Advice for a fruited beer

anteup02 · 01-22-2010, 01:45 AM

My girlfriend has asked me to make a strawberry beer for her. I think it is only fair since she helps me when i need help (holding the strainer, pouring in extract while i stir, etc....)

I thought i could just do this with a wheat beer. My plan was to just take a recipe for a wheat bear and then do a secondary and add strawberries. I had a couple of questions....

1 - How many strawberries would I want to put in a 5 gallon batch?

2 - I am worried if i add strawberries at this stage I may risk infecting the beer as the strawberries may not be completely clean even if i rinse them. Is there a good way around this?

I am not set on adding strawberries in the secondary, if you feel it is better to add them during the boil please let me know, any information is appreciated, I will probably make a few smaller batches of this stuff to experiment, but wanted to get some input here first!

Fat Guy Brewing · 01-22-2010, 01:59 AM

You can look up some of the fruit beer recipes here and find some instructions. Add the fruit to the secondary. I see most people adding about 3-4 pounds of fruit. You can try to pastuerize the strawberries by heating them to about 160*. I did that with raspberries and added some water so they wouldn't get scorched. Then I ended up overflowing the carboy because it was too much. My advice, pick the lesser of 3 evils in your own mind: 1. don't pasteurize and risk infection; 2. pasteurize and risk scorching; 3. pasteurize with water and risk overflowing.

PT Ray · 01-22-2010, 02:17 AM

I used them once, years ago. They were a little difficult to deal with and have read some comments from others that had the same experience. I don't how much or at what point they were added just that I made a mess out of the thing.

I've experimented with fruit and fruit flavored extract, I would have to go back with the extract. It is much easier and gives more intense flavor.

iron_city_ap · 01-22-2010, 02:42 AM

I just brewed a wheat yesterday and was thinking about the doing the same thing. What I was planning on doing was after racking to the secondary, transfering about 12 beers back to the cleaned primary and adding either an ounce or half an ounce of Banana extract to the smaller batch. This way, if it turns out bad I'm not out an entire batch. If it works, then I'll make a full batch of it.

JamesM · 01-22-2010, 02:47 AM

I've had bad luck with extracts, I just don't like the flavor. I made a raspberry wheat a while back, it was a 2.5 gallon batch and I used 16oz of frozen raspberries dumped right into the primary. I was probably risking infection but it came out fine. The raspberry flavor is definitely there but not overpowering. I learned a lot from the

http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f75/requiem-raspberry-56285/

page.

good luck!!

iron_city_ap · 01-22-2010, 02:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fat Guy Brewing

You can try to pastuerize the strawberries by heating them to about 160*.

The thought just occurred to me, couldn't you pastuerize by just heating them in the microwave? Use short intervals to moniter the temperature. Nothing gets scorched, no extra water added....

ReverseApacheMaster · 01-22-2010, 03:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by iron_city_ap

The thought just occurred to me, couldn't you pastuerize by just heating them in the microwave? Use short intervals to moniter the temperature. Nothing gets scorched, no extra water added....

That was my thought. Also, it would seem to me you could freeze the strawberries, killing anything on them and drop the frozen strawberries into the wort, letting them thaw directly in the wort and avoiding any contamination issues. Of course, it will add more time waiting for them to thaw...

**jiggs_casey** · 01-22-2010, 03:03 AM

I made a raspberry wheat a few years ago and just added a can, big can of raspberry puree to the last 10 minutes or so of the boil. It was part of a kit and I don't remember the size of the can, (maybe 32oz's?) but, I'm thinking that the same thing should work for strawberries.

It might be worthwhile to look into a strawberry puree recipe. I would imagine all you would need is a blender and a lot of strawberries...

suckr · 01-22-2010, 03:48 AM

Same as above for me. If all goes as expected with my hydro reading, I'll be botteling mine Sunday. For a 5 gal. batch of wheat bear I added one of the large cans of Oregon fruit puree (Razz) directly to the primary (no boiling). I'm pretty new myself so I'm not saying that's the 'right' way to do it. My LHBS owner does this as well.

anteup02 · 01-22-2010, 12:46 PM

thanks for all the advice - i think i am going to probably instead of making a 5 gallon batch just make 4 smaller batches, that way I can experiment with a few of the techniques you all have mentioned above. maybe then i ll be able to recommend one way over the other!