Do I need to filter my fruit beer?

[MotterFocker]

Hi all,

I brewed a wheat beer and added 4lbs of raspberries and 10 jalapeno's in the secondary per 5 gallons (recipe from BYO). I left it in the secondary for 7 days and the fruit/peppers where mostly white so I kegged it tonight. I used a sanitized strainer to lift most of the junk out, but obviously a small amount of pepper seeds and raspberry bits made it into the keg. Will it be ok to just leave as is, or do I need to filter it to another vessel. Just not sure how crazy people will be to get a "floater" in their beer. It's my first time using fruits or vegetables so not sure if it will ruin the finished beer if it sits for a prolonged period of time.

Cheers,

Dave

[MJB]

This question is way beyond me, but I just listened to an old session that had the brewer from Abita. That guy had a raspberry beer and he mentioned not filtering because he didn't want to loose flavor. At the same time, I think your concern about floaters makes sense. I wonder if some finings and a couple days at a cold temp would take care of it.

[BDawg]

The worry is if the seeds/etc get stuck in your keg fittings.
I've had hops plug up the keg posts (typically they get caught in the poppet valves).
Will it happen? Not sure.
Keep your eye on it. If the keg stops pouring even though there's still beer inside, that's why.
You'll need to disassemble the posts and clean out anything that gets stuck in there.
And make sure you completely take everything apart after you empty the keg so that no residuals are left stuck inside where you can't see them. That is a sure cause of infection.

HTH-

[hop loader]

I have made a few chili and raspberry beers. and what I do is rack off using a racking cane but I cover the end of the racking cane with a hop sock. this seems to get rid of all the seeds and flesh but not affect the flavor of the beer.

[MotterFocker]

Thanks for the suggestions. Wish I'd have thought about putting mesh on the racking cane. Guess I'll know for next time.

[brewinhard]

I would think a good cold crash should settle out the fruit and pepper seeds to the bottom which would then allow you to rack clear beer from above. Just be sure not to let the racking cane touch the trub layer or let it come to close so you don't suck anything up.

[hop loader]

It depends on how you have added the fruit, if he is using whole raspberries which have broken down in the secondary then I have found that you get a lot of floaters even after cold crashing. but if its crushed fruit then these tend to sink OK. but because I'm pretty lazy I just use whole berries and the racking cane/hop sock which yields great results.

[MotterFocker]

I used fresh fruit and hit them with a whisk to break them up a bit, they were in quite a few pcs when i racked to the keg. I was able to get alot of it with the strainer on top. I left probably a gallon in the fermenter to try and minimize what I transferred. My main concern is if I should be worried about letting some particles sit in there and decomposing. I did a split batch (cal ale and american hefe yeast), so I have 10 gallons of this and it will likely be around for a few months.