Jan 2, 2012

Hefe-WIT-Weizen! (Fruli Clone) status: GONE!!

My wife doesn't drink beer but she does enjoy Belgian made Fruli.  Fruli is a Wit (white) beer made with 30% strawberry juice.  At first I thought this meant fermenting a ton of strawberries with the beer but soon realized after some research that Fruli is blended with a fresh strawberry juice just prior to packaging.

I plan to successfully brew a new style of wheat beer made with 50% alberta 2-row base malt instead of belgian or continental pils malt.  I also plan to ferment this beer with a Weihenstephan yeast instead of a Wit yeast to combine the two styles: German Wheat and Belgian Wit.  The grist will resemble the wit style with oats and wheat and will be lightly 
spiced with coriander and fresh orange or tangerine zest.  I also plan to ferment this style cooler than usual at 17C and also pitch a large healthy starter to subdue ester production from this yeast.  Just a subtle touch of banana, pepper, and cloves is all I am going for.  

Finally, when the beer is ready, I will blend a 30% fresh natural strawberry juice with the beer.  In order to do this without it fermenting I will have to do my blending immediately prior to drinking.  This means force carbonation from CO2 and no bottling of the Fruli Clone.  However, this also means I will still have a great base beer to drink and could bottle some of the newly created "HEFE-WIT-WEIZEN"!  I look forward to this new creation and may even enter it into competition.  If the beer doesn't have a decent resemblance of either style, I can enter it into the specialty category where other experimental beers can be entered ;)


Hefe-WIT-Weizen (Fruli clone Base)
16-A Witbier
BeerTools Pro Color Graphic
Size: 7.0 gal! Originally planned for 6 but oh well, more beer!
Efficiency: 75.0%
Attenuation: 75.0%
Calories: 168.62 per 12.0 fl oz



Original Gravity: 1.043 (1.044 - 1.052)
Color: 2.1 (2.0 - 4.0)
Alcohol: 4.5?% (4.5% - 5.5%)
Bitterness: 16 (10.0 - 20.0)

Ingredients:
5.0 lbs Standard 2-Row
5.0 lbs White Wheat
1.0 lbs Oat Flakes
0.25 lbs Light Munich Malt
0.5 lbs Rice Hulls
1.0 oz Sterling Hops (6%) - added during boil, boiled 60 min
1 tsp Corriander crushed - added during boil, boiled 3.0 min
1 tsp Orange zest - added during boil, boiled 3.0 min
0.5 L WYeast 3068 Weihenstephan Weizen

Notes:
Standard Alberta 2-row instead of continental pils.  Wit Grist with Hefewiezen yeast fermentation.  To be blended with 30% fresh natrual Strawberry juice and force carbonated immediatly prior to drinking IE: Fruli Clone.  Procedure: Mash 155F 60-90 min until conversion.  Ferment cooler than usual 17C with heatlhy active starter to reduce ester production.




6 comments:

  1. so...how did it turn out?!?! inquiring minds want to know!!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. How did this turn out for you? Sounds really good.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wow Im sorry. I had no idea I had comments "pending" on this post.

    This Beer turned out fantastic! Unfortunately I couldn't find real strawberry juice anywhere. I guess this makes Fruli even more special. The keg went down at party with only a few of us drinking it. Fresh and full of yeast made the flavor wonderfully citrus with a ton of esters. I did not sit down to "judge" this beer so may have ignored any faults that may have taken some serious concentration to find. However was this beer any better than Hefe or wit on their own?? Its hard to remember now but I don't think so. It's not something I will brew again. I'd stick with Wit I think. Im pretty sure this beer resembled wit more than Hefe when we drank it.

    Sorry for the late response!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Funnily enough my attempt at a Fruli clone started much the same way yours did. My girlfriend isn't a beer drinking, but likes Fruli.
    I just bottled mine (and I took a slightly different approach from you), hopefully it turns out well. If you're curious you can read about my attempt here: http://royalcitybrewing.blogspot.ca/

    Thanks for the inspiration!

    ReplyDelete
  5. What type of strawberry flavouring did you end up adding and how much?

    ReplyDelete