Red Beet Beer

I brewed up a farmhouse ale with coriander and fresh cracked black peppercorns. The total batch size was 8.5 gal, 5.5 gal going into a keg and 3 gal getting bottled.

The 3 gal batch had 12 oz of red beets added to it after primary was over (approx 10 days in) and the beets stayed in the fermenter for 6 more days. If you like beets, this is VERY beety and awesomely red. The aroma is earthy, flavor is earthy as well with a nice saison spice undertone and a little bitter but it's young so that will probably fade a bit with time, and the finish is clean.

I prepped the beets by peeling and chopping into small chunks. I added the beets to a pan and covered them with 180 F water which I let soak for 30 mins to help sterilize. I added this entire mixture to the primary as noted above

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(Edited the original post to change "feminist" back to "fade" thanks to autocorrect)

 

I don't care for beets but it's awfully purty!

This did give me a chuckle, still wondering what you were trying to say.

 

Haha... Damn autocorrect wins again.

I wanted to say that the bitterness will FADE a bit with time. Even when you reread a post before making it official, it's funny how your brain still interprets a word as you meant it and not as it is at times.

 

Hey man, a tip of that to you, you have really done something very much out side the box here that looks good. Well done and very brave. Looks like a success!

 

Damn, that looks interesting. Let us know how it tastes after it has aged some more.

 

Now after almost two weeks in the bottle the beer is starting to have a better balance of flavor yet provide that earthy or beety aroma I desired. The flavor is citrusy, a little spicy, slightly bitter, and nice earthy or beety tones to round everything out. It sure is fun to pour for friends and have them shocked by the deep pink color. I poured the second beer a little violently so that your could see the awesome pink head.

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Schrute beer!

 

Nice. I made a beet rye IPA (with Simcoe) for an Iron Brewer that worked out well. Shredded the beets and steeped them in the wort after it came off the boil. Gave it about the same red color and pink head. Pretty serious earthy-beety flavor.

 

I like the looks of that; very nice!
Did it stain your white bucket?

 

I was a afraid it would but a simple rinse with hot water and a wipe with the sponge made it look good as new.

 

Very cool. I wonder if there's a way to get that color without a STRONG earthy Beety taste. Visually the beer is stunning, but it doesn't sound like anybody is raving about the flavor.

 

Actually, I love the flavor (but I love red beets). My wife enjoys it, but only wants about half a glass before I get to cleanup the rest. I'm excited to see how it ages over the month or two but I'll definitely brew this again

 

EXBERRY shade Bordeaux would do it:
http://www.chicagoift.org/members/newsletterarticles/nov2013/ColoringFood_GNT_INF2013.pdf
http://www.gnt-group.com/us-us

It's a natural food color concentrate made from red beets.

 

Well, I used quite a bit of beet. I think the first step would be to use the beet colder than I did and in a lower quantity, to find the minimum amount that gives that color. I suspect the color is saturated.

I actually thought the flavor was pretty good. It was earthy and distinctly beety, but not overwhelming, and went pretty well with the hops. I think if you cut the amount of beet in half, you might get a similar color but an appropriately subtle level of beet flavor. (If you don't like beets, then I don't know if it can be done.)

 

1 month update - the color and aroma remain unchanged but the strong beet flavor has diminished greatly. The farmhouse yeast flavor contributions are now in balance with the beet tones. The beet flavors are not dominating anymore and the beer has a quick, clean finish.

After trying my first ginger pale ale this evening, my wife immediately said, "the ginger beer is good, but lacking something, what if we added some beets for complexity." I think the beets will be fun to add to future split batches for color and toned down earthiness

 

what was the OG on this brew?

 

OG = 1.046 (target was 1.050)
FG = 1.006 (target was 1.009)