How do you put strawberries in your beer?

[icantbejon]

I've heard a few different techinques and I'm curious. I've heard people say use frozen strawberries cause they are pasturized. I've heard of people using fresh strawberries and basically juicing them and adding them toward the end of fermentation. Others put in secondary. What are your thoughts?

 

[firerat]

You don't...

Sorry couldn't resist.

Someone will be along shortly with a real answer.

 

[Banjorium]

I knew a guy I worked with that would get a few pounds of raspberries every year from a farm and make a wheat out of it. He told me he just threw them in the freezer in ziplock bags, froze them for a day or two and then thawed (still in the bag) and dumped them in. He truly knows how to RDWHAHB

 

[icantbejon]

Well said firerat....but this is for my lovely wife so I'm claiming innocence!

 

[AnOldUR]

You don't...

You know, I'm a firm believer in the same thing, but found myself adding black raspberries to my brew last weekend. We have a lot growing in the field behind my house and I got impulsive. Added them pre fermentation, so I'm not expecting much but color from them (although I wouldn't mind a small amount of flavor.) Wort was a nice light red.

I can't help with the, "How do you . . ." part, because I probably did it wrong, but wanted to get subscribed to this thread to hear other ideas. There will soon be a bumper crop of Blackberries and I may lose control again.

 

[robotinc]

I have found that if you let strawberries ferment they lose a lot of their flavor. What I have done is to cut and freeze the strawberries, then add them to the keg in a mesh bag. As long as the keg stays cold it doesn't start to referment and you get a great flaver

 

[WI_Wino]

I did two beers with strawberries this summer. A kolsch and saison. In both cases I fermented the beer as normal then racked the beer onto the berries for about two weeks and then bottled. I used frozen strawberries from the grocery store, thawed before I racked the beer.

Both beers have a strawberry presence but not over powering. I used about 1 pound per gallon of beer in both cases.

 

[jivex5k]

I used to be against fruit in my beer. Then I learned how to brew berliners.

I did this with raspberries:
Got them frozen, thawed, froze again, thawed again. Use funnel to get in secondary carboy, rack beer onto them. This is after primary is finished, but a secondary ferm kicked off.

Raspberries were mush due to the abuse, this is what I wanted. Read that it will break down cell walls and impart more flavor. Figured comerrcial freezing would specifically want to avoid breakin cells down so I thawed them and refroze them to be sure.

Didn't use a bag or anything, just threw them in. They floated and turned white as the color was drained, pretty damn cool. Dumped right out like slurry, overnight soak in PBW eliminated any residual raspberry matter. Didn't filter, auto-siphon transfer to bottling bucket kept most out. Maybe a few piece slipped in a bottle or two, part of the charm if you ask me.

Used 3.2lbs in 5 gallons. Very raspberry forward aroma, slightly less on taste but it was rasberry and lacto up front in a wonderful combination.

Doing another one tomorrow, time to rack it on raspberries, going with 4.5lbs this time. Looking for that new glarus fruit bomb profile.

 

[baulz]

Does 3-4lbs of raspberries take up a lot of space in the fermenter? I usually use a 5 gal carboy for secondary but wonder if I would need a 6.5 gal with the berries.

 

[jivex5k]

Does 3-4lbs of raspberries take up a lot of space in the fermenter? I usually use a 5 gal carboy for secondary but wonder if I would need a 6.5 gal with the berries.

I used a 5 gallon, fit fine but I think I only had 4.5 ~ 4 gallons of liquid after transfer due to trub loss.
I should really mark off my fermenters...
Kind of hard to see carboy size but I had a decent amount of headspace, needed it too cuz it was bubbling a lot for a day after transferring. Fruit started a secondary ferm.