Watermelon Wheat

[dj1984]

Im thinking of making a watermelon wheat, i had one at the 21st amendment brewery in the US a few months back and it was very tasty and refreshing and with summer not to far away i would like to get this one right so i can enjoy all summer.

If anyone has done something like this i would like to know how you went about it??

This is what i have so far nothing to fancy as its a wheat.

2.5kg pale malt
2.5kg wheat malt
2kg watermelon for secondary
bittered and flavour with liberty to 18 IBU's

american wheat yeast

Now do you think this is to much watermelon??

 

[alkos]

Quick idea: why not brew slightly stronger, like 1.055-1.065 and dilute with pasteurised watermelon juice to taste, after the fermentation?

 

[Josh]

I did one and a lot of my friends liked it. Including my gf who isn't a big beer drinker.

Just a few tips...

I used 1 x watermelon per fermenter. Dropped my original wheat beer recipe a bit because of the sugars from the watermelon.

Trap for young players: Don't just put the watermelon loose in your fermenter, it'll be a bitch to rack your beer through the tap. If I did it again, I'd use a hop bag or something.

One of the beers seemed to pick up some wild yeast from the watermelon. So I'd consider pasteurising your watermelon before adding to the secondary. Alternatively, you could leave the crushed up innards of a watermelon out under a fruit tree for a day and make a watermelon funk.

If I made this beer again I'd:

Make about a 1.040 wort with 50% wheat, 45% pils, 5% melanoidin for a little more sweetness.
Pasteurise the watermelon in a pot of boiling water, then add it in a hop bag into the primary after a few days fermentation.
Consider using a neutral yeast like 1056 for an American Wheat style, instead of muddying things with 3068. Not sure the phenols from the wheat beer yeast work well with the watermelon flavour. Probably wind up doing a double batch using both types of yeast.

Good luck, interested in hearing how it goes.

 

[dj1984]

I have read somewhere that pasteurising watermelon seems to get rid of the flavours and aroma of the watermelon, so i think im best to chuck it in secondary and just leave it at that

 

[dj1984]

anyone else have info on this??

 

[Nick JD]

anyone else have info on this??

I recall somewhere reading that watermelon beer was awful. Palmer, maybe?

 

[dj1984]

I have had it at the 21A brewery and it was great very refreshing when it is hot.

the only think i worried about is nastys and using too much or too little

 

[Supra-Jim]

Not sure if you've seen this dj, but here is a link discussing a recipe with some info gleaned from 21A:

http://outofkey.com/beer/brewing/watermelon-wheat-recipe/

Cheers SJ

 

[joshuahardie]

IIRC,
21A does not use real watermelon anymore, but use watermelon puree.

Probably due to consistency of flavour reasons.

 

[HoppingMad]

Man this is freaky. Had this brainwave to do a Watermelon Wheat this time last year.

Recipe pretty much identical to OP but used German Noble hops (Hallertau). Quantity of Watermelon was pretty much the same!

I used a grainbag in the fermenter with pulped watermelon in it that was frozen, then pasteurised (quickly heated up to pasteurisation temp of 72.5, held for 2 mins then cooled). Used US-05 with my version. Using a wheat yeast is a waste as the fruit overwhelms the clove characters you'd get anyhow.

All I would say about the beer you wind up with is 'meh' not a great combo. Well mine wasn't.
The stuff tastes like fruit punch - if you have some ladies you would like to serve this to or people who like sweet stuff then make it,
but I don't recommend Watermelon Wheats personally having tried a few different fruit wheat variations now. I struggled to hand away most of my batch on this one. It was clean and fine as a beverage with no infections etc, but was not beer-like in the slightest.

If I was crazy enough to do this again? I would skip pasteurisation. Not pasteurising will mean the beer will go downhill quicker (go sour etc), but the fresh drink could possibly taste better. By pasteurising you get a slight boiled fruit flavour which is a shame and depending on how long you heat the fruit can be more noticeable.

Also watermelon is very, well watery - so you don't get a huge flavour from it the way you would if, say you did an apricot wheat (Try a St Ambroise Apricot Wheat if you can find it - awesome stuff).

Have fun, and I think you'll enjoy the process like I did of making it, and hopefully yours comes up better than mine. Quite a few threads on this type of beer if you trawl the US pages. Some use a watermelon candy instead (I think called Jolly Rancher?) and weird things like that.

Hopper.

 

[drtomc]

I'd save the watermelon for watermelon and ginger wine sorbet and serve it with a nice wheat beer beside it.

T.
ps Man that 3 Ravens USB has some kick.