I want to brew something with dates and maybe some figs too, (english. Barleywine?). I'm looking for any suggestions on how to go about this. I'm thinking blend in food processor, freeze, and add to secondary... Thoughts?
Did a super high abv Barleywine about a year back with dried figs. I sautéed them for quite some time (.5 hr ?) to both sanitize somewhat and also caramelize some sugars. Based off of what the kitchen staff at Block 15 said they do for their Figgy Pudding strong ale. Used a bit much Special B (6%)to help bring out the fruit. really good right now, but a bit sweet tasting even with a 1.020FG and 15%abv. Oh, and used just over a pound of figs per gallon. I like it, but would back the Special B down to 3% and utilize some medium-medium dark crystal to bring the total up to 5-ish. strongly recommend Maris or a more characterful base. Pureeing the fruit is probably not a bad idea either. Maybe before sautéing. Good luck!
A food processor would do the job but might be hard to strain out the fine chunks later on. When I put cherries into a batch of hard cider I made I removed the pits, crushed them with a potato masher then tossed them in a frying pan to sanitize until the juice started to bubble a little. It worked quite well.
Be careful boiling any fruit juices before adding to beer. It can cause the final product to become very cloudy and it will never clear. I'm not sure if this is all fruit.
I made a Belgian Dubbel with raisins (won best-in-show I might add) wherein I took a couple of cups of wort from the boil, added the wort to raisins in a blender, pureed it, and added it back to the boil with just a few minutes left.
