New Glarus Raspberry Tart

The in laws were in town over the weekend and we did the New Glarus brewery tour on Saturday. They loved the raspberry tart. I've done some searching and haven't seen much on how to clone this. I've never done a sour beer in my homebrewing career, anyone have ideas on where to start?

I think this is might what I try. A somewhat copy of a NB kit but using raspberries instead of cherries:

5 lb Pilsner malt
5 lb Wheat malt, white
1 oz Hallertau hops @ 60 minutes (4.5% alpha 7.5 IBUs)
Wyeast Belgian Lambic Blend (3278)

60 min mash @ 152
90 minute boil
Ferment @ 68 F

After 2 months or so, rack from primary to secondary on 2 cans of Vintner's Harvest raspberry puree
Let ferment for ~10 months or so
Bottle with touch of champagne yeast, carb to 1 volume or so

Questions
- Is specific temperature important for a Lambic as it ages? i.e. if I use a brew belt for 3 months at 68, can I let it fluctuate with my basement room temps after that for the next 12 months (55-75 F)? Or if I pursue this will I need to maintain ~68 F until I bottle?

- I've read that aged hops are good but not required for lambics. Digging through my freezer I found some hops from when I last brewed in force (~5 year hiatus). I wonder if these have aged at all? I'm thinking of pulling out an ounce, opening them and let them sit on the counter until I get around to brewing this (Easter time probably).

- I'm moving to BIAB from extract. Any reason to use rice hulls for this beer?

- Is it ok to let this sit on the raspberry puree for ~10 months? As a wine maker I would never let a fruit wine sit that long on gross lees...

- Low volume carbing appears to be in style for a lambic but the NG Raspberry tart had lots of carbonation. I may up the carb level.

WI_Wino said:

Questions
- Is specific temperature important for a Lambic as it ages? i.e. if I use a brew belt for 3 months at 68, can I let it fluctuate with my basement room temps after that for the next 12 months (55-75 F)? Or if I pursue this will I need to maintain ~68 F until I bottle?

That shouldn't be a problem.

- I've read that aged hops are good but not required for lambics. Digging through my freezer I found some hops from when I last brewed in force (~5 year hiatus). I wonder if these have aged at all? I'm thinking of pulling out an ounce, opening them and let them sit on the counter until I get around to brewing this (Easter time probably).

Just go low IBU (7-10) and you should be fine.

- I'm moving to BIAB from extract. Any reason to use rice hulls for this beer?

No need for rice hulls in BIAB.

- Is it ok to let this sit on the raspberry puree for ~10 months? As a wine maker I would never let a fruit wine sit that long on gross lees...

That shouldn't be a problem either.

- Low volume carbing appears to be in style for a lambic but the NG Raspberry tart had lots of carbonation. I may up the carb level.

Click to expand...

I think most people shoot for pretty high carbonation on fruitedlambics/sours. Usually 2.5-3.0 volumes.

I would not use any kind of lambic blend for this, or anything with brett for that matter. Rasp Tart is very clean, you need a very clean lacto for this and then a **** ton of raspberries.

You might be best of playing with lactic acid, or a very low mash pH.

As Mudduck said, NG Raspberry Tart is nothing like a lambic. It's very sweet, not due to artificial sweetening like Lindemans' fruit beers, but through careful manipulation of the fermentation, the details of which are a closely guarded secret of New Glarus. There's an older Brewing Network interview with Dan Carey that might have some clues; I can't remember if it's Sunday Session or CYBI.

I knew my HBT brethern would come through. So I should use straight lacto like wyeast 5335 to get that tart taste? Looks like Ill need to add in my own yeast then as well, something like S-04?

I found the Dan Carey episode, it's 3 hours long... On the mp3 queue for the commute.

Also we have an inaugural home brewer meeting at work this week. One guy is bring a raspberry lambic so it'll be interesting to try that.

The big issue in replicating their flavor is going to be getting the high final gravity. Raspberry Tart finishes around 1.040, with some of that being simple sugars. Unless you are kegging (chill, blend with raspberry juice, serve), there really isn’t a way to do it without pasteurization.

Finally getting back to this. Here are my notes from the podcast:

Base beer is a sour brown ale. Ferment the base beer normally, then sour in old wine oak vats (3k gallons). Souring is done with lacto and a little acedic acid. Oak vats are old (30+ years) so there is no oak flavor imparted. Finished beer pH is ~3.6. They use frozen fruit as the freezing breaks down the cell walls. Overall time frame for this beer is measured in "months". Dan recommended that if trying to do a sour mash (vs. pitching lacto afterwards) to keep total acid to 1/2%. I think he said they pasteurize as well to keep the beer from changing after bottling.

No details on when they add the fruit, how long it sits on the fruit, or what their final gravity is.

eh, nevermind

all lambics are sour beers, not all sour beers are lambics. you are confusing styles here. RT isn't really "sour" anyways, nor is about 90% of NG's "sours" they backsweeten like crazy and are closer to Lindemans then anything. Might be kind of hard to replicate this without pasteurization and/or heavy additions of non fermentable sweeteners.