Anyone ever used pineapple in a beer?

[Yesfan]

I was looking through the fruit beer section of the recipes forum and didn't see anything where one has used pineapples. Has anyone done this and/or knows or brewed some good recipes involving pineapples? Pros? Cons?


I've got a strawberry blonde fermenting now, so I thought some sort of pineapple brew would be a good future fruit beer.

 

[SupervisingChildren]

I did a strawberry blonde with 5# strawberries and added 1# pineapple and it was pretty darn good. I've never done just pineapples though, so it may be different on its own.

 

[ArizonaGoalie]

I did a pineapple light wheat brew a couple years ago racking over frozen pineapple chunks from Costco. It came out pretty good.

Right now I'm looking at taking 3/4 of a gallon of an orange wheat (that's done fermenting) and fermenting it for a week with 1/4 gallon of pineapple juice and just see what happens. I've read that the sugar will ferment and I will be left with a sour mess, but I'm willing to take a risk with a gallon.

I'd use frozen pineapple again but my one gallon fermenter only has a very small opening, it's an apple cider jar

 

[VolFan]

I recently made a pineapple Saison using 4 small pineapples (about 5 lbs) that were cut up and minced and added at secondary. It is excellent and the flavor blends well with saison.

 

[sandyeggoxj]

http://www.santanbrewing.com/the-beer/mr-pineapple/

 

[Yesfan]

http://www.santanbrewing.com/the-beer/mr-pineapple/

Hmm......Now you got me thinking.


(non-topic)

Hey Volfan!


Go Big Orange!

 

[crash568]

I do a pineapple saison that uses organic pinapple juice, I freeze it in a plastic freezer bag and then add the frozen chuck into my wort at flame out. It helps cool things down real quick too. Basic brewing on youtube has a full video about it Id link it if youtube wasnt blocked at work

 

[bo_dangles]

I found this thread on the Canadian Homebrew forum for a Hawaiian Pale Ale and have it on my list to brew.

http://www.canadianhomebrewers.com/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=1542

 

[Rev2010]

Maui Brewing Co does a Pineapple Wheat (called Mana Wheat), had a bunch of them last time in Hawaii this past January. The pineapple taste was clearly noticeable and was good, but the beer on a whole was just too one dimensional. it was more like a pineapple soda just much less sweet, couldn't taste the wheat body or anything. So yes, there's are brews out there commercially with it, and as above others have used it. Gotta try it myself sometime in the future.


Rev.

 

[pcmatt]

although the pineapple isn't the star of the show, https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=318340
is freakin' amazing

 

[hbrookie]

I have completely given up on fruited beers and ciders. Once the yeast gobbles up those sugars, everything tastes completely different. Even with a cold crash, I've been unable to remove enough yeast to preserve any backsweetening.

For you intrepid brewers that are still up for it though, here's a few ideas that I had and tried out with varying levels of success.

1). Oak Aged Peach Trippel - Inspired by Allagash Curieux. I added 5 lbss peaches and 2oz heavy toasted Hungarian oak to secondary with a pretty basic trippel recipe. Turned out to be a decent trippel. Peach flavor was non-existent.

2). Peach Hefe Cider - Costco applejuice for the base, add in 2 lbs brown sugar, 5lbs peaches (all in fermentor - it'll be there a while) and ferment with hefeweisen yeast. This one turned out fantastic the first time. sub-par on second attempt. This one needs to age at least 6 months after bottling. The hefe esters actually work as a "flavor extender/buffer" the same way Lecithin works in sugar-free desserts.

3). Apple Ale - 6 lbs sliced apples added to a simple 4% ale (2 row with a handful of carafoam). Apple flavor was there, but was quite bitter. Second attempt with crystal and carafoam to help sweeten it overpowered the apple flavors.

 

[hbrookie]

Sorry, I guess I hijacked you a bit. That wasn't my intention when I started typing... Back on the subject of pineapple... Citrus fruit can be difficult to work with because the citric acid naturally staves off yeast production. However, over time, enough yeast that are tolerant to the citric acid will eventually propagate. If there are any excess sugars left from the fruit, this can cause late process fermentation that can be dangerous if the beer is already in the bottle.

 

[Hujo]

Sorry, I guess I hijacked you a bit. That wasn't my intention when I started typing... Back on the subject of pineapple... Citrus fruit can be difficult to work with because the citric acid naturally staves off yeast production. However, over time, enough yeast that are tolerant to the citric acid will eventually propagate. If there are any excess sugars left from the fruit, this can cause late process fermentation that can be dangerous if the beer is already in the bottle.

Except that pineapple isn't a citrus fruit. Pineapple has citric acid, but so do all fruits. Infact, pineapple is one of the more alkaline fruits and have a higher pH than normal beer. Pineapple juice is a bit more acidic, but unless your wort is a 100% pineapple juice, you don't have to worry about it.

 

[Hujo]

Double post

 

[Hujo]

Triple post, wtf?

 

[Yesfan]

Thanks guys. I'm going to have to give both of these recipes a shot, especially the Spearhead clone.

 

[ten80]

Except that pineapple isn't a citrus fruit. Pineapple has citric acid, but so do all fruits. Infact, pineapple is one of the more alkaline fruits and have a higher pH than normal beer. Pineapple juice is a bit more acidic, but unless your wort is a 100% pineapple juice, you don't have to worry about it.

I can attest that blended pineapple ferments to completion (attains expected final gravity) when added near the end of primary fermentation. No bottle bombs. I did this in a cream ale and the result was delicious.