Banana flavour to my beer

[OldGazza]

I have brewed kit beer regularly mainly woodfordes wherry, and successfully,
is it possible to get a slight banana bread beer flavour by the addition of bananas to the wort in some way shape or form. Has anyone tried anything along these lines.
OldGazza

 

[BrewStew]

i know it's possible as i've drunk "banana beer" served on tap at a whetherspoons... HOW though, is beyond me :wha:

fruit wines use raw fruit, so i dont see why you cant just add banana, or how about banana essence?

 

[Vossy1]

You may be able to impart banana with a Belgium ale yeast and higher fermentation temps, though I have no experience in these practices :hmm:

 

[EskiBrew]

I've done a banana beer by adding bananas to the fermenting bin. Unfortunately the beer went bad and it could have been for any number of reasons - have not tried again yet - it smelled lovely while fermenting.

I got pointers from Ross Kenrick who has won awards with his banana beer :clap:
Basically I peeled a good handful of bananas and put them in a plastic freezer bag then put them in the freezer for a few days. Take them out and thaw them. They will have a pulpy consistancy - mush them up while in the bag by hand then pour into the FV once fermentation of the maltose has died down a bit.

I will try again some time but might boil the banana pulp first in case there are any nasties in it which might have caused my brew to spoil.

 

[A T]

I will try again some time but might boil the banana pulp first in case there are any nasties in it which might have caused my brew to spoil.

I don't know much about this but wouldn't freezing have killed anything that was there? personally i wouldn't bother freezing, just a quick boil, unless there's a reason to freeze it

 

[Vossy1]

I don't know much about this but wouldn't freezing have killed anything that was there?

Nope, unless flash frozen it takes a lot more than freezing temps to kill spores and bacteria, they may simply become dormant. Flash freezing may rupture/desiccate bacterial/spore cell walls but even that's not guaranteed

 

[highwayman]

This Banana Beer appeals to me :thumb: I am keen to mash this one

Eskimobob says

I got pointers from Ross Kenrick who has won awards with his banana beer

Just wondered what techniques Ross used different to yours EB...?

 

[percival]

crE recently started a banana wine and posted a nice thread

viewtopic.php?f=39&t=1200

i'm sure you could get some good inspiration on how to get some of that banana flavour extracted for your brew from this. a nice, rare cross-pollination of wine and beer brewing! now theres a great reason for us all being under one roof!

I drank quite a lot of blandford fly (badger brewery) last year. It was beer brewed with ginger (root, not powdered i suspect) NOT ginger beer. The zesty taste of root ginger was very much there but not overpowering, and left plenty of space for all the usual beery flavours. I've tried lots of 'way-out-there' beers and this one is the only one i would look for again and drink without hesitation if i saw it. It sounds pretty unlikely to be a genuinely nice drink (i'm a bit weird about ginger meself and can only enjoy it in a few select things - cakes/curry) but i loved it and drunk with a curry ..... just perfect!

anyway i mention that because if you wanna try banana beer then you may also want to investigate root ginger some time

 

[OldGazza]

I made a woodfordes wherry kit for this xmas, with banana addition. Turned out very nicely, i mashed up 4 pound bananas and cut up half the skins,also poured some banana essence on,put them into a muslin cloth tied in a knot and poured boiling water over, i then suspended it in the wort for the full fermentation period about six days, agitating gently each day to get the flavours out.Racked and barreled straight off.
When i brought the pressure barrel in from the garage to the kitchen for serving it did take a while to clear after venting pressure about 3 days. Banana flavour was there big style, had also taken some of the bitterness off the ale for a more rounded flavour, went down well with everyone and lasted well about 8 days. I thought it was a success.
Doing with a kit it seemed a more viable experiment as if you had all grained and mashed, spent all that time and went wrong i would have been well ****** off, but for the cost of a kit and minimal hassle well worth it.

 

[Wez]

Sounds like that worked well for you OG :thumb:

Interesting idea :hmm:

 

[J_P]

I think that the banana flavour imparted by yeast is called amyl acetate I find that WLP300 fermented low 20's C gives plenty of banana flavour to my wheat beers

 

[percival]

wiki says about amyl acetate (v short article)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amyl_acetate

Also a pretty neat summary of esters in general, including a table listing names and flavours

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ester

i don't know if these can be bought on the high street as isolated chemicals, probably mostly as blends with other stuff in there like sweeteners and colours. Identifying them from labels while in the shop can't be guaranteed either unless you have some chemistry background AND a decent memory, or do some 'research' first and take notes with you. Names like amyl acetate come from an old naming system that has been getting gradually replaced by a systematic method for around 3 decades, maybe longer. Foodstuff producers often try to disguise the identity of their ingredients (whilst staying within the law) and there are heaps of genuine labels for each ester - no matter how uncommon the usage is. However if you have an ester name then a resource like wiki is brilliant for the hobbyist or layman to find out more.

esters deliver a lot of flavour with a small quantity and the fact that yeasts have something to do with producing them has caught my attention. until i started surfing for yeast info i thought the way it happened in brewing was simply from a very slow reaction between acids and alcohols in the mix

 

[EskiBrew]

I will try again some time but might boil the banana pulp first in case there are any nasties in it which might have caused my brew to spoil.

I don't know much about this but wouldn't freezing have killed anything that was there? personally i wouldn't bother freezing, just a quick boil, unless there's a reason to freeze it

The freezing doesn't kill the bugs. The reason for freezing is that it breaks down the structure of the banana - when you thaw it out, it mushes up really easily in the bag just using your hand. It would not mush up easily if they had not been frozen - try it

I should have said before that IIRC, Ross suggested using very ripe bananas because they are sweeter. Anyway, as I said before, he's wone several awards with his banana brew :clap:

 

[highwayman]

Thank you everyone for your advice....I will definately give Banana Beer a go soon :thumb:

 

[UserDeleted]

Fruit + Beer = Wrong!!

Just say no!

 

[Jonnyv]

Fruit + Beer = Wrong!!

I have to agree But each to their own!

 

[OldGazza]

If it works and tastes good why not.
I expect someone may have said the same about hopping ales many centuries ago.
Don,y be a BOF.

 

[percival]

i was very sceptical about the blandford fly but soooo glad i didn't blinker myself into not trying it!

i agree with you OldG, if you like it then go for it

 

[UserDeleted]

I'm sorry having sampled Wells Banana Beer, I do question the mental health of anyone who thought bananas and beer was a good idea

 

[Parva]

I'm sorry having sampled Wells Banana Beer, I do question the mental health of anyone who thought bananas and beer was a good idea

I love the stuff but haven't had the courage to try and replicate it yet (and possibly lose a lot of beer). Wait until you try Fruili, now if I could replicate that I'd be in heaven! Strawberry beer! It could only be drunk in small doses (couple of pints) but it's the McDonalds equivalent of Diet Pepsi and their thick shake. Awesome stuff and something I aspire to brew one day.