Two raspberry ale questions

Posted April 27th, 2007 by GaryW

1. The recipe said to add 5 pounds of berries to the secondary, then after a week, rack to a thrid fermenter for a week which I did (it has a great taste). In the course of transferring to the 3rd fermentor, all the berries plugged up my racking cane and spihon hose...very frustrating. So I basically just poured the wort through a strainer into my 3rd fermenter bucket. However, this undoubtedly oxygenated the wort. Is there an easier way to get the berries out without frothing up the wort?

2. At bottling time yesterday the beer had a nice red color but was rather cloudy. I had used Irish moss in the boil. Is the cloudiness related to pectins?. Is someway to avoid the cloudiness or will it clear in the bottle over time?

‹ Warning: Kegs can explode! Growing hops ›

mmmm rasberries

MikeT's picture
On April 27th, 2007 MikeT says:

1. The clogged racking cane does sound frustrating. I once dry hopped in a keg with loose whole flower hops and it was a disaster. The hops clogged the pick up tube and the beer was pure foam from there on out. There are a couple of ways to avoid this. First, you could boil a muslin bag to sanitize it and put your berries in it and then into the fermenter. A plastic pail or keg would be best for this since carboys have such a small opening to get the berries out. Another way is to put a screen on the end of the racking cane. A sure screen is made for this, but i would imagine that you could use a nylon stocking or pretty much anything that will prevent the berries from going up the tube.
2. The clarity issue could be from many things. How vigorous was your boil? Did you get a good break? I don't think pectin is the problem unless you also boiled the berries with the wort. Did you heat them up at all before adding them? It could be a yeast issue too. Some kinds don't flocculate well in which case cold conditioning could help in getting the yeast to settle out. There are many variables. If you post your recipe and procedure, we might be able to get a little more accurate as to where the problem came from.

Mike. Thanks for the

GaryW's picture
On April 27th, 2007 GaryW says:

Mike. Thanks for the comments.

Here is link to the raspberry ale recipe:

http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/recipes/recipe/0,,FOOD_9936_17009,00.htm...

I think I pretty much followed the recipe except that I substituted 7 lbs of malt extract for 7 lbs of grain. and I added 2 tsp gypsum at 10 minutes into boil plus1 tsp. of Irish moss at 55 minutes.
I steeped the grains at 148-162°F for one hour in 5 qts. water, then sparged using grain "tea" at 148°F.

Gary