Test_Engineer wrote:just buy a few bags of frozen berries from the grocery store and toss them in the secondary and rack on top of it. Most people will freak out that you should steep the fruit for 15 minutes at 160F, but seriously, you are putting a 10% ABV liquid on top of them.
I used Black raspberries from Trader Joes for my cyser this year. Had the cyser on fruit for 2 weeks, next time I think 1.5 weeks would be better. At 2 weeks, you start to pick up tannins from the fruit skins.
I second this opinion...store bought frozen fruit is a far better option than extract alone, is already sanitized, and the freezing has broken the cells open which helps maximize the release of the flavors you are after. The only thing I would add regarding frozen fruit is the option of throwing the thawed fruit in a blender to make a puree in order to help extract as much flavor as possible. The canned Oregon Fruit purees are a great option as well for about $15 per 3 pound can.
It seems that a pound of fruit per gallon of beer/mead/cider is an often recommended starting point but some milder fruits like blueberries (sounds good to me!) and blackberries need significantly higher quantities to contribute much flavor. Just depends on how much fruit character you prefer. One pound per gallon contributes pretty minimal fruit character so I usually use 2 or 3 pounds and often more per gallon of any fruit. In fifteen years of brewing
everyone I have personally spoken to, from weekend brewers like myself to multiple medal winners, has said if there was one thing they would have done differently in their fruit beer/mead/cider it would have been to add
more fruit...I have
never heard anyone say they would have added
less. Of course, more fruit = more cost but I feel the results are absolutely worth the added expense and doubling the amount really only adds a few cents per bottle. After all, I'm not trying to make the absolute cheapest beer/mead/cider I can but the best one I can. But I definitely understand the need to balance the fruit with the pocketbook.
Also, if you are patient enough, you can leave the cider on the fruit for months if you like until all the color (and flavor) has leached out of the fruit. Whether you bottle after a couple of weeks or after several months, if you find you want to boost the fruit aroma when bottling time comes around that would be a decent time to use an extract.
Wow, that ended up being a longer answer than I intended. Anywhoo, hope it helped a little!
<see, it's getting better.