Smoothie sour

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codysorgenfrey

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Hey all, I’m going to brew a “smoothie” style sour beer next weekend. I’ll be brewing a 10% ABV Berliner Wiesse and diluting it with fruit purée. I plan to do 1:1 beer/purée. Giving me a 5% smoothie.

Anyways I’ve never done a beer like this before and wanted to know if anyone has experience kegging such a beast? Does the fruit and beer separate? Is there issues carbonating? God forbid clogging 😬?

Any advise would be awesome, thanks!
 
No one has tried this?

Mashing my 10% sour base right now… we’ll see how the smoothie part goes!
 
There was a local brewery in town that did sour smoothies for a while. They used those smoothie machines that constantly swirl the frozen stuff to keep it mixed. Rumor was they had skunked a sour and the smoothie thing was a way to salvage it. Brilliant move, really. It was all the rage as a girl beer for a while. No reflection on your brew. Sounds like a completely different concept.
 
Hey all, I’m going to brew a “smoothie” style sour beer next weekend. I’ll be brewing a 10% ABV Berliner Wiesse and diluting it with fruit purée. I plan to do 1:1 beer/purée. Giving me a 5% smoothie.

Anyways I’ve never done a beer like this before and wanted to know if anyone has experience kegging such a beast? Does the fruit and beer separate? Is there issues carbonating? God forbid clogging 😬?

Any advise would be awesome, thanks!

How'd this turn out? Was thinking about making one of these at about 35% puree. Would love to see your recipe and how it turned out for you!
 
How'd this turn out? Was thinking about making one of these at about 35% puree. Would love to see your recipe and how it turned out for you!
I’ll keep this thread up to date. The 10.8% sour base is in the fermenter right now. I’m adding the purée into the keg.
 
Unless you're taking aggressive measures to prevent it, I would imagine you're going to get some diptube/tap clogging.
Any suggestions?

I think if I can’t get the purée fine enough I might just mix the beer with the purée in the glass when I serve instead of in the keg.
 
That sounds like an absurd about of purée to be honest, especially addicting it directly to the keg. 2.5 gallons of pure purée would be like using 22.5 lbs of it in a 5 gallon batch as it’s nearly 9 lbs per gallon of weight. I purée 7 lbs of frozen raspberries and add it in the fermenter for my smoothie style sours and feel that’s pushing it. That said, I have not been a fan of the newer take on this style where there is actual pulp in the glass. i
 
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As a side note, I found this Smoothie Sour recipe with an included step by step by Oakshire Brewing. I'm currently souring mine right now to be modeled after it a bit, marshmallow fluff and all! They use about 40% puree, but I'll be closer to 25%. Found this detailed write up super helpful for this particular style of thicker sour. Understanding what works, doesn't work, and the timing of the adjuncts was really great to read about. Hadn't been able to find too much on it otherwise:

https://oakbrew.com/oakshire-brewings-guide-to-smoothie-sours/
 
We actually just did a Hard Seltzer this way, trying to mimick one done by a commercial brewery by me. We added 9lbs of fruit puree (3 cans of Oregon Fruit Puree) directly to the keg.

I ended up having to remove the poppet from the OUT post on the keg, as well as the pin in the QD to reduce obstructions from pouring. Once we did that, worked beautifully. Here's a pic of that seltzer. It's a seltzer base, but it's definitely like a smoothie with the fruit in it.

However, I will agree with @Dgallo that's a ridiculous amount of fruit. This was a 20% fruit addition and it was a lot!! I would not go more than this to be honest.

HS.jpg
 
As far as separation, it does settle out. The brewery that did the seltzer like what I posted above rolled their kegs every day to keep fruit in suspension. I started out that way but I stopped doing that. The fruit does settle out.
 
We actually just did a Hard Seltzer this way, trying to mimick one done by a commercial brewery by me. We added 9lbs of fruit puree (3 cans of Oregon Fruit Puree) directly to the keg.

I ended up having to remove the poppet from the OUT post on the keg, as well as the pin in the QD to reduce obstructions from pouring. Once we did that, worked beautifully. Here's a pic of that seltzer. It's a seltzer base, but it's definitely like a smoothie with the fruit in it.

However, I will agree with @Dgallo that's a ridiculous amount of fruit. This was a 20% fruit addition and it was a lot!! I would not go more than this to be honest.

View attachment 738055
Whoa! Thanks for sharing that pic! Each one of those cans are 49oz, right? what was your batch size? Might have to scale back my puree addition! Which flavor purees did you go with?
 
Yep, each one is 49 oz and weighs 3lbs. We did 3 of those which, when measured out, is about 1 gallon.

We did blackberry puree and the meyer lemon extract from Amoretti. Not their craft purees or flavorings, extract. This was about 6.5 - 7 gallons in the fermenter. With the fruit additions, I got roughly 1.5 kegs out of it.
 
Yep, each one is 49 oz and weighs 3lbs. We did 3 of those which, when measured out, is about 1 gallon.

We did blackberry puree and the meyer lemon extract from Amoretti. Not their craft purees or flavorings, extract. This was about 6.5 - 7 gallons in the fermenter. With the fruit additions, I got roughly 1.5 kegs out of it.


Did you add directly to the serving kegs? Maybe i'll drop mine down to 2 cans in my 4 gals. So just a touch under your %, especially since I'll also be adding other adjuncts too. How was the flavor of the blackberry? I was going to mix blackberry and raspberry.
 
Yep, just added it directly to the serving kegs first, then transferred the seltzer in after. Sealed them up and carbonated!

The flavor of the blackberry was pretty good. I always pick up on the earthiness of blackberry and I'm never a huge fan of them by themselves. The lemon extract really helped to kind of brighten up the flavor a bit. That in combination with the champagne yeast.
 
Did you add directly to the serving kegs? Maybe i'll drop mine down to 2 cans in my 4 gals. So just a touch under your %, especially since I'll also be adding other adjuncts too. How was the flavor of the blackberry? I was going to mix blackberry and raspberry.
Also, forgot to mention, I know there's a lot of debate on the effectiveness of this. However, we wanted to take all the necessary precautions. We dosed the kegs with the appropriate amount of Camden and Potassium Sorbate in order to prevent the yeast from fermenting that fruit.
 
For future readers. here's the recommended dosages per Oregon Fruit Co: Fermentation Fruit FAQs - Oregon Fruit Products

Our customers typically use 1/2 - 2 pounds of puree per gallon of finished beer. So, for a 7 barrel system (217 gallons), you could use 109 lbs. or all the way up to 434 lbs. Fruits with subtle flavors and esters such as Strawberry, Blood Orange and Red Tart Cherry usually require the higher 2 lbs. per gallon dosing. Stronger flavors like Raspberry, Sweet Cherry, and Blackberry can give great results at lower dosing levels (starting around 1/2 lb). It just depends on if you are looking for a strong fruit forward note, or more subtle fruit notes that produce more delicate fruit nuances.
 
We actually just did a Hard Seltzer this way, trying to mimick one done by a commercial brewery by me. We added 9lbs of fruit puree (3 cans of Oregon Fruit Puree) directly to the keg.

I ended up having to remove the poppet from the OUT post on the keg, as well as the pin in the QD to reduce obstructions from pouring. Once we did that, worked beautifully. Here's a pic of that seltzer. It's a seltzer base, but it's definitely like a smoothie with the fruit in it.

However, I will agree with @Dgallo that's a ridiculous amount of fruit. This was a 20% fruit addition and it was a lot!! I would not go more than this to be honest.

View attachment 738055

Thanks for this! I’m going to reconsider the ratio, however now it’ll be a pretty strong brew 😬
 
We dosed the kegs with the appropriate amount of Camden and Potassium Sorbate in order to prevent the yeast from fermenting that fruit.

Do you recall how much you added? I was considering doing this given all of the adjuncts I'll be adding. Were there any off flavors because of it? I read a number of posts regarding a bad sulfur smell due to the SO2 released as a result.
 
I did half of a camden tablet per keg, crushed up. The potassium sorbate I think was 1/2 tsp per gallon.

I did half of a camden in the keg that only got half full also and there's no detectable sulfur to me.
 
I bought 8 pounds of frozen tropical fruit from Costco, thawed it in the fridge and blended it up last night. I’m going to keg my beer tonight after work.

It’ll be 45% purée. 1.5 gallons 10% sour beer and 1.25 gallons tropical fruit purée.

I know most advised against this much fruit but someone here has to try! I’m going to go ahead remove the poppet from the out post as well as the pin in the ball lock disconnect just to be safe.

🤞

FA193E1A-5BC6-4994-907F-80E8CAD0843B.jpeg
 
I would love to brew this in Taiwan as we have nothing but tropical fruits. Sadly hard to make cider!! Any chance you would be willing to divulge your recipe? Thanks in advance!

Batch #20 - Tropical Smoothie - Cody Sorgenfrey
Brewfather

And no, no pasteurization as it should be kept cold the whole time and not stay in fridge for too long.
 
As a side note, I found this Smoothie Sour recipe with an included step by step by Oakshire Brewing. I'm currently souring mine right now to be modeled after it a bit, marshmallow fluff and all! They use about 40% puree, but I'll be closer to 25%. Found this detailed write up super helpful for this particular style of thicker sour. Understanding what works, doesn't work, and the timing of the adjuncts was really great to read about. Hadn't been able to find too much on it otherwise:

https://oakbrew.com/oakshire-brewings-guide-to-smoothie-sours/
I’ve tried this few times. One tip is that let the marshmallow fluff to ferment in first fermenter and then transfer it to secondary. Keep it cold at all times after that! I ruined the beer when I left it to room temp. All the good sweetness was gone from puree leaving only tartness and bad flavors.
 
I would love to brew this in Taiwan as we have nothing but tropical fruits. Sadly hard to make cider!! Any chance you would be willing to divulge your recipe? Thanks in advance!

Batch #20 - Tropical Smoothie - Cody Sorgenfrey
Brewfather

And no, no pasteurization as it should be kept cold the whole time and not stay in fridge for too long.

Hey, I just made a mango marshmallow smoothie ale, but it ended up being much under abv than I was hoping. Around 5.7%. I can't seem to get the 25% puree to really mix with the beer even after shaking it. I haven't carbed it yet, but the tap seems to only pull off puree. Maybe carbing will help? Did you shake the beer everytime you serve @codeysorgenfrey? Sounds like you have a lot more puree in yours.
 
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