Beer Forum

Been having a lot of people over so far this summer and many of the wives have been drinking Summer Shandy. I don't like summer shandy but a watermelon wheat beer sounds ok. Has anyone tried this beer? I'm just looking at something like this.

OG 1.045

60% 2-row
40% wheat
Bittering with Magnum to about 20 IBUs
WLP 001

Then I have no idea how much watermelon to add. I read somewhere that a 1.5 lb per gallon works. My plans were to get 7-8 lbs and juice the fruit, freeze it and add to secondary to let ferment out again.

Is there a Session where Sully talks about Hell or high water?

Thanks in advance.

I tried it for the first time this past weekend actually (it only recently became available in Georgia). I was surprised at how much like a watermellon flavored Jolly Rancher it resembled, somewhat milder in smell, but pretty close in taste. It should be noted that I'm not a big wheat or fruity beer fan, but the packaging was so awesome that I had to pick up a six pack and give it a try. The base beer seems like it's a pretty run-of-the mill American wheat beer and I didn't detect any of the typical banana or clove esters common in so many wheats. I don't have it in front of me, but I seem to recall that the can states it has watermellon added as both fruit and concentrate.

bingo!

blueberry wrote:Been having a lot of people over so far this summer and many of the wives have been drinking Summer Shandy. I don't like summer shandy but a watermelon wheat beer sounds ok. Has anyone tried this beer? I'm just looking at something like this.

OG 1.045

60% 2-row
40% wheat
Bittering with Magnum to about 20 IBUs
WLP 001

Then I have no idea how much watermelon to add. I read somewhere that a 1.5 lb per gallon works. My plans were to get 7-8 lbs and juice the fruit, freeze it and add to secondary to let ferment out again.

Is there a Session where Sully talks about Hell or high water?


Thanks in advance.

Nice I need to make this since I can't taste the real thing over here

I know 2 guys who have both made a tasty watermellon wheat. One added a significant amount (>1 gallon i believe) of watermellon juice to the secondary and got great results. The other did that, got good flavor, but his aroma was lacking and used watermellon extract to enhance the aroma.

I made this beer last year for our Oktoberfest event, and it was very well received. Pretty much exactly the same recipe you have here. I bought a round, seedless watermelon about 15" in diameter, and scooped out all of the pulp into a large ziplock freezer bag. I didn't weigh it, unfortunately. I froze it for a couple of days, then mashed it up really well, put it into a carboy and racked my beer on top of it. It turned the beer pink for a couple of days. Since this keg was tapped and emptied within about an hour's time, I don't know how well it'd keep long term, but it tasted a lot like 21A's.

When I tried a watermelon wheat beer, I just made a standard German hefeweizen (extract kit), pitched with WLP300 for 6 days in primary, then racked it on top of 6 cups fresh pressed watermelon juice into a secondary for 6 days, and finally bottled. Five gallon batch.

I chopped up a medium sized watermelon with a knife, mashed it into a bowl, then strained the juice. I put that into the secondary carboy and then racked the hefeweizen onto the top of that.

Turned out very well and I'm going to make it again soon.