Fruit in Beer

Joe Peters

New Member
Hey folks. Looking for some feedback/experience in using fresh cranberries versus cranberry juice concentrate for a Cranberry Orange IPA
 
just put my first batch in the fermenter myself. I used my food processor to mince the cranberries and I put them into the primary with my Cyser. Only thing i can tell you is that even chopped, they float.
 
Crush or chop them, don't pulverize them which is why either do by hand or put in a ziplock and smack with a heavy pan. Freeze for a few days. Put in a mesh bag with some sanitized weights like marbles. put the bag in carboy (usually secondary). Sure you can just dump them in but it will be a pain to strain out plus some will float an fruit on the top always leaves more possibility of infections. Using just cranberries will only add cranberry tartness, not sweetness. For an IPA or the Cyser, tart will play real nice. Probably want to do a tertiary to get rid of the haze from the fruit.

-You also can freeze them first then crush, I've done both.
-You can also first heat up the cranberries in water to 165 for ten minutes or so. This should kill off any bacteria. Do not do any higher temp cause is start playing with the pectins.
 
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