Fruit recommendations

[Feurhund]

I have 50 gallons of lambic that just hit 2 to 2.5 years old. There are 6 different types (different bugs and blends) and after having a tasting get together, they are all great in their own ways.

I am going to blend them and then put on fruit. I have room for 6 fruits as I have 6 glass carboys and have the following already:

Cherry
Apricot
Red rasberries
Blackberry
Blueberry

I am looking for a good candidate for the last fruit and wanted advice. Some thoughts were mango, acai, plum, or wine grapes ( cab or muscat)

Let me know your thoughts. Thanks

 

[srob18]

Keep in mind i've never used these:

Pineapple
Peaches
Pear
Lemon/Lime(mixing these 2)

The wine grapes are an interesting idea. All of your choices look very delicious....

 

[Feurhund]

Thanks. I almost forgot I was also considering Kiwi.

 

[kingwood-kid]

Hops. Dry-hopped sours are all the rage these days.

 

[ong]

Gooseberry seems like it would be pretty good, albeit tart. You've covered most of the usual suspects for fruit beers... There's always strawberry, too.

 

[Feurhund]

I saw that on the Mad Fermentationist. Certainly came to mind.

Now I am thinking of doing a small side project......

blend of the Blueberry, Blackberry and Red Raspberry once done, dry hopped with Nelson.

And then a blend of Mango, Kiwi, and pineapple dry hopped with Citra.

Choices........

 

[inflictor-of-grimness]

I feel like I'm giving away a secret when I say this, but try a guava/passionfruit combo if you can. I do a berliner with those and it's amazing. I've been wanting to try it in a lambic type base.

 

[Feurhund]

Thanks for the trade secret. My wife is Brazilian so those fruits are in our wheelhouse at home and will definitely give it a try. I am thinking of doing a bunch of 1 gallons as well so I can try a lot of different variants.

Then I can sell lottery tickets to win a chance to stand in line and pay $50 for 350ml bottle of my Guava Passion fruit limited edition....😆

 

[Feurhund]

Correction, the dry hopped sour was on the Bear Flavored Blog. Great Blog too!

 

[kona_dude]

If your wife is Brazilian how about some jaboticaba?

 

[Feurhund]

I don't want to give away my master plan, but as you know, Brasil is like Willy Wonka with the crazy variety of bizarre fruits.
I always thought it would be awesome to build a huge lambic brewery there and just nail down a solid base and bugs and then go crazy with the rare variants of fresh fruits and then ship back to the US market.

 

[kingwood-kid]

I split a Berliner between kiwi (1lb/g) and mango (.5lb/g). Evidently, you need to use a lot more of either to taste in the final product. I suppose you could just cruise a farmers market and see what looks cool.

 

[Feurhund]

I am going 2LBS/Gal on my fruits as I want it to pop and I might add concentrate at bottling for the carbing sugar.

 

[inflictor-of-grimness]

I split a Berliner between kiwi (1lb/g) and mango (.5lb/g). Evidently, you need to use a lot more of either to taste in the final product. I suppose you could just cruise a farmers market and see what looks cool.

In my experience you need well over 1lb/gal of mango if you want a real definite flavor from it. I'm in Miami so a lot of people here do mango beers.

 

[Feurhund]

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1425869650.057979.jpgView attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1425869671.373888.jpg

Fruited!

Really excited about the Mango Passion Fruit blend. Smelled unbelievable going in.

 

[Dixon9717]

Mango, mango,mango.......

 

[gbarron]

What is the form of that mango and passionfruit? Freeze dried? Or some kind of puree in a bag? I can't tell from the packaging.

 

[Feurhund]

Frozen puree. It is from Market Basket supermarket and a big one that is in an area with a sizable Latino community. They also had guava which I might try soon as well.

Just kegged the Mango passionfruit one and will report back on tasting.

 

[xico]

Kiwi and pineapple have powerful enzymes and may potentially affect the yeast. I don't know about kiwi but bromelain denatures at about 155 degrees so I steamed 4 pounds of it. The pH dropped past the yeasts' threshold and carbonation has been minimal as a result. I love the flavor though. Next time I will buffer the pH when I rack onto pineapple. Something to consider.

 

[Feurhund]

You could also force carb, but I imagine it would make a real sour beer if you base is already there. What would you buffer with?

 

[inflictor-of-grimness]

This thread makes me wish I had more lambic ready to get fruited.

 

[Feurhund]

No time like the present to get started.......

 

[inflictor-of-grimness]

I already brewed some yesterday. Only so much I can do

 

[Jumpman]

last summer i did a pineapple white grape sour and that came out amazing. i have the base going right now and going to secondary with one whole pineapple and about 5lbs of white grapes.

 

[kingwood-kid]

Kiwi and pineapple have powerful enzymes and may potentially affect the yeast. I don't know about kiwi but bromelain denatures at about 155 degrees so I steamed 4 pounds of it. The pH dropped past the yeasts' threshold and carbonation has been minimal as a result. I love the flavor though. Next time I will buffer the pH when I rack onto pineapple. Something to consider.

If you are worried about pH, just add a little dry wine yeast at bottling. Very little, like 1/4 of a 99c pack, although there's no harm in using the whole pack. The brett should ultimately carb the beer, but given how old it is and the conditions it's working under, it may be slow going. Buffering would probably detract from the flavor more than it would help the yeast.

 

[Feurhund]

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1432384018.096749.jpg

Racked off all the fruits to kegs. The basement smelled like fruit salad.

This is a shot of the Blueberry racking. They all picked up great color from all that fruit.

Deciding now if I want to bottle some and natural carb that first or force carb the whole keg and bottle from there.

I will follow up with pics and tastings.

FYI the dry hopped 3 gallon keg on Citra, Mosaic and Nelson is going fast. It has an unbelievable aroma and the sourness plays so well with the dank tropical from the hops. Here is a gratuitous Beer Porn Shot of it, I took on the lawn.View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1432384327.614282.jpg

 

[Feurhund]

Up next.......10lbs of Chilean Malbec grapes, Argentina had a hurricane and the shipment fell through or I would have used those. These are beautiful and taste great. Only took an hour to de stem by hand!


View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1432691377.383222.jpgView attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1432691409.629859.jpgView attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1432691431.814781.jpg

 

[Dixon9717]

I use frozen mango chunks from Costco.

 

[Feurhund]

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1432873459.727154.jpgView attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1432873487.534557.jpg

Frozen grapes going in and then once thawed, the lambic goes on top.

Very excited to see how these Malbec Grapes work with the sour.

 

[BenWillcox]

So I thought I would Necro this thread and ask how everything is tasting?

I have done a blueberry lambic two years past that ended up fantastic, and recently racked my second batch onto the fruit. I went with a 4 pounds per gallon ratio on both (I picked the fruit myself and then froze it). I also recently racked another 5 gallons of lambic onto 10 pounds of peaches, and 10 pounds of apricots, plus a few ounces of crystalized ginger.

I still have another 10 gallons of Lambic that is all in the 2-year range and am trying to figure out what to fruit them with.