Fruit Beer Imperial (Lime) Blonde Ale

Brewed this one for SWMBO's father, who requested a "light, refreshing, drinkable lime beer with at least 8% alcohol."

So I kicked it up a notch, gave it a shot, and am actually very pleased! Goes down SUPER easy, and tastes great, but watch out. At 10%, it doesn't quite "sneak up on you". It walks right up and punches you in the head before you even know what's going on.

The beer pours a nice golden color (which isn't quite as dark as it seems from the picture - crappy camera and lighting!), and has a great frothy head which persists until the last drop.

Smells and tastes like lime, with a little bit of the cluster hops, which in my opinion go nicely, but V 2.0 will be using Sorachi hops instead. There is also a little bit of honey, which in my opinion balances the lime flavor nicely. I was originally shooting for more of an imperial cream ale than blonde, but I think there is enough residual sugar left that it's more of a blonde.

I cold crashed for a week at ~35F with gelatin. The beer was amazingly clear. I could read words through a pint. However, that combined with the high ABV, and the yeast just were not carbonating. Two months in the bottles and there wasn't any carbonation beyond the tiniest 'pfft' when opening. Beer was flat. So I ended up opening and capping half the batch with EC1118 and the other half with CBC-1. Two weeks later, both were carbonated, but unfortunately not clear anymore. Hopefully some time in the fridge will settle it out again. In the future, I'll be repitching a small amount of yeast before bottling, and hopefully that will help it stay clear. For what it's worth, the CBC-1 left a good amount of honey flavor, and the EC1118 left the beer drier and more crisp.

Here are the details:

Briess Pilsen Light LME 6lb - late addition (~15mins)
Munton's Extra Light DME (Spraymalt) - added at beginning of boil (60 mins)
Gambrinas Honey Malt - 12oz
Belgian Biscuit Malt - 4oz
Honey - 3lb 10.5oz
(20 mins @ 166F in ~1.5gal for the specialty grains)

Cluster - 1oz - 60mins
Cluster - 2oz - 15mins
2 limes worth of fresh zest - 15mins
Irish moss - 1tsp - 15 mins
yeast nutrient - 1/2tsp - 15 mins

primary for 2 weeks at 63F
rack to secondary, add 1.75L Simply brand Limeade and the juice of 2 limes, condition 2 weeks, prime and bottle. This batch was excellent after 1 month in the bottles at room temp. At two weeks in, it was very alcohol hot, and the lime was very strong as well. Both mellowed out after a couple more weeks, no problem.

people have generally really liked this one. had a few really rave about it. I never woulda gone for this "style" normally, but I'm liking it a lot too. I've got V2.0 fermenting now, and it's not gonna be done nearly in time.

one warning if anyone decides to brew this. leave plenty of headspace and go with a blow off tube right off the bat. this one is more of a violent fermentation than vigorous. even temp controlled to 63F, it came shooting out of the airlock hole in my bucket lid. not just working it's way up there, shooting. it initially clogged the blow off tube and built up enough pressure it was whistling around the edge of the seal, so I had to take off the tube and clean it and when I did, it was just a steady stream of krausen coming out

how much dme please gonna try it

carguy2833 said:

how much dme please gonna try it

Click to expand...

Weird. The edit button isn't showing up for me. 3lb DME.

If you do try it, please let me know what you think (even if you hate it).

willdo thanks
its up on the schedule in about three weeks

and since you responded i have never added that much lme that late any issues ?

and wou;ld also like to know exactly wjat you did to cold crash i e gelatin

Looking at trying this as a 10g AG batch, and I've never converted before. Here's what Im thinking, any advice would be appreciated.
16# 2 row
4# Amber
1.5# Honey
.5# Biscuit
Everything else the same (but doubled of course), and Im thinking of going with 1388 Belgian Strong Ale yeast to try and avoid the carb issues with some extra yeast tolerance.
Also gonna go with the sorachi ace, I like the sound of that!



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Sorry for the delay guys!

carguy2833 said:

and since you responded i have never added that much lme that late any issues ?

Click to expand...

Nope. That late addition supposedly helps reduce caramelization and keeps the color lighter. The only issue you may run into is you'll get another hot break so watch out for boil over!

carguy2833 said:

and wou;ld also like to know exactly wjat you did to cold crash i e gelatin

Click to expand...

Boil roughly a pint of water to sanitize, cool to 150 or so, add 1 packet Knox unflavored gelatin and stir till dissolved. Add to beer, then I slowly cooled it down to 33F over the course of 4-5 days, then let it sit at that temp for 2-3 days.

zhubbell said:

Looking at trying this as a 10g AG batch, and I've never converted before. Here's what Im thinking, any advice would be appreciated.
16# 2 row
4# Amber
1.5# Honey
.5# Biscuit
Everything else the same (but doubled of course), and Im thinking of going with 1388 Belgian Strong Ale yeast to try and avoid the carb issues with some extra yeast tolerance.
Also gonna go with the sorachi ace, I like the sound of that!



Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

Click to expand...

Without plugging it into software to verify numbers, it looks good to me! Let me know how it comes out. Been considering converting it to AG myself.

My only thought is that the Belgian yeast will add to the flavor, but I think this recipe could make for a descent Belgian trippel. So you'll have a different beer but I think it should be good still. If you wanted to use a more tolerant yeast and retain the original flavor, you MIGHT consider using the CBC-1 that I used for bottle conditioning, but as I haven't used it for primary fermentation, I can't say for sure it won't add flavor as well.

Maybe just use the WLP080, skip cold crashing, and give it a much longer time in the fridge after bottling?

Oh and I do like the Sorachi hops better with this, although I might be dialing the hops down a bit. This latest batch has a little more IBU than I wanted.

a sper your request my experience with your recipie this weekend

i followed your recipe to a t up to this point
my og came in a bit higher 1.114 no bigge
my colour is similar to your pic and in no way near a blonde but oh well
as far as fermintation i made an error was doing wo brewsthe same day and added half of my starter of trappist along with a pkg of safe brew 33
pitched sun aft
nothing much mon am
thank the heavans i had sprung for a burner and moved my brewing to the garage
mon eve aft work had my plug blown about a 6 " head on the fermenter even with a blow off hose
reattached and behaving better lol
will up dat on teh final but just dont see this being a blonde

ok have experienced al you said
blew my tube off the fermenter
color is way darker then a blonde
did have a higher og 1.114
have a stuck fermentation at 3 days
am ready to pitch champagne yeast
hopeing to hear

how did you end up at 1.114? That is definitely a lot higher than my OG, and would explain the color difference. The pic I posted actually looks darker than it really is. The calculated SRM is 7, which looks about right to me.

The only thing I can think of is the honey. Maybe you've got a thicker/darker honey than I used, which will add more sugar and maybe more color as well. But I can't see a variation in honey causing that big of a jump in gravity. What's your final volume?

Also keep in mind, it's going to look a lot darker in the fermenter than in the glass, partially because of settling, but mostly because you're looking through a lot more of it.

I have this one in secondary right now.
After the additions to secondary, I had more beer than would fit in my five gallon secondary. I didn't want to waste the beer, so I started to siphon into my glass.
Warm, flat, and right out of the primary it tasted great. Had about four glasses when I knew I better not drink anymore.