[courtneyt]

I am preparing to brew the Chocolate Cherry Stout recipe that was one of the commemorative beers brewed for the NHC in San Diego.  The recipe calls for five pounds of dark cherries in the secondary but offers no other details. I have never used fruit in a recipe so I have a few questions:

1)  I've found a variety of cherries on the net: Bing, Sweet, Tart.  Which of these would be equivalent to the "Dark" variety called for?

2)  I'm found canned varieties packed in sweetened whole syrup or in water.  I know the water packed would be preferable but it seems the syrup packed are much cheaper.  The question is could I get the syrup packed cans and just rinse them off or would the syrup alter the desirable cherry-ness too much?

3)  Does it matter whether they're fresh, frozen or canned?  Which would be preferred?

4)  Do the whole cherries need to be processed in any way prior to adding to fermenter?

Any other friendly advice would be greatly appreciated as well.

Thanks in advance for the help.

Cheers,
Courtney

[morticaixavier]

Frozen is probably easiest, even if you get fresh you should freeze them to break up cell walls.

Canned might be okay but I would for sure use the water ones in that case and add the water as it will take on cherry flavor.

A good 100% cherry puree is another option. as is a 100% cherry juice. Either of these might be more/less expensive than fresh/frozen.

[thatgeekguy]

Google 'Vintner's Harvest Chery Puree', pre-sterilized and ready to go into primary or secondary.

[hubie]

Very timely post!  I told my neighbor I was going to brew a chocolate cherry stout.  I've never brewed one so I didn't have a go-to recipe.  3 lbs Crystal 40 and 2 lbs chocolate malt!  I'm looking forward to brewing this.  Unless I can find some decent frozen at the Megamart, I'll probably go with two cans of the Oregon puree (assuming it is in stock at the LHBS).  That would give 6-1/8 lbs vs the 5 lbs in the recipe.  That's 20% more than the recipe, but given how subtle cherry flavor can be, I presume that won't be a problem, though I should probably taste it every day to make sure.  I've never used the Oregon puree.  Anybody have any issues with it?  With the much larger cherry surface area with the puree, would two cans be too much and I should just use one (3 lbs vs 5 lbs in the recipe)? 

[HoosierBrew]

The Oregon purees are very high quality.  I use them as opposed to fresh fruit. But cherry flavor is not subtle in beer, as opposed to something like peach or apricot.  Like raspberry, it's pretty assertive.  I would go with one can this time if the recipe called for 5 lbs of cherries. Puree is obviously concentrated - no pits, skins, etc.  You can adjust up or down on the next batch.

[courtneyt]

FWIW, the recipe I'm using is the one posted at the end of the Some Like it Hoppy article posted on the Online Extras of the Zymurgy page on the AHA site.  I'm not typically a fruit beer guy but this one really appealed to me as a good winter beer...

http://www.homebrewersassociation.org/pages/zymurgy/online-extras/some-like-it-hoppy

Very timely post!  I told my neighbor I was going to brew a chocolate cherry stout.  I've never brewed one so I didn't have a go-to recipe.  3 lbs Crystal 40 and 2 lbs chocolate malt!