Indian spices in beer

I have an Indian (i.e. NOT Native American) friend who wants to fool with adding some Indian spices in his beer. He texted me over the weekend to say he picked up pudina and lemon. I'm not sure exactly how to go about this one. Pudina is a species of mint that they often use to make chutney.

I was thinking of starting with a wheat beer base. That's about as far as I've gotten. Lemon zest (soaked in a small amount of vodka)could go in secondary. I'm not sure how to incorporate the mint. I could try out some hops that have more spicy and earthy notes rather than floral notes and that could balance it, perhaps?

Please gimme some help on this one... recipe needs to be extract (w/ or w/o specialty grains) based and has to be an ale as I can't lager right now. Would be even better if a kit from Northern Brewer is recommended as they're still 15% off for a couple of days.

Maybe a Belgian WIt?

seriously? Indian... INDIA PALE ALE!

I would make a very mild IPA and incorporate the mint flavor to be a cool aftertaste if you could manage it.

My first thought was wheat beer. You could try coriander as well, although it does cover some of the same ground as the lemon. Some people have described Northern Brewer hops as being minty, so maybe there's a tie in.

Mosher's Radical Brewing has a recipe for a Chocolate Mint Stout that might give you insights on how to use mint. You can probably search this site for it.

Go for a little cardamom in an extract IPA, either at flameout or as a "dry hop" in the fermenting vessel. I haven't done it personally, but have seen a couple recipes that use it. Plus, I love cardamom, so will probably have to try it myself soon

McGarnigle said:

My first thought was wheat beer. You could try coriander as well, although it does cover some of the same ground as the lemon. Some people have described Northern Brewer hops as being minty, so maybe there's a tie in.

Mosher's Radical Brewing has a recipe for a Chocolate Mint Stout that might give you insights on how to use mint. You can probably search this site for it.

Click to expand...

Might be too much like Sunset Wheat.

Cardamom can be quite nice in a stout.

So we brewed up my buddy's beer today. I let him play brewmaster on this one and I think he's gonna have 5 gallons of nasty brew to drink but whatever. I tried to talk him into brewing as normal then adding stuff in secondary but he wasn't having any of it.

We used the NB Chinook IPA kit and followed their recipe exactly with some Indian additions. At the beginning of the boil, he added 1/3 oz of mint leaves and juice from two limes. At 10 minutes left, he added 2 oz of Jal Jeera masala (mostly tamarind and coriander) and 1 oz of salt. We then completed the boil as normal and put the carboy away for fermentation.

I'll be sure to let y'all know how this one comes out but I really don't have very high hopes for it. I told him that I'm not kegging this one. We're gonna bottle it instead so he can "take it home with him". I'm certainly not taking more than 12 bottles of this one!

Perhaps next time you could use some cinnamon, cloves and cardamom and make a chaIPA.

I tried to talk him into chai but he didn't want to go that route either. Whatev, it's hit money to blow.

so how did it turn out? i'm really curious as i have been playing with this idea as well...

It probably won't be too bad since he added the stuff to the boil, the flavors may not even come through. The first idea of a lemon/mint wheat probably would have been good.

Mahopma, Punjabi export and Pale India Ale. All Dogfish Head brews with India spices... Look them up for some ideas. My buddy is visiting his inlaws in Rehoboth and said they must be on an India kick since they're all on tap now.

How'd it turn out?

Sorry I never replied in this one. I REALLY did not like this beer... at first! After fermenting for a month or so then kegging and leaving it there for nearly a month, I still didn't like it. Then I bottled it off of my keg and gave 45 bottles to my buddy. He brought some back for me a couple of weeks later and they're actually quite good. The saltiness is odd but it's fairly faint. The nose is REALLY weird due to the coriander and dried mango playing off of the chinook hops. The flavor is quite good, though.