Best way to add fresh fruit? (Saskatoon berry)

I have the privilege of obtaining some saskatoon berries (similar to a blueberry). I was wondering what thoughts are on the best method of using fresh, whole berries. They're in the freezer now, but I've heard some make a puree or boil them down before hand. Any advice is appreciated.

 

I made a cherry stout with some fresh cherries. If I did it again I would have liked to concentrate the fruit flavor. I did half the stout w/ cherries and half without and the recipe lost a lot of body w/ minimal flavor (cherry) contribution. There's a lot of water in fruit.

As for timing, I transferred onto the fruit toward the end of fermentation (the only time I use a secondary these days). Oh, and you may consider a bit of pectic enzyme to avoid haze from the pectin in fruit. Add this to cooled beer/fruit, regardless of when you decide to add the fruit. It will become inactive if boiled/heated. I added it to the fruit in my secondary bucket and let it sit for a bit before transferring the beer onto it.

You may find this post helpful as well: http://www.themadfermentationist.com/2010/10/adding-fruit-to-beer-increases-alcohol.html

 

Thanks for the advice. I was planning on making some type of wheat beer, so I'm not that concerned with the haze as much.

 

One thing that you may try is to rinse the berries, add a little fresh water and boil for a short time, then puree the mixture and add it to the secondary fermenter. This is one method of sanitizing the fruit before introducing it to the beer.

 

I just added blueberries to a cream ale. This was for a 2.5 gallon test batch. I took 4 pints of blueberries and mixed it with a 1/4 cup of sugar and a 1/4 cup of honey. Then added 1 cup water. Heated to 170 degrees for 30 minutes while mashing the blueberries with a hand masher. Let cool down and added to secondary. Turned out good. The heat for the 30 minutes is to pasturize. I let it ferment in the secondary with the cream ale for 10 days. I just bottled 2 days ago. The nice color and taste.