Slick_Biscuit
Member
Hey Everyone,
I brewed a 5-gallon batch of blueberry wheat recently that was my first foray into using fruit in the secondary fermentor. Being my first fruit beer, I scoured the forums ahead of time for tips/advice on how to go about it, and I found quite a bit of conflicting information. In the interest of saving future novice brewers the forum-scouring headache I endured, here are the five things I wish I'd known ahead of time, but couldn't find a definitive answer on:
1) 1 pound of fruit per gallon is plenty
I read a number of posts and watched a number of videos by homebrewers who used more fruit than this, or used a combination of fruit and puree, and still weren't satisfied with the amount of fruit flavor the final product retained. My beer spent 10 days in the secondary with 5 pounds of blueberries, and after 2 weeks of bottle conditioning managed to retain a nice violet color, a fruity nose, and a noticeable blueberry flavor up front. The preponderance of information indicating that this isn't enough fruit could simply be chalked up to taste or method, but it seems to me that if you want to make a blueberry beer that still tastes like beer, 1 pound per gallon is a good benchmark.
2) Frozen fruit worked just fine (for me)
I used 5 pounds of frozen, organic blueberries that I simply let thaw before dumping them in the secondary and racking the beer on top of them. They weren't pasteurized or chemically treated in any other way. I've seen a number of people say that the frozen product can still harbor bacteria and they pasteurize just to be safe, but skipping this didn't result in a bad batch in my case.
3) If using a 5-gallon carboy as a secondary, a blow-off tube will be necessary
A second fermentation should occur when racking beer onto fruit, and in my case the fermentation was vigorous. Within a few hours my airlock was clogged with purple goo - I wish I had attached a blow-off tube to begin with.
4) Blueberries will end up displacing more beer than they do at the outset
And this isn't just due to them soaking up beer. Obviously, if they were only expanding from the liquid they soaked up around them, they would displace just as much as they absorb, and you wouldn't have an issue. But it turns out blueberries also absorb CO2, which also makes them expand, and when you have a bunch of CO2 being created from a second fermentation they can end up absorbing a lot of it. This also makes them float, and with all the extra displacement in my 5 gallon carboy they ended up floating right up the neck and right up to the bung. I might try using a 6 gallon better bottle as a secondary next time for this very reason.
5) There is no need to disturb the fruit
I read a few posts that suggested stirring or agitating the blueberries periodically because they tend to float to the top. Anyone I've talked to who has successfully brewed with fruit has argued emphatically against this, not only for obvious sanitation reasons, but also because having the fruit float on top of the beer shouldn't impact the beer's ability to absorb flavors from it. I can't argue with this, as I didn't stir the fruit at all, and I ended up with great blueberry flavor in the finished product.
As a final note, I used Norther Brewer's "Honey Weizen" extract kit for this batch. Aside from the blueberries, I followed the recipe to a T. The honey is entirely overpowered by the blueberries up front (that or my palate isn't sensitive enough to taste it), and the beer has the finish you would expect from a wheat ale. Definitely something I'll be trying again. Cheers!
I brewed a 5-gallon batch of blueberry wheat recently that was my first foray into using fruit in the secondary fermentor. Being my first fruit beer, I scoured the forums ahead of time for tips/advice on how to go about it, and I found quite a bit of conflicting information. In the interest of saving future novice brewers the forum-scouring headache I endured, here are the five things I wish I'd known ahead of time, but couldn't find a definitive answer on:
1) 1 pound of fruit per gallon is plenty
I read a number of posts and watched a number of videos by homebrewers who used more fruit than this, or used a combination of fruit and puree, and still weren't satisfied with the amount of fruit flavor the final product retained. My beer spent 10 days in the secondary with 5 pounds of blueberries, and after 2 weeks of bottle conditioning managed to retain a nice violet color, a fruity nose, and a noticeable blueberry flavor up front. The preponderance of information indicating that this isn't enough fruit could simply be chalked up to taste or method, but it seems to me that if you want to make a blueberry beer that still tastes like beer, 1 pound per gallon is a good benchmark.
2) Frozen fruit worked just fine (for me)
I used 5 pounds of frozen, organic blueberries that I simply let thaw before dumping them in the secondary and racking the beer on top of them. They weren't pasteurized or chemically treated in any other way. I've seen a number of people say that the frozen product can still harbor bacteria and they pasteurize just to be safe, but skipping this didn't result in a bad batch in my case.
3) If using a 5-gallon carboy as a secondary, a blow-off tube will be necessary
A second fermentation should occur when racking beer onto fruit, and in my case the fermentation was vigorous. Within a few hours my airlock was clogged with purple goo - I wish I had attached a blow-off tube to begin with.
4) Blueberries will end up displacing more beer than they do at the outset
And this isn't just due to them soaking up beer. Obviously, if they were only expanding from the liquid they soaked up around them, they would displace just as much as they absorb, and you wouldn't have an issue. But it turns out blueberries also absorb CO2, which also makes them expand, and when you have a bunch of CO2 being created from a second fermentation they can end up absorbing a lot of it. This also makes them float, and with all the extra displacement in my 5 gallon carboy they ended up floating right up the neck and right up to the bung. I might try using a 6 gallon better bottle as a secondary next time for this very reason.
5) There is no need to disturb the fruit
I read a few posts that suggested stirring or agitating the blueberries periodically because they tend to float to the top. Anyone I've talked to who has successfully brewed with fruit has argued emphatically against this, not only for obvious sanitation reasons, but also because having the fruit float on top of the beer shouldn't impact the beer's ability to absorb flavors from it. I can't argue with this, as I didn't stir the fruit at all, and I ended up with great blueberry flavor in the finished product.
As a final note, I used Norther Brewer's "Honey Weizen" extract kit for this batch. Aside from the blueberries, I followed the recipe to a T. The honey is entirely overpowered by the blueberries up front (that or my palate isn't sensitive enough to taste it), and the beer has the finish you would expect from a wheat ale. Definitely something I'll be trying again. Cheers!
