I was looking at brewing this weeking. Ive got an extract American Wheat kit that I was going to use as the base for an Strawberry Wheat. I know there have been similar topics on this beer but I had some ideas for some different twists I wanted thoughts on. First, I was going to add some Belma hops to the brew (1 oz at 15 left and 1 oz at flameout) to add an additional strawberry/citrus hoppy flavor. Second, I was going to soak some stawberries (approx. 3 lbs) in rum during the primary and add them to the secondary. Lastly, I was going to possibly add some strawberry extract during the secondary as well.
Too much strawberry? Im hoping this will be a beer my wife enjoys.
Add the rum as well as the strawberries? (Add a little additional kick??)
Have you brewed this recipe/kit before? Seems like a lot going on at first blush.
I don’t brew many fruit beers, but I do know that brewing a good base beer is key to brewing a good fruit beer. My take:
-make sure you use a 1/4 of a campden tab - wheat has a particular protein in it that is more conducive to making a band-aid beer. $2.99 for a pack of 50 tabs is cheap insurance
re: the strawberries:
-I would start out just brewing the wheat beer, then either racking or throwing strawberries directly into the fermenter after primary fermentation has finished.
-I’d skip the rum, I think its just going to be ‘hot’. If the ladies really want to get after it, have them add a shot when they drink it.
-extract is a good idea, especially with a strawberry beer, as according to Randy Mosher, its pretty tough to get the strawberry aroma into a beer with fresh/frozen fruit. Extract is a great way to supplement this. I would suggest pulling an 8oz sample once the 2ndary ferment is finished, splitting into 4 2-ounce samples, and dosing each one with an increasing amount of extract. Pick the one that has the flavor, but doesn’t taste like a fruit roll-up.
re: Belma hops:
-yes. This will give you another ‘angle’ of strawberry flavor. I would add some @ 30 and a lot late.
Add the rum as well as the strawberries? (Add a little additional kick??)
Thoughts?[/quote]
Make a batch of strawberry extract with the rum and add that. On the last batch of my house beer (lemon-rosemary blonde) I made a lemon extract with rum and added that to the bottling bucket. It turned out good.
