Brooks on Beer: 5 ways to mix fruit and beer, from lambics to radlers

Fruit and fruit juices are among the most refreshing and delicious things to enjoy in hot weather. So it’s probably no surprise that the new wave of Hazy IPAs are so popular. They’re occasionally called juicy IPAs, after all, and their flavors often remind us of orange or grapefruit juice. Hazy IPAs are relative newcomers to the brewing scene, but brewers have been using fruit to make beer for millennia.

One of the earliest known beverages made with fruit was found in Northern China and dated from 9,000 years ago: Pottery jars found in the Neolithic village of Jiahu in Henan province contained the residue of a mixed fermentation drink made with rice, honey and fruit.

Molecular archaeologist Patrick McGovern, from the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, asked Dogfish Head Craft Brewery to re-create the drink. The result was Chateau Jiahu, brewed with orange blossom honey, muscat grape juice, barley malt and hawthorn fruit and then fermented on sake yeast. Although it’s no longer in production, you can still find bottles of it in stores, if you don your Indiana Jones fedora. But many other, more recent fruit beers are easy to find.

Lambics

Lambic brews originated around the 13th century in what today is Belgium, in the area around Brussels known as the Pajottenland. One type, gueuze, is made by blending a year-old lambic with a two- to three-year old versio, then bottling the mixture so it ferments a second time. But there’s also Kriek and Framboise, which are two of the most common lambics. Kriek is fermented the second time with cherries, traditionally sour Morello cherries, and Framboise with raspberries. The beers are still sour, but the intense fruit flavor balances that somewhat, and some modern producers add additional sugars to sweeten them further.

Authentic lambic can only be produced in Belgium, but brewers throughout the world make lambic-style beers.

Gose

Another beer to try is gose, which originated in the small German town of Goslar, then rose to fame in Leipzig. What makes this sour wheat beer unique is its high carbonation and the addition of salt to the taste profile. The style almost died out, but has enjoyed a recent resurgence thanks to modern versions that include fruit.

Boonville’s Anderson Valley Brewing, for example, has an entire line of them, including a traditional take — The Kimmie, the Yink and the Holy Gose — and several fruited varieties such as blood orange, briny melon, cherry and framboise rose. And Southern California’s Lost Abbey has a line of Tiny Bubbles that includes brews with orange and guava, raspberries, and salt and lime.

Berliner Weisse

Dubbed the Champagne of the North, Berliner Weisse was born in Berlin, as its name suggests. This low-alcohol, lightly sour wheat beer was traditionally served with a sweet syrup, usually raspberry or woodruff flavor. You don’t see it as often in Berlin these days, but the beer has spread everywhere else, though modern versions ditch the syrup and instead add fruit before bottling or canning. Fort Bragg’s North Coast Brewing makes one with peaches and another with tart cherries.

Radlers

Radlers emerged a century ago in Bavaria, when innkeeper Franz Kugler created a refreshing drink he dubbed the Radlermass or “cyclist liter.” Fascinated by the growing popularity of the sport of cycling, Kugler had created a biking trail that led from Munich directly to — wait for it — his inn. But one busy day, he was so inundated with customers, he feared he would run out of beer, so he mixed it with lemon soda, and the Radler was born.

Today, many German and American breweries offer radlers — no mixing required — and it’s still a very refreshing drink. You may spot it in other flavors, too, such as grapefruit or raspberry.

Other fruit beers

Of course, any beer can have fruit (or anything else for that matter) added to it to enhance flavor. In those heady early days of craft beer, many brewers added fruit to amber ales to produce blueberry ale or raspberry ale, etc. Happily, that practice has grown more intentional and sophisticated with time.

The key to a great fruit beer is simple: It should harmoniously mix the beer and fruit, so you don’t lose the  beerishness, but it still allows the fruit flavors to shine through. There are so many great, local fruit beers waiting to be discovered. Start with San Leandro’s 21st Amendment and its Hell or High Watermelon. Try Alameda’s Almanac Beer Co. and its Fruit Punch Sournova. Check out Windsor’s Barrel Brothers and its barrel-aged blonde sour ale, The Snozberries Taste Like Snozberries. Pick a fruit you love and start tasting.

Contact Jay R. Brooks at BrooksOnBeer@gmail.com.