Fruit Beer Raspberry Brown Ale

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pvtschultz

Well-Known Member
Joined
Feb 11, 2010
Messages
457
Reaction score
9
Location
New Berlin
Recipe Type
All Grain
Yeast
BRY-97 or US-05
Yeast Starter
If you want
Batch Size (Gallons)
6
Original Gravity
1.050
Final Gravity
1.014
Boiling Time (Minutes)
60
IBU
20
Color
19 SRM
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp)
14 days @ 68 deg
Secondary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp)
7 days @ 68 deg
Tasting Notes
Pleasant blend of raspberry sweatness and Brown Ale roasted malt.
This is my first original beer that I am completely happy with. I don't have any judging results for it yet, but I'm hoping this to compete well.

Fermentables for 75% Efficiency
9.00 lbs 2-Row Pale Malt
0.75 lbs C40L
0.75 lbs C80L
0.50 lbs Honey Malt (25 SRM)
0.25 lbs Chocolate Malt (350 SRM)
0.25 lbs Kiln Coffee Malt (120 SRM)
72 oz Frozen Raspberries (added to secondary)

Mash at 155 deg for 60 minutes.

0.88 oz Cluster Hops (6.80% AA) FWH
Boil 60 Minutes

Fermentation
14 days at 68 degrees Primary, rack to secondary. Add frozen raspberries and secondary for 7 days at 68 degrees. I don't sanitize the berries. I rack to tertiary and cold crash for 48 hours at 32 degrees.

Keg and carbonate to 2.3 volumes. I prefer to bottle condition this one with 4.0 oz of corn sugar per 5 gallons bottling volume. Condition at room temperature (60-70 degrees) for at least three weeks prior to chilling. This one ages well and will start to hit its prime at 6 weeks after bottling.

Taste
I'm no beer judge/critic, but here's my take on this beer.

Pours a medium dark brown with red hue. Two to three fingers of creamy head that dissipates to leave rings of lacing down the glass. Nose is light raspberry with hint of roasted malt, no hop aroma. Mouth-feel is medium, lightened by medium carbonation. Taste is a balanced blend of dry raspberry sweetness, notes of dark crystal malts, finished with hint of astringency and coffee flavor that dries the pallet leaving no lingering flavors. Overall a great late summer, into fall beer that has plenty of dark malt flavor but light enough to have two or three in a sitting.

Personal Notes
I've been working on a technique to use real berries for a natural flavor but without being overly dry for a few years now. This Brown Ale is extremely cloying without the berries due to the large additions of dark crystal and honey malts, but very well balanced with them. The coffee malt adds a very nice touch to the finish.

Any clean ale yeast will work fine, I've been experimenting with BRY-97 and think it fits nicely with darker styles. I've been using a lot of Cluster hops lately in all of my American beer styles. Any clean bittering hop should work fine.

Enjoy!
 
I've been experimenting with raspberries IPA's for the last nine months having pitched 36oz of frozen whole berries into secondary for almost every batch.

The last batch I brewed was an imperial and I pitched 60oz of berries. I puréed them and the aroma and flavor was incredibly more intense.
Don't know why I haven't done this from the start.

Definitely try liquifying those suckers next time, it made a great improvement in my case.

image-2184521757.jpg
 
I know this post is a few months old but I'm curious about your pitching to the secondary. You mention you put FROZEN berries in secondary for seven days @68 degrees. How do you do this? I'm curious because I like your recipe and wanting to try it soon but I'm somewhat confused on the temp of frozen berries to the temp you maintain for seven days

Thx
 
When I add 60oz of puréed frozen berries I lose a degree or two, but then the beer comes back up to ambient. If you have a ferm chamber and a Johnson you can just tape the probe to the side of the ferm vessel and let it do its thing.
 

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