Blueberry Beer Hops

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CliffMongoloid

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I want to make a basic blueberry beer but dont know what hops to use

Heres my recipe (critique if you like)

5 Pounds Light Dry Malt Extract
2 Pounds Vienna Malt
4 OZ Caramel/Crystal Malt

Us 05

5 lbs blueberry puree in secondary

Thanks for the help
 
I used Saaz in a berry beer I made for my wife. The hops stay out of the way and let the berries dominate, which is what she wanted.

On a totally different tack, I've been thinking that Sorachi Ace would make for an interesting combination with blueberries.
 
^ I agree with this. My best fruit beers have been with Saaz. My attempts to mix a fruitier hop with actual fruit has created a sort of clashing flavor. I'm not the best recipe formulator so I'm sure it could be done much better but I like a bittering charge and a 15 minute Saaz addition so far.
 
I used half an ounce at 60 minutes and the other half at 15 minutes, resulting in a whopping 11 IBUs. It was in a 1.048 OG wheat beer with 1.5 pounds of mixed raspberries, blackberries, and blueberries. The berries are definitely dominant.
 
I brewed a blueberry beer in April. Used sorachi ace as a FWH, and 15, 5, 0.

It lends an awesome lemony character to both aroma and flavor. And not to heavy on the ibus

Won a local competition
 
motley, did you ever experience a buttery/ lemon cream flavor from the Sorachi? I did a wheat beer with about 5% honey malt and about the same hop schedule as yours and it tasted like diacetyl. But I've almost 100% ruled that out and see a few references online to a creamy/buttery flavor. I liked the lemon but on the whole it was unpleasant. I'd love to know how to prevent that because otherwise I'm just too scared to try it again.
 
SenorPepe said:
motley, did you ever experience a buttery/ lemon cream flavor from the Sorachi? I did a wheat beer with about 5% honey malt and about the same hop schedule as yours and it tasted like diacetyl. But I've almost 100% ruled that out and see a few references online to a creamy/buttery flavor. I liked the lemon but on the whole it was unpleasant. I'd love to know how to prevent that because otherwise I'm just too scared to try it again.

I didn't experience any buttery flavors. Not sure what would have caused that. I haven't heard of that happening with sorachi. Sorry I can't help
 
I made a blueberry beer a few months ago. I used 1.5 oz hallertau at 60, 0.5 at 30 and 0.5 at 5, and fermented along with notty at 60f. It turned out pretty darn good. It had a floral aroma, but you could smell some blueberry. It tasted the same way (complex and floral) with the blueberry coming through nicely but not too much where it's all you can taste. I used blueberry extract.

BTW my recipe although all grain looks almost exactly like yours. The only difference I made is to add 1/2 # honey malt for a slightly sweeter flavor.

Next time I plan using the same recipe with kolsch yeast.
 
Kolsch yeast would be great!
I like to use a small amount of a light hop. Saaz or tettnang. I wanted to make a strawberry wheat with sorachi, maybe a little honey malt, and kolsch yeast. No sorachi anywhere :(

Also I think my standard fruit base blonde ale calls for 0.5oz tettnang for 60min and that's it.
 
Thank you for all the help! Im brewing this on friday maybe ill take some pics..... im also picking the blueberries from my GFs fathers patch.... what is your reccomendation on how to put the blueberries in the secondary? throw them in and rack on top? smash them and rack on top? heat them up and puree them? thanks in advance
 
Wild fruit seems to have a tendency to spoil the beer easier if you don't sanitize it. If you pasteurize the fruit, make sure you stay In proper temps (IIRC, 150-170) and use pectin (search how to use it, I've only had a bad experience with NOT using pectin and ending up with a lot of haze, and have heard lots of praise for pasteurization and pectin. I tend to freeze store-bought fruit, throw it in the secondary, and rack right on top. However, I have had bad experiences with wild picked fruit. Even on a fully fermented 6.5%abv beer, the beer formed a moldy-ness on top. I was able to rack into priming and leave the funk behind once, and one other time it didnt save the beer from being nasty. I am going to be adding fruit to secondary soon, wild mulberries that I froze. I think im going to give them a soak in sanitizer, then rinse with sterile water, then throw em in.

With blueberries, I would do the above with the whole fruit, don't puree or cut them.

Good luck!
 
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