Fruit Beer Help

[KopyKat]

I have searched and found several recipes for Raspberry fruit beer. All show an OG of 1.042-1.044 and use 7-8 lbs of 2-row malt and 5-6 lbs of raspberries or 1 can of Oregon Raspberry Puree.

When I plug this into BeerSmith with 7 lbs of malt and 1 can of puree I get an OG of 1.061 and an ABV of over 6% - not the light and refreshing beer I all the recipes said.

Where am I going wrong?

 

[Yooper]

Maybe your efficiency is higher than the recipe assumes? If I use 7 pounds of 2-row in a 5 gallon recipe, I will only get 1.037.

You can adjust the amount of malt to your efficiency, and then add the puree.

 

[KopyKat]

I get an OG of 1.037 also before I add the puree. The puree has a brix of 10 and when I add it it raises the OG to 1.061.

 

[Cpt_Kirks]

Chill the beer down for a couple of days, then rack to secondary on top of the fruit. Keep the secondary chilled for about a week on top of the fruit. Then, keg or bottle.

Keeping the temp down helps prevent secondary fermentation of the fruit.

 

[KopyKat]

That sounds like a recipe for bottle bombs. The fruit would have to ferment out before bottling or it would start back up and explode. Isn't that right?

 

[KopyKat]

I still need an answer to the original question. Anyone?

 

[The Blow Leprechaun]

That sounds like a recipe for bottle bombs. The fruit would have to ferment out before bottling or it would start back up and explode. Isn't that right?

Yes... maybe if you kept it chilled all the time, it wouldn't, but I still wouldn't trust that. I fully ferment out all of my fruit beers before bottling.

 

[rpres1977]

your going wrong with using the pureee.......don't. That's where you get all your additional digestables and giving your high gravity. I did a rasberry blonde using 7lbs of pale 2-row and a 1 lb of Carafoam and came out about 1.050 but you can lessen the grain bill to take down your gravity if you like. I fermented for 1 week and then racked on only 1 1/2 lbs of fresh rasberrys that I very quickly blanched in boiling water an laid to rest for another 2 weeks before bottling. I wasn't looking to make a rasberry Cisco. I have to say this one came out awsome........

1 lbs 8.0 oz Fruit - Raspberry (0.0 SRM) Adjunct 15.00 %
7 lbs 8.0 oz Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 75.00 %
1 lbs Carafoam (2.0 SRM) Grain 10.00 %
1.00 oz Saaz [4.00 %] (90 min) Hops 19.5 IBU
0.75 oz Mt Hood [4.10 %] (20 min) Hops 7.6 IBU
0.25 oz Mt Hood [4.10 %] (0 min) Hops -
0.25 tsp Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 min) Misc
1 Pkgs German Ale/Kolsch (White Labs #WLP029) Yeast-Ale

 

[Cpt_Kirks]

That sounds like a recipe for bottle bombs. The fruit would have to ferment out before bottling or it would start back up and explode. Isn't that right?

Ouch. That is a possibility, I keg so it's not an issue (stainless steel "bottles", heh).