Exotic Fruit Wheats

[Big Ole' Loe]

Hey I'm new here and too lazy to search, but was thinking of doing a Blue Berry or a Blood Orange Wheat. I love me some fruit beers and I know the Blue Berry would turn out great but the Blood Orange........ So my question to the experts is, do you think that I can get some Blood Orange Aroma/Taste in a German/American Wheat?
Ohh this will be an Extract Kit from my LHBS, so I don't know the ingredients as of yet.

 

[DeathBrewer]

why not just put a slice of blood orange in your wheat beer when it's finished?

 

[the_bird]

If you're too lazy to search, I'm too lazy to write, other than to say +1 to Death.

 

[Big Ole' Loe]

why not just put a slice of blood orange in your wheat beer when it's finished?

Thanks for your input Death, but that is just too damn simple for me and an obvious answer I was kind of expecting.

So to Edit this a lil', has any one used Exotic fruit in their beers? And not just Wheat Beers.....

 

[Joker]

I took the 5 seconds to search for ya.
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/search.php?searchid=1159389

Exotic fruit would be no different then any other. Anything with citrus sounds iffy at best to me but then someone claimed they were going to add OJ to their brew although they never posted how it turned out that I recall.

 

[z987k]

when using citrus fruits it tends to be best to use fresh zest or one of the dried peals for sale at the lhbs.

 

[Chris_Dog]

I am shooting from the cuff here so feel free to correct me...

The problem as I understand it (and experienced it). Is that the sugars in fresh fruit are fermentable. And we as homebrewers don't pasteurize our beer. So the yeast will be active start to finish.
To impact the flavor as much as adding a slice to the glass will take a lot of fresh fruit in the fermenter. Even then many of the sugars will ferment out. I am not suggesting it can't be done. It will take some experimenting on your part to find the proper amount to add with any fruit.
I wouldn't suggest adding any fresh fruit until the secondary at least.

 

[Chriso]

http://google.us/search?q=fruit+wheat+site:homebrewtalk.com

Here's the list of results, the link that Joker posted is a temporary link that "dies" very shortly after querying the server.

It has been done many times. There are both puree's and extract's that you can add to your beer. The above search should show results from mango to mulberry and more, just takes a little bit of readin' and learnin'... after all, isn't time spent on brewing-related activities the best kind of time?

 

[Skunkyhops]

Welcome to the Boards Big Ole' Loe!! I spy.

 

[discgolfin]

Get the book extreme brews they have a tasty looking blood oarnge wheat beer recipe in it. What people soon realize once they make home brew beers with fruit is that unless you use a campden tablet and kill the yeast and keg carb the sweetness from fuit will be gone and you will be left with the sour flavor from the fruit..this works well with some but in moderation.IMO

blood oarnge wheat does sound like a tasty summer brew..

J

 

[RoaringBrewer]

As noted extreme brews has a Blood orange hefe originally brewed by Dogfish Head... it also has some other weird wits in it if I recall. Ki-wit (guess the fruit in that one) and even one with chamomille flower or something.

Plenty of information around on the subject if you feel like digging...

 

[Skunkyhops]

kiwi wheat sounds kind of tempting

 

[slimer]

I was thinking about a pomegranate wheat.

 

[SteveM]

The data base for fruit beer recipes might have some useful information:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forumdisplay.php?f=75

 

[Dude]

I wouldn't necessarily call the fruits you listed "exotic". Those have been done before, with success.

I'd consider exotic more along the lines of passion fruit, star fruit, durian, etc.

I'm doing a honey wheat with kiwi soon--I'd consider that along the lines of 'different".

Bottom line, they can be done.

 

[slimer]

I was thinking starfruit as well. Tastes like pear, but so much more exotic.

 

[the_bird]

I had a stone-fruit homebrew recently.

Probably the worst beer I've ever drunk (although I don't think it was necessarily the fruit's fault). Very bland, no beer flavor. Cidery. Either old extract or lots of added simple sugar. And, I couldn't tell if it was the fruit, or the yeast, or an infection, but the beer had a metallic taste to it that was HORRID.

In any case, the taste of the fruit wasn't really strong enough to carry through any real strong "beer" flavor. If the underlying beer had any character at all, the fruit would have been completely lost. So, I'd think in terms of fruits that have a pretty strong character to them, something that's got a presense, something that's too subtle is apt to get lost.

 

[Big Ole' Loe]

Thanks for all the replies and info. I ordered "Extreme Brewing", the reason I used the word Exotic is because a lot of people do not know what Blood Oranges are. I am also looking into a Passion fruit, Carambolas (Star) fruit, Mangosteens or Durians. I might do some Ales but more than likely will be doing Wheats with the fruits. Thank you guys again for the help and info.

 

[catamount]

i recently brewed a belgian rasperry wheat ale, and added 8oz of sour malt to try to mimic a lambic sour flavor. turned out tasting great.. racked it on top of 5oz of raspberry extract.

sour malts might be something you want to consider, it really complimented the fruit flavor.

 

[Chippewa]

Not exotic, but I just bottled a peach pale ale this week.

I bought the peaches back in September from a farm in the Yakima Valley in Washington state, peeled them, pitted them, and put them in freezer bags with some orange juice (my wife's grandmother said that the OJ would help preserve them). When I added the peaches to my secondary last month, I thawed them in the microwave, and then blanched them. "Blanching" is basically dipping them into boiling water quickly (3-5 seconds) just to help pasturize them. If you already know what blanching is, then great...I had to look it up! After blanching, I mashed them up and slid them into my secondary and put my brew on top of it from the primary for about 12 days. Fermentation definitely picked back up in a big way (I only added about 3 lbs of peaches).

I tasted my brew when I bottled, and I am REALLY excited. I won't know for sure for a bit, but I'm pretty sure it'll be a winner. Thought you might like to hear how I did my fruit addition. I did alot of research myself on it, and just wanted to pass it along.

Best of luck with the oranges, and I'll be curious to hear how it goes.

 

[Matt Foley]

The Extreme Brewing book is sweet. I am drinking the Imperial Pal Ale from that book now. But even better it is like a coffee table book with a lot of color and input from various brewers.

As far as fruit, I would like to get my hands on some fresh huckleberry this summer for a Huckleberry Wheat.