Lemon/lime Infused Beer

[Benbrewer]

Slightly OT: I was under the (unconfirmed) impression that citrus was added to Mexican beers in Mexico to keep away the flies.
I'd be keen to know if someone with better knowledge can tell me if that's a load of horseshit as I've always found the lemon in Corona beer a bit of a **** (and corona a fairly unexciting beer).

Wa stold by a barmaid that the fly story is true. She learned it on her bar course. I agree Corona is pretty average but the infused beers taste ok and a bit more soild than Corona which I find a bit waterery.

I will test out the infused beer receipe as soon as I drain my first keg, which shouldn't take too long!!

 

[Interloper]

I've used ***** lime leaves (available at any Asian or Indian grocers and some fruit & veg shops) and it gives a Mexican Cerveza a very limey/floral twang. Chuck 3-4 in secondary for a week.

I still don't love corona, as it lacks guts/flavour/taste.

As someone said ages ago on this board "The hardest thing about making a corona clone is getting the stray cat to piss in your fermenter first"

 

[manticle]

Flame suit on h34r:

Citrus fruits such as lemons and limes were originally put in beer in Mexico to keep the flies away form the neck of the bottle.
Why on gods green earth would you spoil a decent beer by adding acid???? :icon_vomit:
Ahhh well whatever floats your boat.

Only just realised you posted this a minute before mine.

Actually just came across this explanation.

Who knows for sure?

The reason for the lime is that hop compounds degrade when they come into contact with light. This causes beer in clear bottles to turn 'skunky.' The lime is used to mask this aroma.

From here: http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Corona-(beer)

Still sounds like something I'll be avoiding.

 

[fiat84]

Great homemade fresh citrus extract using vodka infused with lime, lemon, grapefruit, orange, etc.:

After a few tries the easiest and fastest way to zest citrus fruit is by using a horizontal peeler with light pressure with a sawing motion back and forth. You can thinly skin any citrus fruit by removing the outer zest which leaves the bitter white pith behind. The horizontal type peeler head that you also hold horizontally removes almost none of the white pith compared to those manual razor shaped peelers(the one you hold vertically and the head is horizontal on top 90 degrees). Put the zest strips into a cup, add vodka until 1cm higher than the zest, cover with plastic wrap, wait a few days and magically the zest color and flavor is extracted into the vodka. No need to chop up the zest strips it works fine with big strips and the zest strips have almost no flavor remaining after the extract is strained out with a fine mesh strainer.

For the strongest flavor influence add the strained extract just before bottling to your bulk priming bottling pail. We always taste at this point and add more extract if needed so you can control the flavor influence. Any remaining extract is stored in those small 2oz glass liquor bottles for future use which is why we try to make a bit more than needed. We often add this left over extract to the finished beer when serving for those who want a much stronger citrus flavor.

Make up Coopers Mexican Cerveza kit with 1KG dextrose, to 23L, 14 day primary at 18C, rack and add extract just before bottling, taste and add more extract if needed, add sugar solution to bulk prime, stir, then bottle. Result is a lightly colored, lightly flavored corona clone with infused lime flavor.

The attached picture shows the lemon zest on the far left which is also coloring the vodka yellow, the grapefruit is clearer, and both smell great after a few days through the plastic wrap. Hope this helps others save some time and effort. We came up with this fresh citrus extract idea after making a tea from those gray bitter orange peels at my local brew store which did not taste like orange and were extremely bitter so we did not use it. The other picture shows the two varieties of coriander, the greenish, larger, oblong football shape is the "Indian Coriander" on the right which is much more lemony and citrusy compared to the western brown, smaller, round variety.