Hey fellow brewers, so I purchased this kit and I am ready to brew this Saturday, weather permitting. The instructions state to add the apricot at days 2 or 3. I saw other posts regarding when to add the apricot. Few questions:
Can I add the apricot once I rack to the secondary 2 weeks from brew day?
Not sure what the consistency of the apricot will be, first time brewing this type of beer, what is the easiest way to get the apricot into a glass carboy?
[quote=“hank1105”]
I have a friend that makes this kit every six months, Very Good to drink kit.
Can I add the apricot once I rack to the secondary 2 weeks from brew day?
This is our SOP gives a milder flavor with lots of aroma.
Not sure what the consistency of the apricot will be, first time brewing this type of beer, what is the easiest way to get the apricot into a glass carboy?
the apricot is like a pie filling lots of solid chunks. We use a canning funnel to pour the can in to the carboy.
I brewed this last year for my bother in law, and he loved it so much he ordered up 2 batches this summer. One of which I just made about 3 weeks ago.
I followed the instructions and added the large can after 3 days in the primary. That batch (which is in a secondary 5 gal better bottle now, moved it after about 16 days in primary) went into a 7.9 gallon bucket versus a carboy, so was a bit easier to pour from the can to the bucket. I thought it was more like a thick liquid, i don’t remember a lot of chunks etc but I might not of watched that closely since it was not going through a funnel
I don’t know how different it would be adding to primary (as I did) versus racking on top of secondary (as the other response did).
I will be brewing batch #2 of this in about 2 weeks.
Good stuff, thanks guys. I am going with adding the apricot when I rack to secondary, timing wise it just works out better for me. Figure this is going to be a good summer beer.
Like I said, I have a second batch of this to brew in a few weeks. so now I am curious, and maybe have the same question. would folks recommend the primary like I did the 1st time or racking to a secondary? would the secondary option retain more of the flavor? start the yeast fermenting again?
[quote=“kitzy09”]when adding the Apricot puree at day 2 or 3 - are you supposed to stir it in or just dump it in?
additionally, does it matter if you add it at day 2 -vs day 3?[/quote]
I just slowly poured it in. It was into a better bottle so I did not have a good way to stir it. not sure if that matters or not.
The apricot fruit has sugar in it. So it will restart fermentaion. Unless you sulfate and kill the yeast.
Add it at the end of primary fermentation. Or when you transfer to secondary. Only difference is if you want to reuse the yeast. Then do it in a secondary.
I simply sanitized my secondary, added the apricot to the base, than racked from primary to secondary. Going to keg this week, the kit also contains 4 ounces of apricot syrup or something along those lines.
Good question, I let the beer ferment for 2 weeks in the primary, than racked to secondary with the apricot as a base. I never had that much active fermentation, glad I had a blow off tube. Hell the wort was still fermenting on day 11, although I did use a starter. Plan on racking to keg this Sunday so it is ready for Father’s day.
i added it last evening. At that point there was still some active fermentation - with about an inch of krausen on the surface. i dumped it in, gave 2 light stirs & closed it up. ended up with a slight blow out this morning (nothing major). i cleaned it up, re-sanitized the airlock and we are good to go. still an active fermentation.
ya slightly different then how I have done it twice so far. each time I have just dumped into primary after about 2 days. I might try your way for this upcoming batch.
I did not use a starter either time because I did not know much about starters. since then I have built my own stir plate, bought a flask, and think I will do a starter this time. most likely doing starter tonight or early tomorrow and this batch this coming weekend