Anyone ever have a great blueberry ale?

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divrguy

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I drink IPA's 98% of the time. I love imperial stouts and some hoppy ambers. But I have never liked a wheat and have never liked a fruit wheat beer. But..... I would really like to make a blueberry ale. I have had a few over the years and they were either not good or didn't taste like blueberries. They tasted like berries, cranberry, cherry but just not blueberry. I love blueberries and I would love to find a blueberry ale that tastes like blueberries but is not overly sweet or over the top fruity. Just a balanced hint of blueberry mixed into an ale that also has other fruit notes.

Any recommendations or commercial brews fit that bill? Thanks for the help.
 
The only blueberry ale that I have truly liked because it fits the description you laid out is Sea Dog Wild Blueberry Wheat Ale. Everything else has been an overly sweet mess in my opinion. It's an easy drinking beer with a light, but noticeable blueberry flavor to it. I brewed a Replicator clone of this. This thread has the details. Good luck! I would recommend doing a split batch, half with Oregon Fruit Puree and the other half dosing with various blueberry extracts by the glass until you get what you're shooting for.
 
Ive made a few - keys to a good one are secondary with 3lbs per gallon then add the blueberry extract at bottling/kegging to get that "blueberry flavor". If you dont, trust me it will suck. Blueberry is such a mild flavor in Its natural state.
 
mmonacel said:
The only blueberry ale that I have truly liked because it fits the description you laid out is Sea Dog Wild Blueberry Wheat Ale. Everything else has been an overly sweet mess in my opinion. It's an easy drinking beer with a light, but noticeable blueberry flavor to it. I brewed a Replicator clone of this. This thread has the details. Good luck! I would recommend doing a split batch, half with Oregon Fruit Puree and the other half dosing with various blueberry extracts by the glass until you get what you're shooting for.

shoreman said:
Ive made a few - keys to a good one are secondary with 3lbs per gallon then add the blueberry extract at bottling/kegging to get that "blueberry flavor". If you dont, trust me it will suck. Blueberry is such a mild flavor in Its natural state.

I'll try to make a small batch of that Sea Dog and Shoreman thanks for the info about Blueberry. 3 lbs per gallon seems like a lot but like you mentioned, it's a pretty mild flavor.

Thanks Gents brew on!!
 
We have two decent blue berry's locally in MA, the Boston Beer works has short distribution so depending on location you may be able to find it, and Wachuset brewing (prob spelled it wrong) makes a decent blue berry, BBW is not as sweet and has a better base, but both work very well in black and blue's which is the best way to have a blueberry IMHO.
 
My wife loves Sunset Wheat (Leinies) so we attempted a clone this summer. Turned out pretty close except for the yeast and the color. Leinies uses a clean lager yeast (seems like a lot of work for a wheat), we used German Wheat 3333 which gives it a refreshing tart after taste. Our color was a very pale pink, maybe the lightest colored beer we've made yet. Keg was gone in less than 2 weeks.

4 lbs Malted Red Wheat
4.5 lbs 2 Row Barley
0.5 oz crushed corriander (optional if you don't want this flavor)
1 zested orange peel (might go 2 next time, optional if you don't want this flavor)
0.6 oz Cluster (6.8%) FWH, 0.2 oz Cluster 60 min, 0.2 oz Cluster 30 min (17 IBU)
German Wheat 3333 yeast w/ starter

1.044 OG (pre-blueberry), 1.005 FG

Added 1 lb of frozen blueberries pastuerized at 160F for 15 minutes about 1.5 weeks into fermentation (Could go 2 lbs here if you wanted more). Allow another week of fermentation in primary. Rack to keg or bottling bucket with 2 oz blueberry extract. I see some of the amounts listed above and am amazed at how much blueberry that is. The 1 lb of frozen and 2 oz extract gave me a distinct enough taste of blueberry, but it was not right out in front either. Hop bitterness and blueberry flavor were dead on to Sunset Wheat. We'll probably make this again in the next month or two.

I think you need a combination of real blueberries and blueberry extract to get the blueberry right. Using only one will make it taste artificial.
 
Shipyard makes a really nice one: Smashed Blueberry. According to the label, it's a hybrid Porter / Scottish Ale with a lot of blueberry presence... The Sea Dog is quite good, and Saranacs Blueberry Blonde is pretty decent.

I recently made a nice blueberry muffin ale - 5.5 gallon recipe went something like this, and got great reviews from everyone who tried it:

82% 2-row
9% Biscuit
5% rye
4% carapils
.5oz galena @ 60min
.5oz goldings @ 30 min

In secondary, I used roughly 1lb blueberries per 1 gallon beer, which gave me a bit of color, a slight aroma, and a slight blueberry finish
at kegging, I added 1oz brewer's best blueberry extract

I almost tried to add more fruit before I went with the extract - reading shoreman's post above makes me glad I didn't spend the extra time going that route...
 
stratslinger said:
Shipyard makes a really nice one: Smashed Blueberry. According to the label, it's a hybrid Porter / Scottish Ale with a lot of blueberry presence... The Sea Dog is quite good, and Saranacs Blueberry Blonde is pretty decent.

I recently made a nice blueberry muffin ale - 5.5 gallon recipe went something like this, and got great reviews from everyone who tried it:

82% 2-row
9% Biscuit
5% rye
4% carapils
.5oz galena @ 60min
.5oz goldings @ 30 min

In secondary, I used roughly 1lb blueberries per 1 gallon beer, which gave me a bit of color, a slight aroma, and a slight blueberry finish
at kegging, I added 1oz brewer's best blueberry extract

I almost tried to add more fruit before I went with the extract - reading shoreman's post above makes me glad I didn't spend the extra time going that route...

I heard a basic radio podcast where the guest used about a lb per gallon and he said it still was pretty subtle. But he also mentioned that he didn't crush the blueberries. I would think you would have to crush them to get the flavor but I have never made a fruit beer never mind a blueberry one.
 
Dark Horse Tres Blueberry Stout is by far the best blueberry ale I've tasted. You'd probably have to do a trade to get it though, since they are based in Marshall MI.

A quick google search yields no clone recipe for it, but man is it tasty.
 
I don't know... I didn't crush my blueberries, but I definitely tried a few when emptying out my secondary, and there was absolutely no flavor left to them at all. I'm pretty sure they were completely used up. I used frozen blueberries, and ran through a couple cycles of thawing and refreezing to break down cell walls and such, which I think actually would be more effective than just mashing up the berries.
 
stratslinger said:
I don't know... I didn't crush my blueberries, but I definitely tried a few when emptying out my secondary, and there was absolutely no flavor left to them at all. I'm pretty sure they were completely used up. I used frozen blueberries, and ran through a couple cycles of thawing and refreezing to break down cell walls and such, which I think actually would be more effective than just mashing up the berries.

Hmmm.. I didn't know that the freezing and thawing would do that. Pretty interesting. Would that hold true for any fruit?
 
Oh and there's a brewery by me called Bluepoint Brewing Company who makes a pretty good Blueberry Ale. Granted it's the only one I've tried but it's got a great blueberry aroma and well as a balanced blueberry flavor that's on the light side but dominates perfectly but fades as your mouth gets used to it. Not hop forward at all however I could see it balancing really well with some citrus or apricot flavored hops for more fruit flavor.

http://www.bluepointbrewing.com/bpbc/microbrews/blueberry-ale/
 
Oh and there's a brewery by me called Bluepoint Brewing Company who makes a pretty good Blueberry Ale. Granted it's the only one I've tried but it's got a great blueberry aroma and well as a balanced blueberry flavor that's on the light side but dominates perfectly but fades as your mouth gets used to it. Not hop forward at all however I could see it balancing really well with some citrus or apricot flavored hops for more fruit flavor.

http://www.bluepointbrewing.com/bpbc/microbrews/blueberry-ale/

+1

I live right around the block from Blue Point. Their blueberry isn't a beer I'm crazy about, but it is pretty well-received around Long Island.
 
:off: One of these days I'm going to start a thread for long island brewers so we can find each other. I think that day is today.
 
crazyworld said:
:off: One of these days I'm going to start a thread for long island brewers so we can find each other. I think that day is today.

Where is the thread? I'd love to meet some other homebrewers. I try to talk to my wife about this stuff, and she's totally uninterested.
 
Shipyard makes a really nice one: Smashed Blueberry. According to the label, it's a hybrid Porter / Scottish Ale with a lot of blueberry presence...

I will echo this sentiment. I'm not much on fruit-flavored beers, but this one is exceptional.
 
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