Blending with kegged beer

[brownni5]

The more I think about blending my sour beers, the more excited I get about possibilities.

About a year ago, I started kegging, though in limited capacity due to current space considerations. So, I only have 2 kegs going, and being the only beer drinker in the house, it takes me a while to get through them. But what if I thought those kegged beers might be good candidates for blending with my solera beer? Especially if I was toward the end of the keg and just wanted to get it out of the way. Has anyone blended sour beer with a beer that was already carbed in the keg? Did it work? What was the process? I'm not really interested in blending in the glass (long-term) since my goal is to free up keg space.

Thoughts?

 

[Funky Frank]

I’ve done this with beer in kegs that I was sick of drinking. I had about 1/3 keg of a porter or stout that was a hit at a gathering but must have kicked up fermentation again because it got thin later so I just topped the keg with something like a Flanders brown. It was fine but I would say there was little difference to the unblended beer (especially considering that improved body is usually a goal of blending). I have also dumped sour into part kegs of Belgian bombs when I wasn’t in the mood for them anymore. Never as good an outcome as purposeful blending but it’s never made a beer worse than both parents. Keep in mind that some advantages of blending are short lived.

 

[brownni5]

But what about going from keg to bottle?

 

[Funky Frank]

Wow! I completely missed the point that you’re trying to free up kegs and not just fill them up with a blended sour. Sorry a boot that.

Filling bottles with a fresh blend will take a little figuring and guessing. First off, each gravity point reduced gives about 0.5 vol CO2 (goal is likely between 0.5 and 3.0). So I would measure the sg of your blend and assume it will ferment down to 1.000 over time in the bottle.

Second off, carb calcs assume that the “still” beer going into the bottle has a very low vol CO2 were as half of yours will already be at 3 vol (give or take). My suggestion is to try and flatten the keg a little by agitating and popping the relief valve. I’d then try to get a really “bad pour” when blending to further remove some CO2. You may not need or want to do this as much if the kegged beer is fairly dry. ie....if blending with a beer with fg 1.012 you will want it to be fairly flat but if the clean blending beer is 1.005 then let it a little more carbed.

Good luck and watch for bottle bombs!