Thought I’d share this with you guys. I took my standard Kölsch recipe, and puréed an entire honey dew melon in a Food processor. Added it to carboy along with an oz of Huell Melon hops and aged/fermented it for about a month. Really nice, subtle melon character that I found extremely summery and drinkable.
That sounds like a good summer beer. Great idea.
I like that idea too. One melon for 5 gallons? You didn’t say when it went to a carboy, I assume after primary was about finished…
Yeah! That does sound really good. Interesting twist on a fruit beer. Thanks for sharing. How was it separating the beer from the fruit for packaging?
Yes, one melon was enough for me and had plenty character. And it purees down to a surprisingly small quantity. I added melon and hops to secondary and racked finished beer on top.
i will say that I also aged a Kölsch on quartered tangerines side by side as well and that was a bigger hit than the melon but I thought the melon was more interesting.
Wasn’t a problem at all. I racked from carboy to corny then let corny sit cold for a few days then racked from corny to sanky.
Did your melon selection come into play? Ie - did you choose a melon that was a bit riper than others for this?
This is an interesting question. I think the riper melons may have more sugar and less melon character so I chose a fresh melon that was not overly ripe.
I would like to do this with a nice freshly picked heirloom melon in the summer.
Pete, which melons have you had good results with up your way? The only melons I’ve had even modest luck with were Sugar Baby watermelons (the small, bowling-ball sized ones) and Queen Anne melons (small canteloupes the size of a grapefruit). Any larger melons don’t have enough time to ripen before the cool weather hits. Even the small ones don’t seem to have much flavor unless there’s a string of a few 90+ degree days as the fruits are setting.
I just planted some Hearts O Gold cantaloupe that I plan to use in a wheat beer later in the year.
Eric, I don’t grow melons because of the room it takes and the crap shoot of whether or not they will do well. The nice ones that I have had were grown in the Pioneer Valley (Hadley/Amherst), which has crazy good soil and a great microclimate: even though they are just 20 or so miles southeast of me they start and end their season a week or two before and after and when it’s hot it really gets hot. I seem to remember buying them a couple times at the Garlic and Arts Festival in September. They are small but tasty.
My experience with fruit like peaches and melon in beer is that the suermarket varieties grown for shelf stability just don’t cut it.