perfidy

When my parents drive out to visit goodwyfe Johno and myself, they usually bring a giant haul of goodies; vegetables from their garden, blueberries or apples from their bushes and trees, and jams, jellies, and pickles. Usually, they bring more than we can possibly use.

Two weeks ago my parents came to town, and when they left, our refrigerator and pantry were bursting: leeks the size of baseball bats, summer squash of every size and description, tomatoes, cucumbers, and green beans, dozens of yellow onions tasting of the Ohio earth they grew in, enough shallots and garlic to see us through to spring 2008 (at least), and a good eight pounds of blueberries.

Now, my parents' blueberries are spectacular. Some of them are gigantic and mellow specimens, but others are much smaller and a little tart, but absolutely full of flavor.

And me being me, the first thing I thought this year when faced with eight pounds of berries, was "hey - I can make beer out of that!" (Of course, that's what I think every time I see a potato, pepper, bag of kaffir lime leaves, cherry, apple, or old shoe, so it's not like I'm exactly making a leap here.) Many, if not most, blueberry beers are made with blueberry essence or extract, which imparts the flavor of blueberries without turning the beer purple. Unfortunately, blueberry extracts tend to behave a lot like imitation vanilla - if buried way down in the mix as part of a recipe, they work great and do the job of providing acceptable flavor for a minimum cost. However, once they take center stage, their shortcomings (mainly the one-dimensionality of their flavor) become apparent. And although I could certainly come by canned blueberry pulp or several kinds of extract from a beer supplier, here I am with fresh berries and an overzealous desire to do everything the hard way.

So I say, "nuts to all that!" If my beer must be purple, so be it! I have fresh berries to use, and as God is my witness, they shall be beer!

Brew #11: Buckeye Blueberry Ale

1 Munton & Fison Export Pilsener kit, hopped liquid malt extract.
1 lb honey (in this case, wildflower honey from local bees, because I'm like that.)
2 lb frozen Ohio blueberries
EasYeast European Ale Yeast, liquid

For this recipe, which was going to be a blueberry wheat until my supplier didn't have any wheat malt, I used for the first time a can of hopped malt extract that does not require boiling before fermentation. To make an all-malt beer, you need two such cans, but since I'm after not only a light-colored but a light-bodied beer, I went with one can of malt extract, one pound of honey both for alcohol and for a dry finish, and whatever sugar turns out to be in the berries.

Since this recipe didn't require boiling, this was an ass-easy brew.

Brought two gallons spring water to a boil and added the berries in a gauze bag. Held for 15 minutes at 160-180 degrees to pasteurize. Added the malt extract and honey and held at 160-180 for ten more minutes to pasteurize the honey, which was probably not necessary but the safe thing to do.

Removed brew pot to an ice bath and reduced to 75 degrees. Added three gallons of room-temperature distilled water to fermentor and added contents of brew pot, including the bag of berries. Poured the wort back and forth to aerate. Pitched yeast at 72 degrees and fitted airlock.

At pitching, this is a pale beer with a dramatic orangy-pinky-purply tinge from all the anthocyanin pigments released from the frozen berries. You ever peed the morning after eating a lot of beets? My beer is that color. Cool.

I don't really expect that very much berry flavor is going to survive the primary fermentation - it's probably mostly going to fly out the airlock with the gases. As such, I'm considering adding another pound or so of berries at the end of primary that will macerate in the young beer and replace the lost berry flavor. This will also kickstart another small fermentation as the yeast eat the fresh berry sugars. If I can figure out a way to pasteurize the berries (maybe by heating them to 20 minutes and cooling them in a sanitary environment?) I'll try this. Or, I might just let it go and see what I get for the minimum of effort.

It's a bit of a mystery as to whether this beer will turn out well. But, if I did everything right the first time, I'd never learn anything.

[wik] Very light body with a orangy-purple color and a light pink head. Flavor is very light, almost watery, buy crisp and tart from the faint berry flavor. Not a home run, but nicely engaging as a glass to drink. I'll need to double the fruit and add in some light crystal malt next time in order to make it really good. On the other hand, the yeast is really nice and I want to see it in something darker for sure.