Blue beer: lets beat this dead horse

[Apimyces]

Looks nice. How did it taste, though?

Also, to the suggestion of using other dyes, that's no fun.

This is what I had gotten with 3lb of pilsen LME in a 5 gallon batch, and 50g of BFPB. Far from blue, but still nice.

 

[NinjaBear]

I tried adding sodium bicarbonate to a small sample of this... after dumping a lot more sodium bicarbonate than there was liquid originally, I still only got green. Obviously, it tasted gross. Still, my wife likes the color of my Clitori'ale, so even if it's not blue, it's not an utter failure.

Actually if you’re green, you went too far with too much sodium bicarbonate.

Even in mine I think I went to far because it seems to have obliterated any malt and hop flavors.

 

[Apimyces]

Actually if you’re green, you went too far with too much sodium bicarbonate.

Even in mine I think I went to far because it seems to have obliterated any malt and hop flavors.

Well, yea, but before going to green, it never passed by blue. The must was not very light-colored, so any blue from the clitoria gets mixed with the red from the malt. I'd have to try again with an american light lager malt bill to hope getting something closer to blue. pH was certainly a factor, but not the only one.

 

[AkTom]

This horse has more lives than several cats

 

[NinjaBear]

Well, yea, but before going to green, it never passed by blue. The must was not very light-colored, so any blue from the clitoria gets mixed with the red from the malt. I'd have to try again with an american light lager malt bill to hope getting something closer to blue. pH was certainly a factor, but not the only one.

The red isn’t from the malt. It’s the pH sensitivity of the color. You went from not enough… not enough… too much!

And depending on the volume you were working with, it’s very easy to do if the volume is small.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

Ah, good old Clitoria. You want to be careful with that, as I suspect it acts like litmus and will go pink in something as acid as beer. Certainly I assume that's what's happening with Sharish "magic gin", which is blue-ish but turns pink when you add tonic and lemon, and contains Clitoria.

Here's some spectrographs of Sharish gin with and without (acidic) tonic water :
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/gary...its-gin-ph-activity-6592980389705375744-I2LW/

(may be easier to see the image file directly)

 

[Northern_Brewer]

Nice pictures of the pH response of Clitoria in beer :
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/blue-beer-with-butterfly-pea-flowers.674117/

 

[day_trippr]

Let the beating continue!

https://www.reuters.com/business/en...-brewers-use-algae-make-blue-beer-2022-02-03/
The Onion's take: French Brewer Using Algae To Make Blue Beer

Cheers! (Blue vomit indeed! )

 

[MaxStout]

We want the blue food!