Fruit Beer Roasted Blackberry Ale

Aroma: Smell is very toasty with a fruity nose throughout.
Appearance: Thick off white head that slowly dissipates as it warms. Beer body is dark with a reddish hue from the blackberries. IMHO the color reminds me of merlot.
Taste: Has a berry tart flavor right up front but diminishes over the tongue to bring out the roasted malt. Not too warming but is quite fruity. Very pleasant after taste that is neither harsh nor bitter. Mouthfeel has a nice carbonated tartness that is cleaned up quickly by the roasted malt. I feel this beer has a perfect balance.
Overall: A wonderful beer to call my 2011 Christmas Ale!! One of the best I have ever brewed!

I have to give it up to eschatz and his Requiem Raspberry recipe: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f75/extract-requiem-raspberry-56285/
This brew is modeled off his original recipe. I encourage all of you to try it as well.

Recipe:

Amt Name Type

10 lbs - Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 1 69.0 %
1 lbs - Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) Grain 2 6.9 %
8.0 oz - Roasted Barley (300.0 SRM) Grain 3 3.4 %
0.50 oz - Columbus (Tomahawk) [10.90 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 4 20.0 IBUs
0.50 oz - Cascade [6.40 %] - Boil 30.0 min Hop 5 9.0 IBUs
0.50 oz - Cascade [6.40 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 6 2.3 IBUs
1.0 pkg Safale American (DCL/Fermentis #US-05) [50.28 ml] Yeast 7 -
3 lbs Fruit - Blackberry (0.0 SRM) Adjunct 8 20.7 % (Secondary)

If you brew it please let me know what you think!

Cheers

This looks great! Only change I'll be making is using 5 lbs of Marionberry puree in the primary, and will go all Columbus in the boil. Not sure if I'll use some harvested California Ale yeast or Super San Diego yeast.

IIINuns said:

This looks great! Only change I'll be making is using 5 lbs of Marionberry puree in the primary, and will go all Columbus in the boil. Not sure if I'll use some harvested California Ale yeast or Super San Diego yeast.

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It really is a great recipe... I have made it with the California Ale yeast with great results. Let me know how it turns out for you. One thing I will add is the blackberry will fade over time bringing out the roasted barley a little more.

Cheers!

If you were to enter this beer into a competition what would you enter the seconday/underlying beer as? 10B?
Main : 20A Fruit Beer
Secondary: 10B American Amber Ale

or perhaps 11A - Mild?

American Ales have high hop additions. The Mild will not, and a mild can be roased.

Any sugestions?

zaxsan said:

If you were to enter this beer into a competition what would you enter the seconday/underlying beer as? 10B?
Main : 20A Fruit Beer
Secondary: 10B American Amber Ale

or perhaps 11A - Mild?

American Ales have high hop additions. The Mild will not, and a mild can be roased.

Any sugestions?

Click to expand...

Hi.

That is a great question. I just finished perusing my BJCP iPhone app and I guess I'd go with the 11A -Mild. Good call on that one.

IIINuns said:

This looks great! Only change I'll be making is using 5 lbs of Marionberry puree in the primary, and will go all Columbus in the boil. Not sure if I'll use some harvested California Ale yeast or Super San Diego yeast.

Click to expand...

Did ya get a chance to brew it up? If so, how is it?

I ended up going with 10B. It was really a guess and I hope it is just more of a guide to the judges. You really would not want a strong hop bitterness or aromma with this beer. I tasted some hop bitterness and was afraid the mild classification would get the style classification points reduced. I really just guess though.....

I have not had a bottle yet. My only samples have been from racking. It did have a great toasty smell and also hit you with the tart fruit flavor right away. Aslong as I hit the carbonation ok i expect this to be very good.

The only change I made was to sub out th ebittering hops to 1oz Ahtanum 5.2%AA. I mashed at 153* in the hopes to give it some more body. I racked the beer onto 3.1lbs blackberry puree for 14days at 67deg. There was some additional fermentation, but only slightly.

It was entered in the 2012 NHC. I am sending it to the Philadelphia location for judging. I am brewing on a very simple system.....no pumps....nothing special. Just me, my cooler, pot, and a burner. I do not expect to be a winner, but I hope to hit 35pts. That would mean I did something right!

I will get back to you after my first taste.

zaxsan said:

I ended up going with 10B. It was really a guess and I hope it is just more of a guide to the judges. You really would not want a strong hop bitterness or aromma with this beer. I tasted some hop bitterness and was afraid the mild classification would get the style classification points reduced. I really just guess though.....

I have not had a bottle yet. My only samples have been from racking. It did have a great toasty smell and also hit you with the tart fruit flavor right away. Aslong as I hit the carbonation ok i expect this to be very good.

The only change I made was to sub out th ebittering hops to 1oz Ahtanum 5.2%AA. I mashed at 153* in the hopes to give it some more body. I racked the beer onto 3.1lbs blackberry puree for 14days at 67deg. There was some additional fermentation, but only slightly.

It was entered in the 2012 NHC. I am sending it to the Philadelphia location for judging. I am brewing on a very simple system.....no pumps....nothing special. Just me, my cooler, pot, and a burner. I do not expect to be a winner, but I hope to hit 35pts. That would mean I did something right!

I will get back to you after my first taste.

Click to expand...

Sounds Great!!! I think I may have gone 10C. Hrm....

Keep us posted for sure and GOOD-LUCK!!!!

Cheers

Well, the judging did not go so well. The judges thought there was a low flavor profile and overall hop characteristics. A slight tart/sour generic fruitiness. They would have like more malt and hop character. The roasted barley character as coffee really dominates. Very dry.

24/50. Most points were lost on the flavor section.

The thing is some of the points they bring out as problems are what I was looking to shoot for. The nice barley flavor and low hop characteristics. Perhaps I would have done better in the mild sub category. Anyway, I am very happy with my results as are most who try the beer so I will brew again. I could bump up the amount of base grains and some late aroma hop additions and see how that shakes out. You never know! Anyway, thanks for the brew. We love it here!

zaxsan said:

Well, the judging did not go so well. The judges thought there was a low flavor profile and overall hop characteristics. A slight tart/sour generic fruitiness. They would have like more malt and hop character. The roasted barley character as coffee really dominates. Very dry.

24/50. Most points were lost on the flavor section.

The thing is some of the points they bring out as problems are what I was looking to shoot for. The nice barley flavor and low hop characteristics. Perhaps I would have done better in the mild sub category. Anyway, I am very happy with my results as are most who try the beer so I will brew again. I could bump up the amount of base grains and some late aroma hop additions and see how that shakes out. You never know! Anyway, thanks for the brew. We love it here!

Click to expand...

Thanks again. Me too, I am quite a big fan of this one. I get the tart fruitiness up front that fades to the roasted malt. It is always a big hit with friends and family. I appreciate the feedback and your support by entering this into a competition.

Cheers!!

hmmm, this certainly looks interesting. What are your thoughts on dropping the late addition hops by half, or maybe a little more. I don't necessarily like the idea of cascades competing with blackberries, especially with such a small addition (3 lbs). Additionally, what about upping the lovibond on the crystal, mostly for color purposes, but some raisiny fruitness may be nice too..... Thoughts?

LayerUp said:

hmmm, this certainly looks interesting. What are your thoughts on dropping the late addition hops by half, or maybe a little more. I don't necessarily like the idea of cascades competing with blackberries, especially with such a small addition (3 lbs). Additionally, what about upping the lovibond on the crystal, mostly for color purposes, but some raisiny fruitness may be nice too..... Thoughts?

Click to expand...

I think you're just fine changing up the hops/addition amount. I have not had issues with the cascades challenging the blackberries. Also, upping the crystal may be interesting indeed. This one is quite roasty so that may provide a little more fruit, as you're assuming. If you do make this recipe or modify, please report back!

Cheers!

MichaelsBrewing said:

I think you're just fine changing up the hops/addition amount. I have not had issues with the cascades challenging the blackberries. Also, upping the crystal may be interesting indeed. This one is quite roasty so that may provide a little more fruit, as you're assuming. If you do make this recipe or modify, please report back!

Cheers!

Click to expand...

Alright, sounds good. I'm still undecided about the hops, I'll probably go with what your recipe suggests, simply because it worked for you, but I will probably also go with a darker crystal.

This is on the list to brew, but it might still be a couple weeks, I've got a couple beers to do between then and now. I've also still have 60 lbs or so of blackberries in the freezer from last year, and since august is coming up, I need to clear them out so I can make room for more. The girlfriend can only drink so much blackberry cider....

Edit: how high are you carbonating this? your second picture suggests a rather large amount of dissolved CO2....

LayerUp said:

Alright, sounds good. I'm still undecided about the hops, I'll probably go with what your recipe suggests, simply because it worked for you, but I will probably also go with a darker crystal.

This is on the list to brew, but it might still be a couple weeks, I've got a couple beers to do between then and now. I've also still have 60 lbs or so of blackberries in the freezer from last year, and since august is coming up, I need to clear them out so I can make room for more. The girlfriend can only drink so much blackberry cider....

Edit: how high are you carbonating this? your second picture suggests a rather large amount of dissolved CO2....

Click to expand...

Pay no mind to what I suggested as the carb amount. I usually throw this in my corny keg at about 10lbs of pressure. Set and forget. I am not looking to have a lot of carbonation as the co2 and the roastiness does not compliment one another IMHO.

Going to brew this one Saturday. Using the darker crystal and a little bit more roasted. Also trying to decide if I want to use pacman or my washed American ale yeast.

Baileisdad said:

Going to brew this one Saturday. Using the darker crystal and a little bit more roasted. Also trying to decide if I want to use pacman or my washed American ale yeast.

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I'd say go for it. Pacman is a good one. I will probably use London ale yeast next time I make it. Blackberries aren't quite ripe in Ohio yet...

They are not ripe here either but I was thinking frozen ones would work

Baileisdad said:

They are not ripe here either but I was thinking frozen ones would work

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Yeah they definitely will work. Last batch I made were from frozen berries.

Brewing this up as I type. Going to pitch yeast as soon audit cools then off to the Oregon country fair. Good times!!

Baileisdad said:

Brewing this up as I type. Going to pitch yeast as soon audit cools then off to the Oregon country fair. Good times!!

Click to expand...

Oh yeah. Going to use Marion berry instead of black.

Baileisdad said:

Oh yeah. Going to use Marion berry instead of black.

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Solid, I would actually like to brew a 5 gal batch then split it up into 5 individual gallons and use black, rasp, marion, black currants, and elder. Then see how each berry affects the taste.

MichaelsBrewing said:

Solid, I would actually like to brew a 5 gal batch then split it up into 5 individual gallons and use black, rasp, marion, black currants, and elder. Then see how each berry affects the taste.

Click to expand...

Yeah that's a good idea. Maybe next time I will try something like that.

Forgive the rookie questions, but how long did you have it in the primary & secondary?


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Sorry that I just saw this message. Keep in primary until fermentation ends by way of hygrometer. Secondary about two weeks. Hope this helps.

Cheers!


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