Adding cherries to beer

I am thinking of adding some cherries to a belgian strong ale. I had one of these and thought it was great even though I usually don't like fruity beer. The one I had was this one Tres Fem from http://halesbrewery.com/brews.htm I have come up with a recipe but I am not sure how many cherries to add. I don't want them to be over powering. One of the local stores has 2 lb bags of unsweetened frozen pie cherries on sale. I am making a 3 gal batch. Does anyone have any suggestions?

 

I made a cherry stout last year using two 14 oz cans of tart cherries in a 2 1/2 gallon batch in secondary. The cherry taste is just barely there ... not enough.
Jamil did a show on friut beers and recommended 2 lbs of cherries per gallon. He said it takes a lot of cherries to produce any cherry flavor. He also strongly recommended against using cherry extract saying it taste nothing like cherry but a lot like bad cherry cough syrup! Most other extracts were ok in limited amounts.

On that note, a week ago I was in NJ and tried a chocolate cherry stout at a brewpub that was rated very highly ( the pub that is). It was without a doubt the worst beer I've ever put in my mouth! REALLY BAD, really strong cough syrup.

 

Whatever you decide put the cherries in a bag before they go into the beer. It seems like common sense, but if you forget it you will have a hell of a time getting the chunks out of the bottling bucket. I gave up fishing the chunks of raspberries out of my dunkel last night. Good luck.

 

I kegged my Cherry Belgian Dubbel about a week ago which was a 5 gallon batch with 6lbs of cherry puree. The cherry flavor is somewhat noticeable, but next time I will definitely add 3 more pounds of puree. All in all, a very enjoyable beer. If you read Designing Great Beers, the fruit beer section specifically states that cherries are often added in higher quantities than most other fruits. Also, the recipe below says secondary, but in reality I just dumped the puree into the primary. Turned out just fine...

Cherry Belgian Dubbel
Style: Belgian Dubbel OG: 1.066
Type: All Grain FG: 1.016
Rating: 0.0 ABV: 6.55 %
Calories: 215 IBU's: 28.16
Efficiency: 70 % Boil Size: 6.01 Gal
Color: 12.2 SRM Batch Size: 5.00 Gal
Boil Time: 60 minutes

Name Days / Temp
Primary 5 days @ 68.0°F
Secondary 6 days @ 72.0°F
Bottle/Keg 14 days @ 74.0°F

Grains & Adjuncts
Amount Percentage Name Time Gravity
7.00 lbs 59.57 % Weyermann Pilsner 60 mins 1.038
2.50 lbs 21.28 % Weyermann Vienna Malt 60 mins 1.038
0.75 lbs 6.38 % Dingemans Aromatic 60 mins 1.037
0.50 lbs 4.26 % Dingemans Special B 60 mins 1.030
1.00 lbs 8.51 % Corn Sugar (Dextrose) 10 mins 1.046

Hops
Amount IBU's Name Time AA %
1.00 ozs 14.91 Tettnang 60 mins 4.50
1.00 ozs 13.25 Saaz 60 mins 4.00

Yeasts
Amount Name Laboratory / ID
1.0 pkg Belgian Strong Ale Wyeast Labs 1388

Additions
Amount Name Time Stage
0.50 tsp Yeast Nutrient 15 mins Boil
0.25 tsp Irish Moss 15 mins Boil
6.00 lbs Cherry Puree 06 days Secondary

Mash Profile (disregard the volumes and temps [iBrewMaster is a PITA] I use http://www.brewersfriend.com/mash/ to calculate mash schedule. Started with 0.75 qts per pound for protein rest)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Medium Body Infusion In 30 min @ 126.0°F
Add 13.44 qt ( 1.25 qt/lb ) water @ 137.1°F
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Medium Body Infusion In 40 min @ 146.0°F
Add 4.72 qt water @ 212.0°F
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Medium Body Infusion In 25 min @ 156.0°F
Add 3.63 qt water @ 212.0°F
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

I have tried a chocolate cherry stout four times now, with increasing levels of success. The last two batches were made with RW Knudsen Black Cherry Juice concentrate.



This is the best way I have found to add cherry flavor and fermentables to the brew. I brewed the beer without the juice, but left headspace in the fermenter for the concentrate. The first time I used this method I added 40oz concentrate, the second time I added 72oz (both times the concentrate topped off the batch to ~5gal).

I measured the SG of the concentrate - it was around 1.200, but I will have to look that up later. The concentrate is nice because you get a lot of fermentables in less volume, and you get better flavor than when actual fruit is used IMO (although the first time I made the recipe I used real cherries, then reused them in tarts... yum).

 

I was thinking of using a 2 lb. bag of cherries but the juice concentrate looks to be a good idea. Morebeer has a kit for this but, it is a little different than the actual beer and I don't like the idea of cherry flavoring. I would rather use real cherries or juice.

So if I use the juice concentrate, should I make 2.75 gallons of beer and add the juice concentrate. I was originally going to add the cherries to the secondary.

 

I was thinking about adding a single cherry per bottle during conditioning of my hale's ale tres fem kit from morebeer, just for looks and the added ego boost. Anybody ever done that? If so, how does it turn out?

 

My expirience has actually been the opposite of the others here. I used 1lb of dried sour cherries in a 2.5 gallon batch of a sour dark saison that I did, and I found the character to be pretty overwhelming. It may be that the cherries I used were dry, and they were in there for quite some time, comparatively (3 months,) but I'll be using half that amount the next time I try a cherry beer.

 

1lb dried is a lot more cherry than 1 lb fresh. I think about 5-6x as much. Plus, the acid in your sour saison wouild accentuate the cherry flavor. Most saisons are pretty dry, which would make the cherries stand out as well.

 

I've tried Tres Fem, they have it on tap at Der Blokken Brewery in Bremerton.

Maybe you could use cherry puree in the secondary? I would suggest that, that's what I'm going to do for a smoked cherry porter in the next couple weeks. Found a recipe here on HBT and the gentleman who used brewed it said the cherry flavor came through nicely.

 

I just finished bottling a cherry Blond ale, I used 4lbs of frozen cherries (thawed) and pureed them. Added to the secondary. First problem was definitly was the amount of debris when siphoning to the bottling bucket so I used a hop bag to filter as much out. And after tasting it really needed another 2lbs i feel. Was a very fine hint of cherry but not enough to called it a cherry ale. the cherry concentrate sounds like a great replacement