Brewing tonight with a couple first

[Kmcogar]

Tonight I'm brewing with a couple of first. I am brewing a banana bread beer, or trying too. Brewing with fruit will be a first for me. This will be my 3rd all grain batch. So I'm still fairly new to that too.

Im gonna put the 5lbs of bananas in the oven and let them brown until they ooze goodness. Then I'm gonna throw them in my mash with my grains.

I also am doing a yeast starter for the first time. I set this up last night. It actually spilled out a little over night. I going with the idea that it will be fine and in throwing it in my brew tonight.

After it ferments I'm throwing 5lbs of frozen bananas in my secondary and letting it set for a month.

Wish me luck!

Please leave and advice or questions.

 

[bloodonblood]

What's your base for this? Good luck!

 

[Kmcogar]

8lbs of Pilsen malt
1/2 lb of Vienna for mouthfeel
1.5 lbs of victory malt for nuttiness.

I'm trying for 75% efficiency. Last time I got 80% though. I am a little worried the bananas will kick up the ABV. I want it to be about 5% ABV

Im also putting in some vanilla as well.

 

[DonutMuncher]

I haven't added fruit to beers in a secondary, so I'm not sure but a month on top of 5 lbs of frozen bananas sounds like a long time. But if you are really going for the banana taste I'm sure it'll turn out great. Sounds yummy

 

[Kmcogar]

I'll check it out after 2 weeks and see how it taste

 

[neko]

I've never done a recipe like this before, but are you afraid of a stuck sparge? 5 pounds of bananas seems like you might get a gooey plug.

 

[AmandaK]

Some tips:
1) Use rice hulls in your mash. That banana is bound to be sticky, so I would throw about a half pound in the mash to prevent a stuck sparge.
2) With all the oils in the banana, I doubt you'll get much head or have much retention. That's just more of an FYI just in case it does happen.

Good luck! Let us know how it turns out!

 

[Kmcogar]

Well the brew went pretty good last night. Everything was on point. The only thing was...I didn't get much banana flavoring. Hopeful long the frozen bananas in the secondary will do the trick. If not, it still taste like a pretty good spring beer