Fruit Beer Lovers AND Brewers of, HELP!

Hiya!

I'm going to brew a fruit beer soon, and I'm torn on a couple of things.

1) I'm thinking about using Ed's Hefe as a starting point, but with a couple of changes to fit my fruit beer needs. Here are the changes:

7# White Wheat
4# 2 Row
.5# Rice Hulls (if needed to prevent stuck mash)
Mash for 90 minutes at 153 degrees.

Only a bittering addition of Willamette to achieve around 15 Ibu's.

2) I'm thinking about using either blackberries or raspberries, but I don't know how much should I use? Should I add at flameout? Should I add in secondary? If so, how much!?

I'm thinking from all I've read, I will add in secondary b/c that's the best way to achieve the most fruit character. For a recipe such as that, I'm thinking that I should add around 3 lbs to secondary.

Does that sound right?

Thanks a lot,
J

That's a lot of wheat malt. I bet you will have some serious sparging problems with that amount.

As for the fruit, go with the secondary and add about 10# for about a 5% batch.

As for your recipe, I would go about 60% 2 row and no more than 40% wheat. I've had a stuck mash from wheat malt and it isn't fun.

I just brewed a watermelon wheat, I started with a basicamerican wheat recipe of 50/50 2-row and wheat, and added 2 quarts of fresh pressed watermelon juice to the secondary fermenter, it came out quite nice as far as the hydro sample tasted as I was racking into a keg.
Is that based on Ed's bavarian hefe? if so I love that beer, simple and quick, I think as long as you use plenty of rice hulls you will be fine. I have never had a problem with wheat when using enough hulls.

avidhomebrewer said:

That's a lot of wheat malt. I bet you will have some serious sparging problems with that amount.

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How much?

Brewed Ed's wheat 6 times now with ZERO rice hulls and have never had a stuck/slow sparge. Same goes for 6# white wheat/4# german pilsner of my standard hefe and 8# red wheat/3# mixed specialty grain/german pilsner for my dunkel. It all depends on the equipment, I'm batch sparging in a 48 qt. cooler with a stainless braid.

azscoob said:

I just brewed a watermelon wheat, I started with a basicamerican wheat recipe of 50/50 2-row and wheat, and added 2 quarts of fresh pressed watermelon juice to the secondary fermenter, it came out quite nice as far as the hydro sample tasted as I was racking into a keg.
Is that based on Ed's bavarian hefe? if so I love that beer, simple and quick, I think as long as you use plenty of rice hulls you will be fine. I have never had a problem with wheat when using enough hulls.

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Yep, that's Ed's recipe (changed a bit) . I think I put that in the OP (gotta pay credit where credit be do!). I've never made it, but I assume it's a great recipe considering it's got about 30 pages of people telling him how great it is. So do you think that would be a good base recipe for a fruit beer, or should I start with a 50/50 wheat/2 row mix with the same gravity/Ibus?

So, how much berries do you think I should use (will either use blackberries or raspberries).

Also, should do you think I should use a neutral ale yeast or a basic wheat yeast? I have some washed Danstar Munich left over from my last batch of American wheat (actually a pretty nice dry yeast for an American wheat style brew).

Oh yeah, I'm not too concerned with a stuck sparge...I've got skills!

Oh yeah Coob, I almost forgot to talk about the pipes!

I've never smoked on a pipe like that before, but I do love myself some good stogies after a long week as well. Do you smoke cigars?

I am in the process of coming up with a recipe for a blueberry ale, not sure if I want to make it a wheat or a blonde or other light ale. I might use the base beer I came up with for a ginger ale (recipe posted here) obviously without the ginger and using different hops. I am going to be using fresh blueberries that I just put in the freezer tonight, and will probably be using all 4.5 lbs of them.

yes I also enjoy a cigar every now and again!
As for the fruit quantity, do you want it to be the focus or a subtle hint that makes you think, hey is that raspberry?
I would just stick with your inital recipe, Its a good'n!
My watermelon wheat was based on the American Wheat recipe from the Big Brew this year, and I also used the Danstar Munich yeast just to give it a try.

azscoob said:

I am in the process of coming up with a recipe for a blueberry ale, not sure if I want to make it a wheat or a blonde or other light ale. I might use the base beer I came up with for a ginger ale (recipe posted here) obviously without the ginger and using different hops. I am going to be using fresh blueberries that I just put in the freezer tonight, and will probably be using all 4.5 lbs of them.

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Hmm, so 4.5 lbs of berries. I'm liking the honey malt in that recipe to up the sweetness a bit. I've read a bunch of stuff about people saying that fruit beers being too dry can be a problem.

I'm thinking about just washing my fruit fairly good and just dumping into the secondary. I've only had contamination in the primary and have found that if you can get past that stage, you're typically going to be alright with a >=5% beer or so.

Have you every made a plane ol wheat like I'm making or similar and added some fruit to it?

Hmm, well I don't really know how much of a hit of fruit I want!

I've never made a fruit beer, so I don't know what exactly I want. The only fruit beer I've had was SA cherry wheat, and although I liked it, I know I can make a better beer than that, sorry Jim CocaCola. I actually enjoyed the cherry in that, but I know that had some extract in it which tasted synthetic to me.

Thats how the watermelon one started out, I was going to keg it but saw a watermelon on the counter, so I chopped it up and took the potato masher to it, ran the juice through a mesh bag and racked the beer on top of it! later my wife asked where the watermelon she bought for the weekend went.
I like a fruit forward beer, I tend to go heavy so the flavor comes through loud and clear. this usually equates to about 1 pound of fruit per gallon.
The reason I freeze the fruit is that it breaks down the fruit a bit and makes them a little mushy, I feel that this helps get the flavor into the beer, it is also easier to rack off the fruit than a puree in my opinion.

oh, raspberries can get a bit tart in a beer, so keep that in mind. you could always backsweeten with a little splenda to bring up the berries