Kettle Sour Recipe Critique plus a few questions

[Lynchy217]

I want to brew a series of light, tart, fruited kettle sours for summer. I'm basically aiming for a similar acid/salinity profile to Seaquench, but change up the recipe for a few different fruit versions (Raspberry, Blueberry, Cherry, maybe even a dryhopped version, etc.). I'm aiming for ~4.5% alcohol

Recipe:

7# Pilsner
2.5# Wheat

Kettle sour with TYB 282 L. Brevis post mash down to 3.3-3.5 pH

0.5 oz Willamette @ 60 mins
1.0 oz Corriander @ 10 mins
0.75 oz Sea Salt @ 5 mins

Using the Brewers friend calculator and a brewhouse efficiency of 75%, this gives me ~4.56% ABV using a medium attenuation.

What do you think about this? Is 0.75 oz of salt too much? Does the pH range seem right? What would you change to get closer to SeaQuench?

Questions:
This is the base recipe for using something like lime/lemon zest or dry hops. How would I adjust the grain to account for the additional gravity of the fruit puree?

I'm sure this depends on the brand of puree and how much sugar is in it, which brings me to my next question: Is there a good brand of puree to look for? I'm hoping to get a good variety of fruits and try a few different versions. I also want good quality with no added sugar or anything like that.

Last Question (for now): What yeast strains should I use? I think the yeast should probably be fairly clean, but I could see some English yeast with fruity esters being super helpful to keep the beer from being one-dimensional. The main concern I have is finding a yeast strain that will be able to handle the low pH from the kettle sour.

 

[Lynchy217]

Oh, forgot one question: How much puree should I use? I've been reading American Sour Beers lately, but he mostly talks about lbs of fresh fruit per gallon or similar. What's a decent starting point for puree in a 5 gallon batch?

 

[TwistedGray]

Subscribed as I'm curious about the fruit addition as well and too lazy to dig through the probably dozen threads.

Perhaps this also answers my lingering question: What is the difference between a Kettle Sour and a Gose. I thought if you add salt it defaults to being a Gose and not a Kettle Sour. Is this not the case?

 

[Lynchy217]

Kettle Sour is the technique, as differentiated from the long term mixed fermentation approach to producing sour beers. Gose is a style. That being said, it would probably be accurate to call this beer a Gose. Seaquench, which is the inspiration for this beer is actually a blend of a Berliner, a Gose, and a Kolsh.

 

[RPh_Guy]

SeaQuench has lime, so you'd need that if you want to clone it. I'm not sure if it even has any coriander.

Remove carbonation from a sample of Seaquench and measure its pH at room temperature; that should get you in the right ballpark for a target. I'd guess around 3.6.

The amount of salt and coriander looks typical for a gose style.
If you're worried about it being too much just start lower. You can add more at bottling/kegging to taste (you can make a coriander extract/tincture with alcohol or make a tea with boiling water).

I would not adjust the grain for fruit additions.
This page: http://www.brsquared.org/wine/CalcInfo/FruitDat.htm has specific gravity info for fruit juices.
You can do the math yourself if you really want but I think the change in ABV will be negligible.

I don't make fruit beer so can't help you selecting a product. Some online brewing shops sell puree and might have product reviews; that's where I'd start. Many breweries just use juice. It's always possible to take a sample when you reach FG and add more fruit if you find it lacking.
Buy fresh organic fruit and make your own puree if you want to be certain it meets your standards. OTOH natural flavoring is available too if you want to go the easy route.

For yeast strain, almost anything you like will work just fine
I use US-05 for kettle sours and it works great (when used in sours I get subtle notes of berries, lemon, melons, and peach).
I'd also consider WLP029 German ale/Kolsch to complement the style.