Beer Update: Coffee Vanilla Porter and Blueberry Ale

I spent a good hour or so yesterday transferring two batches of beer from their primary fermenters to secondary fermenters (this two-stage fermentation allows the beer to clear a bit before bottling/kegging). My initial fermenters are plastic buckets, and the sendary ones are big 5-gallon glass bottles called carboys.

One is a blueberry ale that I'm making with a friend of mine... the base beer, a cream ale, turned out really nice. I'm a little worried how it'll taste after the addition of two cans of blueberry puree -- the smell isn't phenomenal and the color is nothing short of weird. I don't think we're going to get what we wanted from it... but if it's drinkable, I'll be happy. We wanted an intensely blueberry-flavored beer, so our general attitude was "no guts, no glory". If anything, we'll just age the hell out of it until the fruit mellows.

The second beer is a porter (a dark, toasty beer), to which I added freshly brewed coffee and homemade vanilla extract at the time of racking to the secondary. I have to say I am really excited about this beer. The vanilla seems to have gotten lost in such a deep beer (bummer), but the coffee aroma comes through beautifully. Hopefully it still will when I keg it in two weeks. Maybe the vanilla will still show up in the flavor profile. I could always add more, but I really don't want to overdo it. I thought about throwing a few split vanilla beans into the secondary but I don't wanna fish those babies out, seeing as the carboy has a very narrow neck. I imagine it akin to trying to get my pick out of my guitar when it happens to fall through the hole. :)

So, stay tuned. When the beers are done, I'll post some pics and a review of how they taste.