racking into frozen strawberries.

[2brew1cup]

Ok so i racked a beer after 6 days onto frozen strawberries. I had used wyeast 3068 in the primary and reached final gravity of 1.012. Upon racking onto berries i noticed fermentation restarted. Is this bad? Should i hit it with a campden tablet? Does it even matter..??

underground and under the influence

 

[Improbable]

Fermentation stops because the yeast are running out of sugar to eat. You just gave them a load of strawberries full of sugar, so they're going to start eating that and making more alcohol.

 

[glickmanii]

I'm assuming you put the strawberries in the secondary? I wouldn't worry about it, you should be fine. I've used frozen fruit numerous times w/o sanitizing it and have never had an issue.

However, what you are probably going to find is that you aren't going to get any big berry flavor in this beer, as the yeast are going to convert the majority of the sugar from them into alcohol. I had this happen to me a while back with a Strawberry Wit, and the beer became more tart and less sweet than I intended. Since then, I normally give the beer 2 weeks in primary, 2 weeks in secondary, and then a few days chilled in the keg. Then I add the frozen fruit in a sanitized hop sock (along with a bunch of sanitized wine corks to make the fruit and bag float and not clog the dip tube) directly into the keg. I've found I get much more of the desired fruit flavor this way.

Hope this helps.

 

[2brew1cup]

Do you think a campden tablet would help to slow or even stop fetmentation to where i can keep it sweet or at least avoid a sour brew?

underground and under the influence

 

[biochemedic]

I'm assuming you put the strawberries in the secondary? I wouldn't worry about it, you should be fine. I've used frozen fruit numerous times w/o sanitizing it and have never had an issue.

However, what you are probably going to find is that you aren't going to get any big berry flavor in this beer, as the yeast are going to convert the majority of the sugar from them into alcohol. I had this happen to me a while back with a Strawberry Wit, and the beer became more tart and less sweet than I intended. Since then, I normally give the beer 2 weeks in primary, 2 weeks in secondary, and then a few days chilled in the keg. Then I add the frozen fruit in a sanitized hop sock (along with a bunch of sanitized wine corks to make the fruit and bag float and not clog the dip tube) directly into the keg. I've found I get much more of the desired fruit flavor this way.

Hope this helps.

I think it depends on how much fruit you add...even if the yeast eat up all the additional fermentables in the strawberry, your FG is still plenty to perceive a light sweetness that should complement the berry flavor. I've done cherry and strawberry beers that used frozen fruit in secondary...I used 3-4 lbs of fruit though, but with that amount there's plenty of fruit flavor. I agree you really don't need to worry about contamination adding frozen fruit to secondary/late primary.

 

[PowellAvenueBrew]

I find frozen strawberries to impart a tart slightly sour taste to my beers. I did let them ferment all the way out. You could try to kill the fermentation with a campden.

 

[wolfman_48442]

I personally love the tart strawberry flavor, but you could also add a bit of lactose, which the yeast cant eat, to sweeten it. I believe the artificial sweeteners like splenda can be used as well.