'd like your inputs on what your results were, what you were aiming, in what styles, and why you didn't like it.
 
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