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Date: 07 Sep 2006 15:04:04
From: Scotty B
Subject: Help with "Holiday" Brew
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I've been throwing ideas around in my head all day and thought I should
get this out before I forget everything.
I was thinking of making a spiced holiday/winter brew, perhaps with
cranberry. From what I've been able to find, it is best to chop up the
berries and add them to the secondary prior to racking (suggested
amounts of cranberries seem to vary by taste, but more often than not
I've seen that people say "I'll use less cranberry next time" so 2
lbs-ish?).
Other than that, I've looked at possible spices. I certainly won't use
all of these, but here's a list of possible ingredients I've come up
with (in no particular order):
orange zest (lemon?), cloves, cinnamon, almond, vanilla, ginger, honey,
cinnamon, coriander, allspice, ginger, cardamon seed, chili peppers
(for warmth), maybe some chocolate. I think that's it. Oh, and perhaps
a non-fermentable sugar (which is it, fructose/lactose?) for a bit of
sweetness to counter the tart of the cranberry.
Anyway, if anybody has any suggestions as to how to put some of these
together in a potentially delicious combination please let me know. I
should note that I may be aquiring several 4L jugs (just over 1 gal)
and I am open to experimentation, divying the batch by five and using
said jugs.
Thanks as always,
Scotty B
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Date: 07 Sep 2006 15:40:01
From: changey
Subject: Re: Help with "Holiday" Brew
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Scotty B wrote:
> I've been throwing ideas around in my head all day and thought I should
> get this out before I forget everything.
>
> I was thinking of making a spiced holiday/winter brew
My only advice, from brewing one batch last year:
DO NOT GET CHEAP AND USE IMITATION VANILLA EXTRACT. Use the real
stuff.
I still have 4.5 gallons sitting here from last year, and I can't even
choke it down. Sad, becuase it is around 8% (it was called a
barley-wine by the recipe guy), but I can't even drink it to get
drunk-like. Stomach turner.
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Date: 08 Sep 2006 14:47:40
From: John 'Shaggy' Kolesar
Subject: Re: Help with "Holiday" Brew
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On 7 Sep 2006 15:04:04 -0700, <michaellasalle@gmail.com > wrote:
> I've been throwing ideas around in my head all day and thought I should
> get this out before I forget everything.
>
> I was thinking of making a spiced holiday/winter brew, perhaps with
> cranberry. From what I've been able to find, it is best to chop up the
> berries and add them to the secondary prior to racking (suggested
> amounts of cranberries seem to vary by taste, but more often than not
> I've seen that people say "I'll use less cranberry next time" so 2
> lbs-ish?).
The one time I did a cranberry beer, it was just a fruited wheat beer, IE
no spices or anything. I wanted the berries to be the main flavor. I'd
have to check my notes, but I think I used around 4 lbs in the secondary.
It was actually a pretty good beer. I used a Wit yeast and the tartness
of the yeast really complimented the berries. The flavor was strong
though. If you want to spice it as well, you'd probably want to back off
on the amount of fruit from what I did.
Crushing was a pain because I hadn't thought about it until I started
adding them. Usually when I make a fruited wheat beer I use raspberries
or blueberries. With those I just freeze them ahead of time to break the
skins and drop them right in. It's not quite that easy with cranberries.
I'd definitely plan ahead on some way to crush/chop them.
John.
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