Blueberry Wheat Recipe Question

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mbaker33

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Hey all,

I am trying to plan out a blueberry wheat recipe for my wife. She loves the Sea Dog Blue Paw, which I believe to have a pretty strong Blueberry flavor, which she prefers.

The recipe so far is as follows:
6 lb Light Weat Malt
4 lb Pilsner
.75 oz Hallertauer (60)
.25 oz Hallertauer (15)
1 Gallon Juice from fresh blueberries

My question is, how to calculate the ammount of sugar that I will get from the Blueberry juice?

Also, Do you think 1 Gallon is too much/less?

Thanks in advance.
 
I usually add a pound of fresh fruit for each gallon. I'm not sure how that would translate over to gallons of juice. With a wheat, especially a light one like this, I'd probably add half of that.

You're going to want to throw in a bunch of rice hulls too so you don't get a stuck mash with that much wheat.
 
There is some information online about how to approximate the sugar content of fruit. It may be a little easier since you are using juice. You should be able to look on the side of the container (if you bought it) and determine the grams of sugar, and then convert that to ounces.

Otherwise, you could always boil your wort take an OG reading and then add the juice and take another reading. Then when you take your FG reading, you could take the difference of the estimated FG and actual FG and get a rough idea of how the blueberry juice ferments. I don't that doesn't help ahead of time, but that will give you insight for future reference...

A gallon seems like a lot of juice for a 5 gallon batch. You may want to make your wheat beer and then add the juice in steps to see how much blueberry taste you get after the juice ferments.
 
Sugar varies widely depending on the ripeness of the fruit as well. I just picked up some Sonoma Swamp Blueberries today that are little sugar bombs. Sweetest blueberries I've ever had, but they would never stand up to shipping to a store. I bought them in the swamp.
 
I agree that the gallon seems a like a lot. I'm sure that it varies based on the type of juice and the amount of sugar in it. Some people on here have used extract and added it to the bottling bucket to taste (between 2-6 oz per batch), should be able to do the same thing with juice.

For my blueberry wheat I used 3 pounds of frozen blueberries in the secondary for two weeks. Turned out great with a very light blueberry taste, not overwhelming at all.
 
Thats almost the same exact recipe i use for my wheat. Which strain do you plan on using for this?

I actually made a batch of kiwi wheat, everyone loved it.
 
Thanks guys for all of your feedback. I agree after looking through that the ammount of berries is probably way too high. Also, after some further research I discovered that the Sea Dog Blue Paw I seek to clone for the wife actually uses a blueberry extract, despite the fact it is brewed in Maine, where fresh berries are as plentiful as water pretty much. So, knowing that, I've found a good clone recipe that I am going to blend with my own. The recipe below is the clone, except the pilsner is actuall replaced with american, and the yeast is generally a ringwood yeast, as that is the brewery strand.

6 lbs 8.0 oz Pilsner (2 Row) Ger (2.0 SRM) Grain 59.1 %
3 lbs 8.0 oz Wheat Malt, Ger (2.0 SRM) Grain 31.8 %
8.0 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 4.5 %
8.0 oz Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 4.5 %
1.00 oz Hallertauer [4.80%] (60 min) Hops 15.8 IBU
0.00 oz Hallertauer [4.80%] (25 min) Hops -
2.00 oz Blueberry Extract (Bottling 5.0 min) Misc
1 Pkgs German Ale (Wyeast Labs #1007) Yeast-Ale

I'll keep the yeast, and hops, but may play with the grain bill a little bit, not exctly sure. I use German Ale in all of my "Americanized" hefe's.
 
mbaker33 said:
Thanks guys for all of your feedback. I agree after looking through that the ammount of berries is probably way too high. Also, after some further research I discovered that the Sea Dog Blue Paw I seek to clone for the wife actually uses a blueberry extract, despite the fact it is brewed in Maine, where fresh berries are as plentiful as water pretty much. So, knowing that, I've found a good clone recipe that I am going to blend with my own. The recipe below is the clone, except the pilsner is actuall replaced with american, and the yeast is generally a ringwood yeast, as that is the brewery strand.

6 lbs 8.0 oz Pilsner (2 Row) Ger (2.0 SRM) Grain 59.1 %
3 lbs 8.0 oz Wheat Malt, Ger (2.0 SRM) Grain 31.8 %
8.0 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 4.5 %
8.0 oz Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 4.5 %
1.00 oz Hallertauer [4.80%] (60 min) Hops 15.8 IBU
0.00 oz Hallertauer [4.80%] (25 min) Hops -
2.00 oz Blueberry Extract (Bottling 5.0 min) Misc
1 Pkgs German Ale (Wyeast Labs #1007) Yeast-Ale

I'll keep the yeast, and hops, but may play with the grain bill a little bit, not exctly sure. I use German Ale in all of my "Americanized" hefe's.
Click to expand...

I'd flip the pilsner and wheat and ditch the cara-pils, then you'd be close to my recipe. You want it to be a wheat beer, so 50% or more should be wheat.
 
xjncoguyx said:
I'd flip the pilsner and wheat and ditch the cara-pils, then you'd be close to my recipe. You want it to be a wheat beer, so 50% or more should be wheat.
Click to expand...

This isn't true at all. It all depends on what kind of wheat you're aiming for. Most wheat beers are 50/50, or 60/40 pils/wheat. I've never used more than 50% wheat in a beer.

If it has wheat...it's a wheat beer. It all depends on the yeast at that point.
 
Suthrncomfrt1884 said:
This isn't true at all. It all depends on what kind of wheat you're aiming for. Most wheat beers are 50/50, or 60/40 pils/wheat. I've never used more than 50% wheat in a beer.

If it has wheat...it's a wheat beer. It all depends on the yeast at that point.
Click to expand...
If its less than 50% wouldn't it just be a wheat ale/american wheat at that point. And true Hefeweisse is always 50%+
 
Hefeweizen is the only beer I know of that uses more than 50% wheat. That's why I said it all depends on what style wheat your aiming for.

Since it has blueberries in it, I'm going to rule out the german aspect of it.
 

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