How much fruit should I use?

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StrongBad42

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Hey gang, I just had a batch of a slightly modified MAOM finish in primary, and I'm thinking of doing a secondary with some mango. I was just wondering how much I should use and how long to let the mead sit on the fruit before I rack it for some bulk aging. It's a 2 gallon batch and I'd like a good amount of the mango flavor to come through, but still want the honey to be dominant. Cheers! :mug:
 
Can't say for certain, but I'd suggest you google for country wine recipes and use the suggested weight as a guide.

Maybe half or something like that ?
 
For both my sour cherry beer and my blueberry mead I'm adding around half a kilo of fruit to 5 liters in secondary. Not sure how much that is in freak avoirdupois :)
 
I personally like to have 2 quarts of the fruit per gallon. That has worked very well for me so fast.

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Thanks for the replies. How long should the mead sit on the fruit before it is racked off?
 
I never leave the fruit in more than 3-5 encase the fruit begins to rot or go bad. I left it in one for a week and it started developing mold.

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~1 lb per gallon should give you decent flavor with mangoes. Up it to 1.5 ish if you really want more flavor. My procedure for sanitizing fruit with peels is as follows:

-Wash fruit with soap and water
-dip fruit in Starsan solution (mixed per manufacturer instructions)
-peel fruit on sanitized cutting board
-cut fruit into chunks
-put fruit chunks into zip-lock with small amount of starsan solution (~1oz)
-freeze fruit for 48hrs
-thaw and dump into carboy


The freezing helps break down the cell walls in the fruit and will get more juice out. The sanitizing procedures described are one step below boiling the fruit, which risks creating pectin haze. A small amount of Starsan doesn't pose a risk to your beer in small amounts, the yeast will actually use the phosphates in the Starsan for growth. I have two plum beers on tap that I made using this method (without peeling of course) and they have not become infected after 6+ weeks in bottles.

Keeping the mead on fruit for 2-4 weeks should be about right, but I have little experience with meads, so perhaps someone else would know better. I take my beers off the fruit once the color has been extracted from the fruit and the fruit has sunk to the bottom. If it was a lambic or dark beer you might leave it on for 4+ weeks.
 
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