Adding wine to beer and other ramblings

[applescrap]

Does anyone add wine to beer? Whiskey? Apple juice, fruit, oak? Would love some tips.

I think it was michael tonsemeire (sp?) I heard in a podcast talking about this. He said that the pros have rules about adding alcohol to alcohol so they have to add whiskey/wine through barrels or chips. Dont know if I heard that right or not but its certainly true we all have our own freedom to do whatever we want and i would like to experiment. Expensive liquors in stouts, wines, oak, fruit, and tinctures.

This weird Belgian recipe from a local brew shop was supposed to be racked on apricot and barrel aged. I thought about using a secondary to add oak chips, and raspberries and maybe wine. Well 10 days later, snowy saturday and no pipeline, I had to rack, force carb and drink it. My wife is drinking a nice bottle of kenwood so I thought, wtf, blend some in my glass and sure enough, I love it. Has anyone else tried this? I'm thinking about buying a 20 dollar bottle of wine to dump in the keg. Tips, comments ?

 

[doomy86]

Yes, i had sours mixed with white wine, they were delicious. I think that a coconut porter with rum would also be a good idea.

 

[madscientist451]

Adding other alcohol to beer is one area that homebrewers have an advantage over commercial breweries.
I've never tried adding wine, but I've blended homemade cider and beer many times.
When adding fruit, don't forget that the fermentation will kick off again, the sugar will be turned to alcohol and the resulting flavor will be different than the original fruit.
Commercial beers that have a lot of fruit flavor have probably contain flavor concentrates added at packaging.
I've found that most fermented fruit like raspberries/cherries/peaches have a sour/tart taste and contributes a very faint aroma.
Fruit character is quickly overwhelmed by super malty or hoppy beers.
If I want a fruit taste in cider I'll add about 1/2 can of frozen concentrate to a 1.5 ml bottle. I then keep that in the refrigerator and try to drink it right away.
I prefer oak cubes compared to chips, about 1 ounce/gallon. I've soaked them in bourbon, then added to secondary. You have to pull samples on a regular basis, like once a week, and see how much oak/bourbon you are getting. I use a high quality "oaky" bourbon, but I'm wondering if just using cheap bourbon would be ok.
Once you reach your preferred oak level, you can always add more bourbon, but of course if you get too much oak/bourbon flavor you can't get it out, so go slow and be careful.
One thing I haven't tried yet is adding gin soaked oak cubes to a pale ale or IPA. Gin these days is all over the map with many flavors and crazy high prices. I was going to look for a gin that has a "piney, citrus" character and soak that in some oak cubes and do some experimenting.
Making tinctures with vodka is another area I've wanted to experiment with but haven't gotten around to yet. You can do taste trials with tinctures and dial in the flavor profile you are looking for.

 

[Brownalemikie]

Hmmm, mixing beer and wine.....we use to call that a "Sneaky Pete".

 

[brewcat]

No, but I've been thinking about doing a fortfied barleywine. So adding brandy (or some other spirit) to stop fermentation. Then age on oak for awhile. Then bottle and age for multiple years. Haven't really figured the particulars. Maybe someday when I have nothing better to do.

 

[SanPancho]

You can pull a good amount of wine flavor from a fresh barrel by aging. Lighter beers show most impact obviously. Can also add wine grape juice to your ferment if you can find it. I know brew shops will sell concentrate kits for wine, but not sure youd wanna use the equivalent of a 5 gal batch of wine. A few of our breweries our here in bay araea do it. Can be really good, or just weird.

As for actual wine, sours would be the most obvious place to combine.

 

[applescrap]

No, but I've been thinking about doing a fortfied barleywine. So adding brandy (or some other spirit) to stop fermentation. Then age on oak for awhile. Then bottle and age for multiple years. Haven't really figured the particulars. Maybe someday when I have nothing better to do.

Why wait to make one, make a strong beer, put on oak in secondary and keg with brandy. Then enjoy it. Carb it and let it sit a few months if so desired.

 

[brewcat]

Why wait to make one, make a strong beer, put on oak in secondary and keg with brandy. Then enjoy it. Carb it and let it sit a few months if so desired.

Need to brew other things first and haven't thought on it enough. I'm not even necessarily a fan of oak so I could save a lot of time. The other thing holding me back is I don't really drink wine or liquor.

 

[5mooth0perator]

I use sweet potato as a base, I think that is technically a wine beer mix according to the F. D. fricken A! Gosh it's good to be a homebrewer.