Making your Beer Red.....

[Crusader-Rob]

Hi all,

Its a relatively simple/quick question. I have a Pale Sour beer coming out of the barrel in a week or so, and had planned on adding some berries for further ageing. (most likely Blueberries) however, I've found with other pale beers with fruits, that while they take on some colour, they never really end up a beautiful red/pruple colour.

and wondered about adding some hibiscus to make it look a little more vibrant?

Thouights?

Oh and where would I find hibiscus?

[Sam DT]

Hey bro - blueberries do go nice and red in a sour - I've used them at a rate of 125g/l - I think I've got some kicking around at home - the flavour was a bit off but the colour should be there still if you want to take a look. Might also have a cheery one somewhere too. - I've never used them but raspberries are supposed to go well too.

If you wanted to go the grain route you could try making up an infusion of chocolate malt and adding it - I've been using 50g late in the mash of glad-fields light choc to make my amber nice and amber - not quite true red tho.

[Crusader-Rob]

cheers Sam,

Yeah I've used blueberries once before, and the colour looked good. I was thinking about ways to make it look really quite vibrant, i'll start with the berries and if i think it needs something I can go from there.

I'm heading nearer towards 20-250g/l on this one anyway, so it should be fine. (blueberry can be pretty subtle at times)

[Sam DT]

Yeah that should be heaps,

I think avoiding oxidation would be key to avoiding browning but not usually an issue if you're throwing them in for re-fermentation.

I suppose the other thing is clarity, I used gelatin on my cherry berliner at christmas and the colour was great that said most of my sours seem to drop really clear even when they're 40% wheat - maybe something to do with the acidity?

[Cain Harland]

Garage project did a pink beer with Hibiscus a while back it wasn't bad. My partner makes hibiscus drinks sometimes with dried flowers that I think she gets from an organic food shop. I think it would be a good choice for adding some natural color to beer, subtle flavor and a lot of color.