Smoked Pineapple Gose

My recipe is a bit of a play on a traditional gose, resulting in more of a Contemporary Gose. To me, Gose is a very summery style of beer. Something that has always had a special place for me is when my uncle would grill pineapple at family gatherings. That was my inspiration for this beer.

I started out by determining my fermentation process and decided to go with a normal primary fermentation with a clean(ish) finishing german ale yeast. The Gose would then be soured during secondary fermentation/conditioning using White Labs Brett. Bruxellensis. This brett strain should give off mango and pineapple like aromas to complement and intensify the pineapple flavor. Adding the pineapple will create additional secondary fermentation driven by the brett culture.

My malt bill is what you would expect from a gose beer with a few extra additions. I started with german wheat malt and pilsner malt. After Identifying the unique twist I wanted to have on this beer, smoke, I added in a pound of smoked wheat malt at about 10% of the grain bill. Instead of adding any lactic acid to the mash to adjust pH level, I also have a 4 ounces of acidulated malt to the bill. Lastly, 0.5lb of rice hulls were included to prevent sticking of mash due to high wheat usage.

On the spice/salt side of things for this gose, there will be a 10 minute boil addition of fresh ground corriander seed and smoked sea salt. The smoked salt will play along with the smoked malt to give a very light smokey quality to pair with the pineapple. My hop selection is another complementary choice to the pineapple. Azacca hop addition during whirlpool will keep the IBU low to prevent any effect during souring.

I have chosen to extend the boil by an extra 30 minutes. My goal here is to create more maillard reactions and notes of carmelization like on a grilled pineapple ring. To counter the boil off volume loss, I increased the sparge water volumes.

In total, I expect a normal primary fermentation time with a 3-4 month secondary fermentation time.