Lagering/Gelatin/Fruit question

[brownni5]

Not sure where this belongs, so here goes.

A couple weeks ago, I brewed a dopplebock. Half I plan to "eis" (taking advantage of MN winter) and the other half I'd like to add cherries to - inspiration thanks to Randy Mosher's Radical Brewing and The Mad Fermentationist - Mike T.

The question arises with the fruit. Could I lager this beer (bringing down to near freezing) and/or add gelatin before adding the cherries, or would there not be enough yeast left in suspension to referment the cherries? I don't want cherries in the whole batch, so I don't want to lager and/or add gelatin before splitting the batch. My primary yeast was S. arlingtonesis from Bootleg Biology.

The other option is to split and then lager/add gelatin, which obviously isn't impossible, but checking on options.

Thanks!

 

[Jag75]

If it were me I'd split the batches like you want and then add the fruit to one. I would do this at the tail end of fermentation. Let it go for a week or 2 then lager.