Fruit Beer Blueberry Summer Ale

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I am glad I'm not the only one who enjoys this one! Too often a fruit beer is over the top fruity, when I was working this recipe up I wanted a beer that tasted like beer and not a wine cooler
 
So I am about to start this brew and was wondering what I should do for blueberries. I want a good flavor of blueberry and a blueish color. I leaning towards fresh/frozen blueberries, if anyone can help me out and give any suggestions thanks.
 
coonz said:
So I am about to start this brew and was wondering what I should do for blueberries. I want a good flavor of blueberry and a blueish color. I leaning towards fresh/frozen blueberries, if anyone can help me out and give any suggestions thanks.

Fresh. Puréed. Pasteurized.
 
Brewed mine up on Monday brew day turned into 6 hours of fun. Messed up on the OG reading, but looking forward to adding blueberries.

Does anyone have their fermentation schedule? Not sure if I should do 1-2 weeks in primary and how long on fruit in secondary?

Thanks
 
Brewed mine up on Monday brew day turned into 6 hours of fun. Messed up on the OG reading, but looking forward to adding blueberries.

Does anyone have their fermentation schedule? Not sure if I should do 1-2 weeks in primary and how long on fruit in secondary?

Thanks

I ferment for 2 to 3 weeks in recent batches, rack onto the berries and let that go for another week before transferring to a keg and carbing for 3 weeks to a month to let it carb up.

You could go longer on the fruit for more berry flavor, I prefer the blueberries to be a background player in this beer.
 
Anyone try oregon blueberry puree for this? I was listening to the Jamil show and he was raving about how the puree aids in geting consistent results. I was thinking 3 lb or puree in secondary? Thanks!
 
Anyone try oregon blueberry puree for this? I was listening to the Jamil show and he was raving about how the puree aids in geting consistent results. I was thinking 3 lb or puree in secondary? Thanks!

Yes. It's what Mcmanamins uses in their ruby. I have made both a ruby clone and a blueberry ale with it. In both cases I added to the primary and racked on top.
In the ruby it worked great, perfect clone recipe and the raspberries really shine through.
In the blueberry I can't taste any blueberry at all. I could when I first kegged it but not anymore.
 
Yes. It's what Mcmanamins uses in their ruby. I have made both a ruby clone and a blueberry ale with it. In both cases I added to the primary and racked on top.
In the ruby it worked great, perfect clone recipe and the raspberries really shine through.
In the blueberry I can't taste any blueberry at all. I could when I first kegged it but not anymore.

Do you mean you added it to the secondary or did you really add it to the primary? My understanding would be that adding it to the primary will drive of a lot of the aroma due to CO2 escaping, whereas adding in secondary preserves this.

Thanks for your help.
 
Do you mean you added it to the secondary or did you really add it to the primary? My understanding would be that adding it to the primary will drive of a lot of the aroma due to CO2 escaping, whereas adding in secondary preserves this.

Thanks for your help.

Yes, the primary. Co2 will escape in the secondary as well as there is an airlock on the carboy.
 
archer75 said:
Yes, the primary. Co2 will escape in the secondary as well as there is an airlock on the carboy.

Fermentation is not very vigorous in secondary so more of the subtle flavors and aroma seem to be retained by going secondary with the fruit
 
Well all I can tell you is myself and a friend both made ruby clones that were spot in with using the raspberries in the primary. My friend made an apricot ale with the puree in the primary as well and it came out good with a nice little bit of the apricot sweetness coming through and not being overpowering.

Both my buddies made a strawberry and blackberry wheat beers with frozen berries in the primary and both turned out great.

Now with my blueberry I got nothing for flavor or aroma so next time i'll try that in the secondary.
 
Rasberries are such strong flavor contributors, that I wonder if relatively less flavor is needed to get the desired effect. Blueberries are pretty muted fruits, I bet it just takes more to get what you need.

In any case, I'm going to try it with the puree and I'll report back.
 
We have a bunch of frozen fresh berries left over from the summer and gonna brew this up - I know not the ideal season but what the hell that's what makes home brewing fun, we can do whatever we want. Anyone have pics of finished product?? Any thoughts?
 
We have a bunch of frozen fresh berries left over from the summer and gonna brew this up - I know not the ideal season but what the hell that's what makes home brewing fun, we can do whatever we want. Anyone have pics of finished product?? Any thoughts?

Cripes! I just kicked a keg a couple weeks ago, I never think to take pics, I may have a bottle reserved that I can snap a pic of and post up.
 
Just throwing out some info here, blueberries have almost no flavor, even when eating them they ar dull. So one would need a massive amount of fruit to get any noticeable flavor, but it's going to dissipate rather quickly. Now as far as finished flavor even the best commercial examples do not carry a lot of flavor but they have aroma. To achieve this use the berries as everyone had been
using but in the secondary, and right before kegging or bottling use a fruit extact. Use in moderation as it will add flavor not just aroma. Look at commercial beers, clear but a big blast of blueberry aroma, just not a lot of flavor. Wachusette uses up to 762 lbs. of fruit in their batches. Good luck brewing and I hope this helps a little bit.
 
After a few days on the fruit.

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I brewed up a batch of this two weeks ago, and added six pounds of puréed blueberries tonight. Those things turn the beer purple really fast. I'm really looking forward to trying this next month.
 
I brewed up a batch of this two weeks ago, and added six pounds of puréed blueberries tonight. Those things turn the beer purple really fast. I'm really looking forward to trying this next month.

Last batch I made I used 5 lbs of a mixed berry blend from the frozen section of the grocery store, it was fantastic! And also a bit of a change up of my usual recipe
 
Figured it out. I had a box checked that shouldn't have been. Brewed this up today. It's gonna sit in primary for 2 weeks before I put it on the berries. Never used sorachi ace before, or FWH, or whole leaf so it was a beer of firsts. My LHBS only had pellet sorachi, but did use whole leaf centennial.

Also, I've got it in Blonde Ale category (light hybrid). Is that pretty accurate? All the numbers were perfect for Blonde Ale. Never brewed a fruit beer before, and this is the lightest SRM beer I've brewed also.

I am having your same issue, can you let me know what you changed to get BeerSmith2 to be right?
 
I have my beer in light hybrid in my notes, and when I have entered it in competitions I have used light hybrid as the base style with good results.
 
Did you have the centennial addition set as first wort hop? Also have you adjusted the AA%?

I brewed up a version of this recipe and everyone has loved it! I'm also having the same problem with Beersmith giving a very high IBUs when I know it's not.
 
Sorry for reviving the old thread but does anyone know how to resolve the beersmith IBU issue? Do I just roll with the recipe as is? I'm showing almost 50 IBUs. :confused:
 
Sorry for reviving the old thread but does anyone know how to resolve the beersmith IBU issue? Do I just roll with the recipe as is? I'm showing almost 50 IBUs. :confused:

I think it's the way beer smith calculates the first wort hopping addition that causes the issue, I never get complaints about over hoped flavor!
 
I think it's the way beer smith calculates the first wort hopping addition that causes the issue, I never get complaints about over hoped flavor!

I tried to change it to a 60 minute boil instead of FWH but it only moved it a few points...no where near the 18 IBUs listed in the recipe. Oh well, I'll give it a go and see what happens!
 
Did this as my first AG beer about a couple weeks ago and thinking about the blueberry addition.

I have fresh-frozen wild blueberries that if picked and packed in a ziploc bag. They were hand-picked, some of them with a decent amount of debris (twigs, leaves from the blueberry bush) that wouldn't wash off easily. They have been in the freezer since.

Is contamination a concern here, or do I just crush, pitch, and hope for the best?

Ideally I would like to avoid boiling/using pectin enzyme because that would change the flavor a bit, or using chemicals but... Is the risk of contamination high? If it's a pretty low chance I guess I would just toss em in and be OK with risking it.
 
I would try and thaw, then pick the debris out as best you can, the wee little blueberry stems shouldn't be an issue, it's the leaves and sticks I'd fret over
 
So, tasted the beer before transferring to primary and racking onto the berries.

One thing was strange: the beer had this flavor and mouthfeel that I can only describe as "milky". It had this slightly flavor of milk and like creamy mouthfeel to it, towards the end of the taste.

Anyone experienced this?
I adjusted some of the hops down but that's about it.

Also, was my first AG beer, so probably some kinks to work out in the process.

Or is this a normal flavor that will go away/change when it carbs up?

-Used fresh yeast (S-05)
-sanitation was good,
-aeration of wort was good,
-temp control was ambient room temps but adjusted to stay within the range of the yeast. Mid 60's for most of the fermentation.

Process notes:
-good for initial temps but did one thing wrong, did not cover bottom of MT/hose braid with water.
-did not mash out (first AG)
-efficiency sucked, wort was like 1.044.
-Stirred every 15' of mash.
-Had some delay in going to the boil as we were deciding on how to adjust the hops additions.
-transfered to fermenter while it was light out but then put inside immediately...

Any ideas??

Cheers,
Wooden
 
This looks like a great recipe! I was wondering if it could be easily modified to be more of a wheat beer, using primarily 2-row and wheat malt and still use Sorachi Ace and Blueberries?
 
Just put this on the blueberries.
I thought I had a small packet of sorachi ace but turned out only had half an oz. on brew day (was making 1 gallon test batches and used some)
But I had .75 oz of motuka and threw that in the boil at 60 mins.
this tastes so good before the berries.
Like better than most beers out of the primary.

I only used 3lbs cause these are expensive but have a bottle of blueberry juice for the keg so i'll have to figure out how much for taste.
 
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