This June I'm harvesting blueberries for a beer

[Chadwick]

A thread about worse beers ever reminded me that I have a small orchard of blueberries. I usually just eat them and make pies. This year I'm inspired to include them in a batch of beer.

I'm thinking either an ale or a siason would work nicely. I'm leaning toward a siason because they brew at warmer temps and the location I have available for my fermenter will be around 75-78F this summer.

Any suggestions?

 

[Cyclman]

Saison, how 'bout a blonde? Fruit blondes are awesome, but so are hefes, or even berlinerweisse.

If you want to ship some berries to CO...

 

[brewingmeister]

Where is this special place where blueberries are ready in June?

 

[NorthRiverS]

I made a Blueberry Blond and it was great. I used a blueberry extract for the flavoring, but I'm sure real berries would even be better. Go for it. Good luck.

NRS

 

[Chadwick]

Where is this special place where blueberries are ready in June?

End of June my plot is getting ripe. Actually one bush is getting ripe. The rest are two weeks later. I have 3 different varieties. This I know by looking at them. What I cannot tell is which varieties they are.

The largest of the bushes spans 10' in width and is 6' tall. It has the smallest berries, usually the same size as the ones in the grocery. This is the bush that ripens in late June. A few weeks later the others come in. I would be more than happy to posts pics for skeptics to see.

 

[BigAlex]

Wheat beers make an awesome base for blueberry style. Just look up any recipe for a basic wheat beer, then add a few pounds of blueberries (I usually do 1#/gallon) to the secondary (sanitized of course) and let it sit for a couple weeks. You could use extract too, but real blueberries give a light colores beer a slight purple tinge, which is great presentation for a fruit beer in my opinion

 

[brewingmeister]

Sure post some pics. You must be in a southern zone or something. Where I pick blueberries it's hard to find any ready in July let alone June.

I'd suggest trying some brews that use blueberries and see if you like it enough to have whole batch of it. The sweetwater blue would be the best blueberry beer I've had.