Have you ever brewed/aged a beer with dates?

[FutureJack]

I have 3 pounds of California dates from Shield Dates Farm in Indio, CA. I've been wanting to brew with them for a while, but have been unsure about the best way to use them. I've never aged a beer with fruit or anything really.

I also have 8oz of pure date crystals- which I believe should be close to 100% fermentable. I was going to throw that in with 10 minutes left in the boil.

I hear that the date flavor is very difficult to extract, but I can't find any good information on the process. Was planning to do some kind of moderate gravity brown ale (7% or so). I'm sure they would work in a stout or big porter also, but I want to try to feature the dates, and I'm afraid I will lose that altogether in a giant roasty type porter or stout.

I think at the very least I need to split the dates to expose as much as possible to the beer. I would probably rack onto the dates in a secondary after a couple weeks into fermentation. But should I split them and soak them in vodka? Bake them for a few minutes in the oven? Freeze them before I do any of this?

Anyone have any experience with these delicious fruits/bacteria vehicles?

 

[Revvy]

I've done figs and dates in beers before. I used about two pounds of dried fruit which I reconstituted over night with boiling water and a campden tablet. I then ran them through a sanitized food processor to a paste, then I pressed the pulp and liquid through a sieve and added that to the boil.

I've also done the same thing without using a sieve and just added the pulp and liquid into a secondary into secondary. I did this recently with figs in a saison.

 

[beergolf]

I did a Belgian Dubbel using dates a while ago. It has been in bottles for two weeks now so I should be ready to taste one in a few weeks. Going into the bottles it tasted great. I used about 8 oz chopped dates at the end of the boil and added 8 oz of date sugar after fermentation slowed. Some date flavor, nice dubbel. Once the beer conditions a little more I will do a good taste test and post back.

 

[Revvy]

Also if you do press it through a sieve to extract only the liquid, you can use that pulp to make an amazing date or fig cake. Just google for a recipe. Like a basic ginger bread type batter and add it in.

 

[FutureJack]

I've done figs and dates in beers before. I used about two pounds of dried fruit which I reconstituted over night with boiling water and a campden tablet. I then ran them through a sanitized food processor to a paste, then I pressed the pulp and liquid through a sieve and added that to the boil.

I've also done the same thing without using a sieve and just added the pulp and liquid into a secondary into secondary. I did this recently with figs in a saison.

Did you get a significant date flavor by adding to the boil? How did that compare to use in secondary (not clear if you used dates in secondary also)?

 

[TyTanium]

There was a thread about this recently:
Got a Beer Brewing date (!), need a belgian recipe!

Oh, nm...food date, not girl date.

 

[kingwood-kid]

I think dates would go very well in a dubbel or quad, subbed for dark candi sugar. 3lbs of pitted dates is about 2.2lbs of sugar. If you want to be able to see from one side of your beer to the other, you might want to pick up some pectinase from your LHBS.

 

[FutureJack]

Now thinking of using the dates in a pumpkin beer I'm going to brew for local homebrew comp. Belgian yeast sounds pretty good too. Guess we'll see what happens! Thanks for the replies.

 

[NoIguanaForZ]

Found this thread while searching. How much of a darkening effect do people observe adding dates?