Partial mash raspberry wheat

[BrettV]

I've been tapped by a friend to create a raspberry wheat to be served at his wedding reception this summer, and I've been researching for a while. The recipe for the beer isn't the hard part, it's the adding the fruit part. Several avid brewers I have spoken to both recommended using frozen raspberries, blending them, and adding them right to the boil at the very end so to pasteurize without adding too much pectin, and then straining them out when the wort goes into the primary.

However, I have not seen a single recipe on this site that did not call for putting fruit into a secondary. Can anyone chime in on this? Has anyone created a fruit beer by adding fruit in the boil? And when adjusting your recipe, raspberries WILL add fermentable sugar, correct? Monkeying around on hopville, I noticed the OG and ABV skyrocket when I added 5 lbs of raspberries to my recipe. But by that logic I'd have to significantly decrease my grain bill if I don't want to end up with a beer that's around 8% ABV. If it was just for me, I'd throw caution to the wind and experiment, but the stakes are a little higher right now and I'd hate to **** it up. Should I just forget all this fruit nonsense and just use extract before I bottle? Anyone out there want to help this novice fruit beer brewer?

 

[mewithstewpid]

here is my suggestion:

add raspberry puree to the primary 2-3 days after fermentation begins. I use this:

http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/oregon-raspberry-puree.html

but if you blend frozen fruit, that should work, too.


then, at bottling time, I add this:

http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/raspberry-natural-extract.html


2-4oz to taste, i always use 4oz.