Blueberries

If you don't mind me asking, why not just use frozen blueberries? I have found that blueberries freeze very well (I sometimes freeze a lot during the summer so I can use them later), and even store-bought frozen blueberries tend to be very good.

 

Gotcha. I have never brewed with blueberries, but to be honest I can't imagine the flavor would come through very strongly in a lambic. But the acidity might come through, and the color definitely will.

 

I would try to find wild blueberries, which are much closer to something like the berries used in blaeber. Not the right time of year, but in the summer they are easy to find in New England.

 

I just put 4 gallons of a barrel aged sour onto 12 pounds of frozen blueberries from a local farm. Took up the color really fast. Will leave it for ~2 months through malolactic fermentation.

 

I dethawed (@rocdoc1) them for most of the day in a sanitized 6.5 gallon glass carboy and racked the beer on top in the evening. I left them whole. They took up almost half of the carboy. The beer is refermenting and is a deep purple color. The blueberries floating are turning a pale white-ish color.

 

I did a Hefeweizen with blueberries. I used 6# for 4 gallons and it was overkill. If I ever did another batch I'd start with 1# per gallon and have some extra ready in the freezer.

 

I did a lambic with blueberries (3 gallons racked onto 6 lbs of fruit). I pureed 2 lbs in a sanitized blender, added that to the other 4 lbs and vacuum-sealed the bag, and popped 'em in the freezer for a month. As they thawed, I just mashed 'em up in the bag a bit and dumped the whole lot in the carboy. Bottled it back in October.....has a beautiful purplish-blue hue, nice acidity and definitely some lingering blueberry flavor. Definitely one of my favorite homebrews to date

 

Yeah, I killed it with 3#/gallon. Going for a color 5-ish type of beer.

 

Sweeter beers need less fruit than dry beers. It's difficult to get good blueberry flavor in a dry beer. 3#/gal might not be overkill for a lambic. I've used 2#/gal in a dry lambic and wasn't impressed with the realism of the fruit flavor, but it was a good tasting fruit lambic. Next time I'll probably use the same amount of fruit and a dash of flavor extract.

Let us know how the 3#/gal works.

 

I did a saison on vintners harvest puree. Used 6 lbs in 5 gallons and while the color was crazy the flavor was lacking, but this follows what @Brew_Betty suggested that dryer beers need more fruit, the saison went from 1.070ish to 1.004.

 

I was thinking of trying this.
http://www.brownwoodacres.com/wild-blueberry-juice-concentrate/

 

I racked 3-gal of brett-saison onto 6# of frozen blueberries on Sunday. I bought (2) 3# frozen blueberry bags from Costco. Not cheap; I believe they were $11 each. I let the berries thaw and funneled them through a sanitized funnel into a 3-gal carboy. They would of course jam up in the funnel and I used a sanitized spoon to smash them through.

I'll try posting some pics...

 

Beers like these just give you an excuse to brew another and blend.

 

I've done two batches of lambic with blueberries. Whole 2#/gal both times. First time fresh second time frozen. Both turned out very well. The first was one of the better lambics I've done. I just threw them in whole using a funnel and sanitized spoon handle to mash them into the carboy when they got stuck.

 

So, thought I'd give an update. I had been keeping an eye on my brett-saison for re-fermentation and it showed no signs of life. Then, this AM before heading to work I walk in to find this.



I hate giving beer away.

 

Oops! Did that stain your tub?