Fruit Beer McMenamin's Ruby

As a local Portland head and big fan of Ruby, I'm gonna attempt this one. Not looking for exact clone here. Just what I think would be good.
PM-full boil 5.5 gal

3lb X light DME
3.5lb 2-row
1lb wheat malt
.25lb 40L
.5lb honey malt
.4oz Columbus (cause I have a sh@t ton!) @ 60
.2oz Columbus @ 30
3lb raspberry puree @ 3min
Might split up some in boil, some in secondary

70% efficiency
OG 1.047 FG 1.012 4.62 % ABV IBU 27.8+/-
Beer Tools Pro doesn't seem to add anything to OG for the raspberries, it'll "up" it a lil more I'm guessing. Could be wrong.

I took a bit from all the recipes posted here. Might be a lilttle "meatier" than Rube, buy I think it's a little too lite as is. Any thoughts fellas? Much appreciated. Oh and I'm pretty new to the forum and loving every minute of it. My brewing has gained leaps and bounds w/ all your help. Thanks!

Edit:In their pubs you can request a "Rubinator" Ruby mixed w/ there Terminator stout. SWMBO (who doesn't like "chick beers" loves this) If this works I'll adapt it to a darker style.

reviving this thread due to SWMBO loooves this beer especially the RUBINATOR!

jughead i have taken your recipe and will be planning on brewing this one question though what do you suggest for a yeast ?

I gave an extract version of this a try last weekend. She's still in primary right now. My recipe is as follows...

4 lbs Briess Pilsen Light DME
1oz Willamette (60mins)
3.3 Fresh whole raspberries (Previously frozen, thawed and crushed) added last 5 mins of boil

California V Ale yeast

My OG was 1.055 (which might not be accurate, I don't remember mixing the wort and the top off water before taking a hydro reading.) Brewing software had OG estimated at 1.035, but I don't think it accounted for the sugars in the berries either.

I bottled last weekend. Put a couple bottles in the fridge yesterday and popped one last night. Great raspberry flavor. We just ate at McMenamins a couple nights ago one person in my party ordered a Ruby so I got a taste to compare my brew with the original.

Theirs is very light in color and raspberry flavor, very smooth and easy to drink. Mine's got much more pink color and raspberry flavor, but on the down side is that it's got a bit of tartness to it. I think that the tartness could be attributed to keeping the seeds in during fermentation and bulk aging. Next time I think I'm going to run the berries through a mesh bag to strain out the seeds. I really hope that will get rid of the tartness, as the color and raspberry flavor is truly excellent!

Hi All,

New to the forums and home brewing. I was trying to think of a great beer I liked to give a shot. I'm going to give this a try based on Picobrew's recipe. I used to get this beer all the time at Mcmenamins when I lived in northern oregon. Sadly their are no Mcmenamins south of Roseburg when I moved to Medford. So I'm going to attempt to make a clone.

Update on my version... the tartness is gone! It's beautiful and very delicious!

daenja said:

Update on my version... the tartness is gone! It's beautiful and very delicious!

Click to expand...

Wow this is alive! ....again. Did you take the seeds out? Share your knowledge?! Here is my attempt.

Author: CarGan Brewery

Size: 5.36 gal
Efficiency: 75.0%
Attenuation: 75.0%
Calories: 195.57 kcal per 12.0 fl oz

Original Gravity: 1.059 (1.026 - 1.120)
Terminal Gravity: 1.015 (0.995 - 1.035)
Color: 5.92 (1.0 - 50.0)
Alcohol: 5.78% (2.5% - 14.5%)
Bitterness: 17.5 (0.0 - 100.0)

Ingredients:
8 lb Maris Otter
1.0 lb Wheat Flaked
1 lb Torrified Wheat
1.0 tsp Amylase enzyme - added during mash
1.0 lb Candi Sugar Clear
1.0 oz Willamette (5.0%) - added during boil, boiled 60 min
2 lb Raspberries (pureed) - added during boil, boiled 5.0 min
1.0 ea WYeast 1272 American Ale II
Notes
Oregon rasberry puree Split 2lb in boil 2 lb in secondary

Nope I didn't take the seeds out, they were on the fresh/frozen berries that I brewed with. I did put a mesh bag on my siphon to filter the berry leftovers and seeds when I racked to my bottling bucket. This is still from what I brewed just about 2 months ago...

recipe is:

4 lbs Briess Pilsen Light DME
1oz Willamette (60mins)
3.3 Fresh whole raspberries (Previously frozen, thawed and crushed) added last 5 mins of boil

California V Ale yeast

The tartness is gone completely and some of the raspberry flavor has mellowed. But there's still more raspberry flavor and a darker pink color than the original Mc Menamins Ruby. And mine is less cloudy than the original, it seems that even adding the berries to the end of the boil to get the pectin cloudiness didn't do much.

Wow, I can't believe I just stumbled across this... I spent a week in Portland a few months ago, and my hotel was across the street from John Barleycorn's in Tigard.

I must have downed a few gallons of this stuff. I'm going to give it a shot here very soon.

Me and some friends are very find of this beer. I think I will brew this for my next batch

So I'm giving this a shot tonight. I used daenja's extract recipe, sort of:

4 lbs Briess Pilsen Light DME
.75oz Chinook (60mins)
3# Oregon Raspberry Puree (Half added to boil for 5 mins, half added to primary)
White Labs California V Ale yeast

It had a very pink color, and an OG of 1.031 with all the berries. I'm optimistic...

Looks great! Let us know how it is after its bottled and carbed up!

I moved mine to secondary this weekend. I had a quick taste, and it seems very good. It is definitely a little more tart than the Mcmenamins ruby. I have a few bottles of it I'll compare it to once its bottled and carbed.

I think I'm gonna brew this up this weekend. Thanks for sharing the recipe Evil.

Gonna go with the original recipe with the exception of using 2 lbs puree as opposed to the fresh berries. Ferment, rack to secondary, bottle, and enjoy.

Do you folks have any extra tips? I've been reading a bit on here about the tartness from using 3-3.3 lbs of puree, so I'm going to cut that down to 2 lbs.

Thanks all,
Pat

I ended up brewing this. Posted up the info for anyone curious. Ended up hitting 1.041-1.042 OG.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f85/brew-log-mcmenamins-ruby-ale-clone-218186/

Finished product. OG/FG was dead on perfect. Great beer. Light, refreshing, crisp, with a wonderful aroma of raspberry in the nose when you drink it. Color was a bit more golden than I expected but it still has a beautiful slightly pink hue to the haze.

So I'm going to be brewing this with raspberry puree over the weekend.. For those of you who have brewed this, how much puree should I use to accurately match the flavor to Ruby?

Went ahead and brewed this today, still chilling actually. Definitely has a pinkish hue to it.
I used...
8 lbs Marris Otter
3 lbs raspberries from our garden that I blended to oblivion. Boiled for last five minutes.
.75 oz Northern Brewer, for 23 ibu's.
Safale US-05
Was planning on pitching Pacman, because I use it for just about everything, but after returning home from a vacation to find that my beer fridge broke and my yeast sat at warm temps for a week, my starter didn't start.
Mashed at 150*F.
Update: 1.048 og ( with the berries. )

Having brewed two batches of Ruby at one of the McMenamins breweries, I can say for certain that the beer is racked on top of the raspberry puree, the fruit does not get put in the boil. They use the aseptic Red Raspberry puree from Oregon Fruit (available to homebrewers here). The mash bill is 2-row, wheat, and a little bit of crystal - I don't remember the exact proportions. IIRC, there's only a bittering hop addition (the previously-mentioned Chinooks, which seems to be the universal bittering hop for most of the McMenamins beers). A single-infusion mash - 150F, recirculated for 40min before pumping over to the brew kettle for the 60-min boil.

Oh, and it's a lot of work! While the pump over to the kettle is happening, you're kegging another beer to make room in the fermenter for the new batch, and cleaning the fermenter, and getting ready to wash returned kegs... it makes me tired again just thinking about it!

Where does one get the puree at? I followed the link above but they only sell to breweries. They link to brew craft USA for home brewers but they are a home brew store supply shop and not for the general public. So now not sure where to get the puree.

Also, according to their website as well as the paper on the taster tray, the only malt they use is 2-row. They make no mention of crystal and wheat.

Yeast recommendations?

khiddy said:

Having brewed two batches of Ruby at one of the McMenamins breweries, I can say for certain that the beer is racked on top of the raspberry puree, the fruit does not get put in the boil. They use the aseptic Red Raspberry puree from Oregon Fruit (available to homebrewers here). The mash bill is 2-row, wheat, and a little bit of crystal - I don't remember the exact proportions. IIRC, there's only a bittering hop addition (the previously-mentioned Chinooks, which seems to be the universal bittering hop for most of the McMenamins beers). A single-infusion mash - 150F, recirculated for 40min before pumping over to the brew kettle for the 60-min boil.

Oh, and it's a lot of work! While the pump over to the kettle is happening, you're kegging another beer to make room in the fermenter for the new batch, and cleaning the fermenter, and getting ready to wash returned kegs... it makes me tired again just thinking about it!

Click to expand...

Any clue on the proportion for the puree?

I tried making this and it came out waaaay too tart. I also subbed fuggles and Willamette hops, and found them a bit too floral.

I brewed this last week, this week I transferred to a secondary. I'll bottle next week. If it comes out close to a ruby i'll go ahead and post the recipe.

Well here's confirmation as to the puree and malts (here):

RUBY'S CURRENT RECIPE
Malts: Great Western Premium 2-row Malt
Hops: Vary
Fruit: Oregon Fruit Product Aseptic Raspberry Puree
Yeast: Proprietary McMenamins Strain
Alcohol by Volume: 4.39%

Click to expand...

The tartness should fade with time.

I've had great success using fresh berries that I've frozen, then thawed, smashed and put right into my hop bag to catch all the plant matter and seeds. I put the berries in at flame out. My wife's favorite beer used to be the real Ruby, now she prefers mine! It's got more berry flavor and a nicer pink color too.

My recipe can be found here: http://hopville.com/recipe/637894/home-brew/ruby-clone-ag

Sub any hop and readjust to get around 15 IBUs. I usually just use what I have on hand at the time.

here's the recipe that I used: http://hopville.com/recipe/1268190/fruit-beer-recipes/aunt-flos-raspberry-ale

I've done two batches of this beer during this year.
I did them both with frozen raspberries from wally world.
First was 8lb 2 row, 2 lb red wheat with 1099 whitbread yeast mash @ 148
1/2 oz of chinook @ 60 min
12 oz raspberries @ 15
1 lb lactose @ 15
then 48 oz raspberries in secondary

This was very light and thin bodied, very refreshing, my wife loved it I thought I was copying Mikes hard lemonade or something. (not really but I like hop bombs or roasty stouts and dopplebocks)

The second Mashed 154
8 lbs 2 row, 3 lbs red wheat, 1/2 lb crystal 75
1/2 oz chinook @ 60
1/2 oz chinook @ 30
1 lb Light DME @ 15
12 oz raspberries @ 5 mins
1 lb lactose @ 15
1099 whitbread

48 raspberries in secondary

This beer is more beer like. Its a little hot from alcohol. Its got body. Although the chinook takes a little from the raspberries. I should have done maybe a 1/2 oz at 15 mins and dropped the 30 min addition.

The first batch was like someone dropped a little beer in raspberry juice. The second actually tastes like a beer with raspberries peeking in from the back.

It should also be noted that according to this website from 2011 that they only use 42# of Oregon Fruit Raspberry Puree for 210 gallons. If you do the math that comes out to only 1# of Puree for 5 gallons, so i think a lot of people are over fruiting their recipes.

http://www.mcmenamins.com/blog/2011/3/18/75-Happy-Birthday-Ruby-Ale

This makes sense because Oregon fruit sells Aseptic fruit thats specially pasturized and deseeded to breweries in 42# box's.
https://www.fruitforbrewing.com/