Fruit in Primary?

[SwissRico]

So I've had some mishaps in transferring to secondary and I'm now looking to make a Wailua inspired Hefeweizen which requires me to add around a dozen passion fruits into secondary.

So my question is this: Do I need to transfer to secondary to add fruit to my Hefe, or can I add it to the primary after the krausen has subsided like I would if I was dry-hopping?

 

[IslandLizard]

At the current price of passion fruit you definitely don't want to screw that up. Holy cow, trying to get your hands on some of these is almost impossible. Hope you're near a good and affordable source. Even canned ones are hard to come by.

You don't really need to rack to secondary to add fruit. Most brewers do it to be able to save their yeast or get the beer off the yeast and trub for longer aging on the fruit, which you probably won't do. In the 2-3 weeks that takes your yeast won't autolyze.

What kind of mishaps did you incur with secondaries? It's a pretty straight forward procedure, although unnecessary for most homebrew beer.

 

[SwissRico]

I'm in Switzerland... Everything's expensive. But passion fruit are currently about $5 for a half dozen at the local market.

Previous secondary issue was due to my inexperience in how yeast works. I read secondary fermentation and figured there would be some *fermentation*... Transferred too early, thinking the fermentation would help replenish the CO2 protecting the beer ended up with a stalled brew with too little yeast to finish off - despite best efforts to kick start them again. Did however avoid oxidation, and the final brew was just a little sweeter and had lower ABV than hoped for. A good learning experience, and nothing wasted...

 

[CJ-3]

I have had good luck adding fruit to the primary. I wait until the bulk of fermentation is over and add the fruit then. Don't be surprised if your fermentation kicks in pretty heavy again as the yeast devour the sugars in the fruit.

 

[C-Rider]

I'm in Switzerland... Everything's expensive. But passion fruit are currently about $5 for a half dozen at the local market.

.

To bad about that price. Here in Hawai`i we can just go into the forest and pick them during season.

 

[C-Rider]

I'm in Switzerland... Everything's expensive. But passion fruit are currently about $5 for a half dozen at the local market.

.

To bad about that price. Here in Hawai`i we can just go into the forest and pick them during season.

 

[Vamptrump]

I'm just waiting until late August - early September to go find some paw-paw to make beer with.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asimina_triloba