Mango In IPA?

I'm about to do the same thing. I'm adding 3-4 mangos to 5 gallons of beer. Mango, in my opinion, is a very subtle so I'm not even sure 3-4 are going to come through once the yeast eats the fruit sugars. I pealed my mangos, diced them, placed them in a ziplock and put them in the freezer. I've done this with pineapple and got a hint of pineapple.

There is a rather large risk of contamination with this method so be as fastidious with your cleaning and sanitation as you possibly can.

 

Can you send me some of them? I will do a side by side and let you know how you did

On the serious side, my daughter-in-law is a native of India and her father grows about 1000 hectares of mangoes. The first time she tried Heady she said, "tastes like mangoes". So the mango flavor is desirable. The question is, will adding mangoes to the beer result in the right mango flavors? I don't know. Has Cigar City done anything along these lines?

 

I haven't brewed with it yet, but I smelled a sample of the new hop variety Azacca. It was straight up mango and perhaps the best smelling hop I've encountered. I'm eager to try it in a beer.

 

When I use fruit I like to puree it to get as much flavor integrated in the beer as possible. I sanitize/sterilize anything that will come in contact with the fruit (knives, spoons (scraping out mango meat), components of my juicer and/or blender, etc.). I make sure primary fermentation is complete before transferring so there will be as little secondary fermentation as possible - cold crashing to drop the yeast out of suspension helps. I've also had great results using organic frozen fruit from the store that comes already diced into small pieces (if using mango, peach, apricot, or apple - berries are whole, though). Drop it straight into the carboy frozen then transfer the beer on top of it. Now I need to brew an IPA with mango, peaches, or apricot...or all of them. Good luck!

 

It's so much more of a pain in the ass (and wallet), but I much preferred the aroma/flavor using extremely ripe fresh mangoes vs what you get frozen in the bag.

I just looked at Beersmith recipe because I was curious how much I used (3.5lb / 5gal) and actually wrote myself a little note. "Do not use frozen mango ever again. You're welcome".

 

Stone used this in ruination 2.0, which I thought was off the charts good.

 

Tired Hands has a mango IPA, Mago Tago, that is incredible. Not sure how they use the mango, though.

 

I've got a tart beer (100% Lacto/Brett) that'll be getting apricot, and then big American dry hopping. Dry hops should be added as close to service as possible, so get the fruit fermented out before you give it that last kick. Best of luck!

 

If you blend it up be prepared to lose about a gallon of your batch. We've done this 3 times and came out with an awesome session ipa. We threw the mango at knock out though.

 

Did you use any pectinase to clear the beer? I have no issues with cloudy beer, but I've yet to get a straight answer on whether or not pectin haze has any negative effects on beer aside from appearance.

 

We had no problem with the session but we didn't use any pectinase. We did a double ipa using the same process and the beer was a bit cloudy but eventually clear after bottle conditioning. Preferred the session ipa over the double. Mango offered a clean citrus notes at the end where the double came off a little too sweet for my taste.

 

Thanks, that's reassuring. If I were to do a fruit beer, I'd want to add it on the hot side, not deal with pectin enzyme, and not have detrimental effects on the base beer. Yes, I'm a diva.

 

Since the OP is going for subtle mango, using Citra is the way to go. Simcoe has no mango.

If you use enough Citra, the mango isn't what I would call subtle. You can make a juicy mango bomb without using mango.

 

Depends on the lot. Some Simcoe is super-tropical Mango, some is much more pine/catty.

 

I've never experienced intense mango from Simcoe. For me, it's typically pine forward with a lighter blend of ambiguous fruit and citrus.

https://www.hopunion.com/simcoe-brand-ycr-14-cv/

Hop Union calls it passionfruit, pine, earth and citrus. Mango is suspiciously absent.

 

At Dixie Cup last year, Ted Hausotter from Hop Heaven gave a really interesting presentation about why some hops sometimes have split personalities. Apparently there are often sub-varieties that develop within a single market variety, in addition to the influence of local terroir.

 

Did he explain how these sub-varieties develop? Without DNA being shuffled and/or (erroneously) copied, I wonder what the mechanism could be.

 

If you can find bottled mango juice, you can add that directly to primary. Just make sure it is pasteurized. problem is most juices are a mix of mango and something else.

 

Certainly there can be differences in the same type of hops depending on the source of the rhizome, where they are grown, when they were picked, how they were stored and how old they were when they hit the kettle.

I have been using Simcoe since its inception and not once have I encountered mango. I have noticed a gradual decline in cat pee and haven't ticked the cat pee box in the last three seasons, but the pine remains strong. Now, if Simcoe tastes like mango to you, that's great. Mango is a nice flavor, but I'm pretty sure somewhere along the way we have used the same Simcoe from the same crop and our perception differs.

If you are determined to assert that Simcoe is more mango than Citra, I will have to say your palate is busted from drinking too much sour beer. One man's mango is a bearded lady's ambiguous fruit and you are welcome to quote that verbatim on your blog or in your next book without a paying royalty.