honey vs honey malt

was thinking about making a honey lager. was wondering what was better to use honey or honey malt???

Honey malt is fantastic. Just like coffee malt. If you want real flavor skip the honey and go with honey malt

Why not use both? I'm no expert but I'm Currently drinking a honey pale ale that used both honey and honey malt in the recipe. It's excellent.

honey malt is best if you are new to recipe formulation because honey can thin and dry out your beer. it only takes a little honey malt to get a good honey flavor.

It really depends on what you're looking for. Honey will almost completely ferment out and leave the beer drier. Honey malt on the other hand will leave a honeylike sweetness behind.

If I want honey flavor I use the honey malt (only about 5% of grainbill), it's pretty potent. If I want a subtle (very sublte) honey aroma and a drier beer, I use honey.


Hope that helps.

First of all, if you are going to have a HONEY whatever, put some actual honey in it!!!

That being said, some Gambrinus honey malt is wonderful.

Like previously posted, why not use both? A pound or two of honey at flameout and say... 4-6 oz of honey malt should do the trick.

Adding the honey at flameout is the key if you want to retain the most honey character that you can.

Pez.

can someone post a link to a recipe or 2 using honey malt? I've got 5 lbs and wouldn't mind using some!

Pezman1 said:

Adding the honey at flameout is the key if you want to retain the most honey character that you can.

Click to expand...

Or add the honey to the primary after things have started to slow down...just dissolve the honey in a small amount of boiled/cooled water, and pitch it in. It will kick up the ferment again for a day or so, and you'll retain a lot of the aromatics that could've been driven of by the primary fermentation.

crazyseany said:

can someone post a link to a recipe or 2 using honey malt? I've got 5 lbs and wouldn't mind using some!

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Just make your own. Recipe formulation is super simple. Or you could find any blonde or cream ale that uses crystal 10 for example, and just sub in the honey malt.

Adding honey doesnt actually add much in the way of honey flavor. It ferments through completely (or close to). If you want to dry it out then...well this will do it.

I dont have access to honey malt, but from what i've heard if you want honey flavor, just use honey malt.

If you are kegging I guess you can add a small amount of honey at kegging time and add potassium sorbate and KBS (which stuns yeast and stops it fermenting). This is basically the same as back sweetening mead. A mate of mine had done that once. tasted decent to me but he added a bit too much honey.

honestly...just use honey mead

Use honey malt in the grain bill then bottle with honey. I have had fantastic success JUST bottling with honey and getting the aroma and flavor, so both will make it an intricate part of the beer.

thanks for all the advice. i think i will use both. use honey malt than add honey when going to the secondary.

crazyseany said:

can someone post a link to a recipe or 2 using honey malt? I've got 5 lbs and wouldn't mind using some!

Click to expand...

Here's the one I recently brewed. It's an extract kit from MoreBeer. I altered it slightly by moving the honey addition to flame-out rather than start of the boil. It turned out great. Nice honey notes. My wife and I have made quite a dent in the keg already.

Jim Rossi's Honey Pale Ale

Style: American Pale Ale
Type: Extract Calories: 175
Rating: 0.0 Efficiency: 70 %
IBU's: 9.75 Boil Size: 5.57 Gal
Color: 8.0 SRM Batch Size: 5.00 Gal
Boil Time: 60 minutes
Estimated Actual
Brew Date: - 02/26/2012
OG: 1.053 1.055
FG: 1.017 1.008
ABV: 4.72 % 6.16 %
Serve Date: 03/31/2012 / /

Fermentation Steps
Name Days / Temp Estimated Actual
Primary 14 days @ 68.0°F 02/26/2012 02/26/2012
Secondary 0 days @ 72.0°F 03/11/2012 03/17/2012
Bottle/Keg 14 days @ 74.0°F 03/17/2012 03/17/2012

Grains & Adjuncts
Amount Percentage Name Time Gravity
4.00 lbs 50.00 % Munton's Light LME 60 mins 1.037
0.50 lbs 6.25 % Munton's Light DME 60 mins 1.046
0.50 lbs 6.25 % Honey Malt 60 mins 1.037
3.00 lbs 37.50 % Honey 1 mins 1.035

Hops
Amount IBU's Name Time AA %
0.50 ozs 9.34 Cascade 60 mins 5.50
0.50 ozs 0.40 Cascade 1 mins 5.50

Yeasts
Amount Name Laboratory / ID
1.00 pkg English Ale White Labs 0002

Additions
Amount Name Time Stage
1.00 oz Whirlfloc Tablet 05 mins Boil

Mash Profile
(none)

Carbonation
Amount Type Beer Temp CO2 Vols
4.05 oz Corn Sugar - Bottle Carbonation 74.0°F 2.30

Notes
Steep Honey Malt as water is heating, remove at 170 degrees.

www.iBrewMaster.com

Pezman1 said:

First of all, if you are going to have a HONEY whatever, put some actual honey in it!!!

That being said, some Gambrinus honey malt is wonderful.

Like previously posted, why not use both? A pound or two of honey at flameout and say... 4-6 oz of honey malt should do the trick.

Adding the honey at flameout is the key if you want to retain the most honey character that you can.

Pez.

Click to expand...

I did this last night.

Recipe:

2lb Wheat Malt
3lb Pale 2-row
0.25 lb Honey Malt

3lb Wheat DME (65% Wheat/35% Pale)

1lb Clover honey at flameout

1.5 oz Willamette 3.7% AA (60)
0.5 oz Centennial 9.7% AA (15)
0.5 oz Willamette 3.7% AA (1)

US-05

I'll have to wait and see how it comes out.

I had some amber ale, ready for a secondary, so i added 24 oz of honey to it. When i added it a bunch of stuff started floating on top. Is this ok????

will keep you posted on how it turns out. had another idea could i have put it in the bottles when i bottled the beer???

you can bottle with any sugar but the amounts vary.

I've bottles with honey lots of times. I use 7 ounces, and it turns out just right. It might be a little more or less carbonated each time, but the volume of brew is also changing slightly when I'm bottling.

3 tablespoons per gallon is pretty spot on. I use four because I like them overcarbed. If you run into a non-uniform batch (aka 5.25 gallons) just remember that a tablespoon is three teaspoons, and a tablespoon translates to about 21 grams of honey (could be 27, i don't have my notes with me)

I brewed a honey wheat beer a few days ago. In the past I've been unable to get honey flavor and aroma due to adding honey after flameout. This time I'm adding 12% (1lb) quality wildflower honey directly to primary after fermetation tapers off. I included 2% honey malt in the grain bill as well, for extra insurance. I also mashed high and included 9% rye malt to keep some body, since its only 1.048 OG and I don't want the high amount of simple sugars to thin the beer out. Looking forward to sampling this one!