Northern Brewer Kits

Ok dont laugh. Since my wife is helping with the brew process. Eg cleaning all the bottles, delabeling etc. She has asked that my 2nd brew be fruity. She wants a light beer that can have fruit additives added to it. She does seem to enjoy Anchor Steam, that's as far as her hop pallet will let her go. My first kit was from NB and would like to stick with them.

Can someone recommend a light to average kit from Northern Brewer that can be fruitified? Light as in nothing too bitter.

Also any advice on how to add fruit flavorings?

Ok go ahead and laugh now.

 

Any hefeweizen or blonde ale is always a good candidate. I've done both with fresh strawberries. About half a flat of strawberries in 5 gallons works well. Add them after primary fermentation has wound down for the most part. A Mild Ale would probably be nice too, but you might want to try making that one for her normally and see what she thinks, as it doesn't have a lot of hop bitterness and isn't very strong, but it does pack a very satisfying malt profile.

 

NB has a raspberry wheat that many of my buddies and wives enjoy. Just follow the instructions that they send with it.

 

Personally, I would stay away from the fake fruit additives (oops sorry "natural fruit extract"!) and use real fruit. I love a good strawberry blonde, but I am a chick so that is OK. I would make a good beer first -- a blonde or wheat ale from NB will work fine -- and then add fruit to it [watermelon, strawberry, mango, etc]. The base beer should be cheap & straightforward because you do not want a lot of hops or extra malt flavors to mute the fruit. No more than 15-18 IBU.

here is a thread with some good discussion.
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/tips-adding-fruit-beer-117058/

 

They have a Pick-A-Fruit Kit that would likely do exactly what you're looking for. It's a wheat extract kit that allows you to pick a flavoring.

http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/pick-a-fruit-wheat-beer-product-grouping.html

Alternately, you could do any of the wheat based kits (Bavarian Hefewiezen, American Wheat, Honey Wheat) or light pale ales and add a fruit extract flavor packet that they sell a-la-carte. Pretty simple.

 

+1 to real fruit. Right now is berry season and pretty soon will be raspberry season. Get some real, fresh, flavorful fruit and use that. I think NB's American wheat kit might be a good one for fruit.

 

LOL they wrote "It's a choose-your-own-adventure beer kit!"

Awesome find.

 

Got two fermenters? Nothing wrong with splitting a batch across two of 'em, doing one fruity and one not, or one raspberry, one apricot, or one fruity and one dry-hopped like mad with some Cascade, etc.

 

Thanks everyone. From your recommendations I have found this hef kit. http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/...bavarian-hefe-weizen-extract-kit/category/81/

Priced pretty good, plus a bunch of great reviews. Not sure which fruit would go well, nothing overly fruity though as I want to drink this as well. Maybe oranges? Orange zest in the primary after fermentation?

 

I've heard good things about this, and it fits your bill
http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/...-apricot-blonde-pro-series-all-grain-kit.html

 

I added a blueberry flavor from morebeer to the bottling bucket before on a wheat beer with a neutral yeast. It was very good. Since blueberry isn't very sweet, it had a nice flavor on the end of it.

recipe is pretty easy.....
half wheat dme, half light dme
1oz hallertau at 60
us-05
that's it. Then the bottle of blueberry at the bottling bucket. (or pick your flavor here.....)

 

You can get some "fruity" taste without actually adding any fruit. I made the heffeweizen recipe on Defalco's website and it had a wonderful banana and clove taste. I have also made a blue moon clone that only required some dried orange.

Both great beers without being too fruity.

 

You can get some "fruity" taste without actually adding any fruit. I made the heffeweizen recipe on Defalco's website and it had a wonderful banana and clove taste. I have also made a blue moon clone that only required some dried orange.

Both great beers without being too fruity.

 

I made a raspberry wheat extract kit from Annapolis Homebrew that came with 3lbs of pasteurized raspberry puree. I split the batch and added the flavoring extract to half of it. Overall, the real fruit tastes better and doesn’t give any weird aftertaste on the finish. You can buy all types of pasteurized real fruit from your local homebrew supply store as well.

 

I just ordered this kit and brewed it on Wednesday, it is now sitting in my fermenter. Super simple kit and it got a lot of positive reviews, it smells very good from what I can get out of the airlock. I'm not going to do any fruit additions though.

 

You might also like their honey kolsch kit. I made that one earlier in the year (swapped out their honey with something local) and it was a hit. Gone in a flash!