Pomegranate Ale

[levin_ae92]

Howdy Y'all,

at work yesterday one of our students was juicing pomegranates and automatically the first thing I thought was I want to ferment the juice in some beer!!

Now I was thinking around 8L incase it tastes awful and I cant drink it.

For simplicity I was thinking 2kg of Ale malt mashed at about 66-67 for some longer sugars to balance all the short sugars in the juice. Made up to 8L with 1L being pomegranate juice. Oh and for hops maybe about 20IBU worth of EKG at 60 and 10 or something like that!! Oh and maybe some US-05 as yeast, I have plenty kicking around.

Will keep people posted with results (including tasting with food techs and students at work)

Cheers,

Colby

Oh and PS I havent made it into the obvious choice, a wheat beer, cos I dont like em!!

 

[brettprevans]

have you tasted the juice? pomegranate syrup is damn bitter. i abondonded my pomegranate cider using syrup as it was too bitter.

but yeah go for it and report back

 

[jbirbeck]

wheat beer makes sense to me. I tried one of these and it wasn't like a wheat beer and tasted great.

 

[levin_ae92]

I have some juice where she juiced the whole fruit, and I can get some she juiced just the pulpy bit, so less btter, but that's why I'm going to mash a bit high to get some long sugars, or maybe just add some crystal, I'll see how I go

 

[MisterJingosSmile]

I think a pomegranate wheat beer is a good idea too. I like pomegranates although the flesh is a PITA to separate from the shell

IMO pomegranates have a flavor profile similar to raspberries, containing sweet, tart and bitter elements. I find pomegranates a bit dryer though.

I say go for it, barley or wheat either way should be interesting.

 

[Nick JD]

What yeast will you use?

Ratios of wheat:barley in wheat beers make less difference than a different strain of weizen yeast IMO.

I've made a couple of 100% weizens and a 0% weizen and to be blunt - wheat beers should be called wheatyeast beers.

Like in Germany.

 

[levin_ae92]

I'm thinking US05, got plenty spare

 

[donburke]

i brewed a pomegranate ale a couple of weeks ago, bottled 2 days ago,

my fresh pomegranates were rotten so i bought a litre of 100% pomegranate juice from coles (glass bottle/jar)

tasted ok out of the fermenter, the high mash temp balanced the tartness of the juice

pomegranate juice is not that bitter if you dont use the seeds inside the pulp

it had a distinct 'earthy' taste, a quite subdued pomegranate flavour, with very little red colour

i guess i'll find out in a couple of weeks, here is the recipe

Recipe: PERSEPHONE
Style: Fruit Beer
TYPE: All Grain

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Batch Size: 12.00 L
Boil Size: 10.50 L
Estimated OG: 1.043 SG
Estimated Color: 7.7 EBC
Estimated IBU: 15.0 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70.00 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
0.90 kg Pilsner, Malt Craft Export (Joe White) (3.Grain 39.82 %
0.90 kg Wheat Malt, Malt Craft (Joe White) (3.5 EBGrain 39.82 %
0.10 kg Caramalt (Joe White) (49.3 EBC) Grain 4.42 %
0.10 kg Carapils Weyermann (4.0 EBC) Grain 4.42 %
0.10 kg Oats, Flaked (2.0 EBC) Grain 4.42 %
9.50 gm Amarillo [8.50 %] (60 min) Hops 15.0 IBU
0.50 items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 min) Misc
1.00 l Pomegranate Juice (After 5 days) Misc
0.16 kg Cane (Beet) Sugar (0.0 EBC) Sugar 7.08 %
1 Pkgs American Ale (Wyeast Labs #1056) Yeast-Ale


Mash Schedule: Temperature Mash, 1 Step, Full Body
Total Grain Weight: 2.10 kg
----------------------------
Temperature Mash, 1 Step, Full Body
Step Time Name Description Step Temp
60 min Saccharification Add 12.00 L of water at 72.1 C 69.0 C
15 min Mash Out Heat to 76.0 C over 10 min 76.0 C

 

[Thirsty Boy]

nothing wrong with bitterness if you are making a beer.... I understand bitterness is an essential component of beer Just compensate for the bitterness component of the pomegranates by adjusting your hop regime.

I have played with making sour ales by using pomegranate molasses - I worked on the idea of a tart and bitey amber ale, cut down on the caramel malts used in the actual beer because an element of that would be being added by the molasses

It worked OK but needs a bit more experimentation. I was just mucking about with beers I had already made and wasn't trying to specifically tailor a grist for the pomegranate molasses.

I think with pure juice, the grist from a Flanders Red or Flanders Brown ale would be good - you know it will work with tartness and fruitiness, plus it gives you a nice malt backbone and isn't just another wheat based fruit beer. If its lacking a little as a "straight" ale... then you could think about tossing in a pack of roselare blend and some oak cubes & walking away for 9months. Pomegranate Flanders Red.

TB

 

[levin_ae92]

Mashing now

 

[levin_ae92]

At 1.024 after 48hrs, hydro sample is interesting, he'll of a lot of floaties, hope it all drops out in cold conditioning