Looking for the original Bar Towel blog? You can find it at www.thebartowel.com.

We have a trivia question in order to register to prevent bots. If you have any issues with answering, contact us at cass@bartowel.com for help.

Introducing Light Mode! If you would like a Bar Towel social experience that isn't the traditional blue, you can now select Light Mode. Go to the User Control Panel and then Board Preferences, and select "Day Drinking" (Light Mode) from the My Board Style drop-down menu. You can always switch back to "Night Drinking" (Dark Mode). Enjoy!

How long to leave sour beer in secondary with cherries?

Post your own tasty recipes or homebrewing advice here.

Moderators: Craig, Cass

Post Reply
User avatar
Gedge
Bar Fly
Posts: 892
Joined: Sun Oct 29, 2006 6:19 pm
Location: Dementia Five

How long to leave sour beer in secondary with cherries?

Post by Gedge »

A couple months back I brewed my first sour beer. I racked the beer into the secondary and onto the fruit and dosed with the Wyeast Lambic Blend approx. 60 days ago.

What I've read with sours is that you can/should let them secondary for a year or more to really get the full sour effect/flavour profile.

What I'm wondering is if there is a point where I have to rack the beer off the cherries before that.

User avatar
markaberrant
Seasoned Drinker
Posts: 1664
Joined: Fri Nov 16, 2007 4:28 pm
Location: Regina, SK

Post by markaberrant »

You typically age a lambic for a minimum of 12 months in primary. You can then rack onto fruit and let sit for 2-3 months, then bottle.

What you have done isn't the end of the world, but it should sit for another 10 months. I'd just leave the fruit in there at this point instead of messing around with it any further.

User avatar
saints_gambit
Bar Fly
Posts: 652
Joined: Mon May 31, 2010 2:38 pm
Location: Toronto, Ontario
Contact:

Post by saints_gambit »

markaberrant wrote:You typically age a lambic for a minimum of 12 months in primary. You can then rack onto fruit and let sit for 2-3 months, then bottle.

What you have done isn't the end of the world, but it should sit for another 10 months. I'd just leave the fruit in there at this point instead of messing around with it any further.
Just be careful that there aren't any LCBO health and safety types around to test it for trace levels of cyanide.
saintjohnswort.ca

atomeyes
Beer Superstar
Posts: 2153
Joined: Fri Oct 14, 2011 1:39 pm

Post by atomeyes »

Gedge wrote:A couple months back I brewed my first sour beer. I racked the beer into the secondary and onto the fruit and dosed with the Wyeast Lambic Blend approx. 60 days ago.

What I've read with sours is that you can/should let them secondary for a year or more to really get the full sour effect/flavour profile.

What I'm wondering is if there is a point where I have to rack the beer off the cherries before that.
check the gravity.
I'd assume that you'll be racking on the cherries for a year. if the Lambic blend was your primary, then the primary would have been a year and the secondary would be in question.

The longer you ferment, the more sour character. 60 days isn't nearly enough. 100 days is the brett go-to minimum #. considering that it also has lacto-pedio, leaving it for 2 months seems way too short to me (even if you didn't rack it on fruit).

your eyeballs won't lie to you. the brett is going to chew at the fruit. when the fruit's disappearing, then its probably getting close. but yeah....leave it for 10 more months like Mark said.

User avatar
Gedge
Bar Fly
Posts: 892
Joined: Sun Oct 29, 2006 6:19 pm
Location: Dementia Five

Post by Gedge »

Thanks for the advice guys. Looks like this one's sitting for awhile.

Post Reply