Strawberry and blueberry flavoring

[brewbush]

I am looking for a good quality flavoring of both the above. I made some strawberry and blueberry dragon blood and after they have both fermented completely the fruit is much less then I had hoped.

I will be backsweetening and I know it will bring out some of the fruit flavor but I want a bit more.

Any suggestions to a brand anyone has used?

 

[Turock]

Many of these flavorings are not the best to use in wine. Flavorings for candy can give an off flavor. Someone might know of one of these flavorings that works well, but I've never found one.

One of the best ways to improve flavor is to get yourself some bags of frozen fruit and do an f-pac. Mash the fruit up, add some sugar, then place it in a nylon bag and allow all the juice to drain out, then add this to the carboy. Because you need to use sorbate when you do this, add the f-pac only after the wine is clear. Sorbate does not work well when wine is cloudy and too many yeast cells are present.

GSF has lots of this frozen fruit if you're having trouble finding it elsewhere.

 

[Boatboy24]

I've tried flavorings in beer. I bought a blueberry flavor from Midwest (IIRC) for a wheat beer I made a while back. It was bad. On that same batch, I also tried McCormick's raspberry extract. Also bad. I think Turock's suggestions is a good one. You could also look at the concentrates offered by Homewinery.com. I used their Blueberry and Merlot concentrates to back sweeten a blueberry port. Worked nicely. They are not cheap in small quantities though.

 

[wineforfun]

Few thoughts before you add flavoring.
a. Have you backsweetened the DB yet?
b. Is the DB bottled?
c. How many lbs. of fruit per gallon did you use?

If you haven't backsweetened, you need to and then let the DB sit in the bottles for 2-3mos. At this time the fruit flavor starts to really come forward.

 

[the_rayway]

I used LorAnn Orange Oil in a mead and it tastes wonderful at 2.5 years. It is a completely natural oil (essential oil).

I have no idea about how the blueberry and strawberry oils are, but here is a link to the company page: http://shop.lorannoils.com/shop-all-products/more-natural-flavors

 

[Bergmann]

Not bashing Dragon Blood, But lets face it. The stuff is not Chateau de Rothschild. I mean how bad could 2 oz. of Brewcraft flavoring hurt it. I had some skeeter pee that had been doctored with some and it was not half bad for skeeter pee.

 

[willie]

After I back sweetened a batch of Blueberry Dragon Blood (Blue Blood) 12lbs. of Wyman's frozen wild berries this last November and it was then 2 months old. My wife and I tasted it and agreed it needed more Blueberry flavor. So I ended up putting in 3oz. of Brewer's Best Blueberry Flavoring. Not quite a full 4oz. bottle to get the flavor we wanted. It worked great and was a big hit with friends and family. It is all gone now.

Will

 

[brewbush]

Few thoughts before you add flavoring.
a. Have you backsweetened the DB yet?
b. Is the DB bottled?
c. How many lbs. of fruit per gallon did you use?

If you haven't backsweetened, you need to and then let the DB sit in the bottles for 2-3mos. At this time the fruit flavor starts to really come forward.

No not yet. I am at the "aging" step with both my strawberry and blueberry DBs. Added the sorbate, kmeta, etc. The only thing left to do is let clear a bit more, sweeten, and bottle.

For the strawberry I did 7# for the 6 gallons batch. And 9.5# blueberries for the batch.

 

[wineforfun]

No not yet. I am at the "aging" step with both my strawberry and blueberry DBs. Added the sorbate, kmeta, etc. The only thing left to do is let clear a bit more, sweeten, and bottle.

For the strawberry I did 7# for the 6 gallons batch. And 9.5# blueberries for the batch.

Ok, that explains the lack of flavor, if it hasn't been backsweetened yet.
Few things I would recommend.
I would double, at least, that strawberry amount next time as 7# isn't near enough. Strawberry doesn't give alot of flavor to begin with.
The blueberry amount may be enough.
Also, don't sorbate until the wine has cleared(I know the recipe calls for it ahead of time, but you should really wait until it is clear).
After you backsweeten it, you will notice alot more flavor than you currently have and after 2-3 months in the bottle, you will notice even more.
As a general rule, when I make DB, I use 1.5# of mixed berries per gallon.