Has anyone tried caramelizing lactose?

I am working on a creme brûlée stout recipe. The beer has been made, 1.100 down to 1.025 with 4 ounces of lactose in the boil. I want to add some dark caramelized sugar to give it that burnt sugar element. I started thinking about the idea of caramelizing lactose, as it is not fermentable and so maybe more of this flavor I'm after will stick around. I did a little research, and was pleased to find that not only will lactose caramelize but that it tends to hold volatile aromas longer than other sugars, as per this article
http://www.usdec.org/files/pdfs/US08D_08.pdf
So I'm excited! Has anyone tried anything like this? I am thinking that along with the vanilla beans, the lactose and caramelized sugar I should be able to pull off some sort of a custardy burnt sugar thing. I'll post results to this thread - maybe this will work!

I haven't tried anything like this, but it sounds like it would be delicious. I'll be adding lactose to my banana split stout whenever I get around to brewing it, so your post has prompted me to consider trying your idea out. If you do it before I do, let me know how it turns out and I will do the same if I brew it before you do.

Sounds fair! I may do it this weekend but likely it will be next.. Or next I'm pretty backed up.

Yeah, same here. I've got a lot of brews planned, but this idea is so exciting, I may bump my English pale ale to do this. It would make a better fall/winter beer anyway.

Cool idea! I can't wait to hear more about it. I'm all for caramel! Beer and caramel = win win!

Hmm...haven't done anything like this either but also am curious how it turns out. Would you be willing to post your full recipe and comments when you are done with it? Sounds like it would be a fantastic cold weather brew.

ColumbusAmongus said:

Hmm...haven't done anything like this either but also am curious how it turns out. Would you be willing to post your full recipe and comments when you are done with it? Sounds like it would be a fantastic cold weather brew.

Click to expand...

Yes I will once it is done. I'll post it up in the recipe section and link back to here.

Well, just so you know, it may be easier and more flavorful to caramelize regular sugar. Lactose doesn't have much flavor by itself- ever stick your finger in the bag and taste it? Once you caramelize regular sugar it becomes unfermentable- if you caramelize it, all that flavor is going to stay in your beer.

it has some funk - never done it in beer - but I've had this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunost

ekta gjetost (ekta yaa-toast) which is goat milk. It's basically cheese made out of caramelized whey.

daksin said:

Once you caramelize regular sugar it becomes unfermentable- if you caramelize it, all that flavor is going to stay in your beer.

Click to expand...

Pretty sure that is what he is going for.

daksin said:

Well, just so you know, it may be easier and more flavorful to caramelize regular sugar. Lactose doesn't have much flavor by itself- ever stick your finger in the bag and taste it? Once you caramelize regular sugar it becomes unfermentable- if you caramelize it, all that flavor is going to stay in your beer.

Click to expand...

What source says that caramel is unfermentable? I know whatever has carbonized won't ferment, but I'm pretty sure everything else will.

Well, lactose is already unfermentable as it is, so caramelization wouldn't change that. But after a quick search, daksin seems to be correct. The reactions that occur during caramelization form higher molecular weight sugars that I'm assuming are unfermentable.

EDIT: After thinking about it a bit, this actually makes some sense. When you caramelize sugars in the boil, that flavor also remains, so it's not unreasonable to expect caramelized sugar added during or after the boil to exhibit the same behavior.

Interesting. I may have to try an experiment with that sometime. It would be easy and cheap to caramelize a little sugar and see if it it fermentable.

Yeah. I would be interested to know how that turns out.

More research! Apparently table sugar doesn't take part in Maillard reaction because it is not a reducing sugar. I'm not sure exactly what constitutes a reducing sugar, but table sugar isn't one while lactose is one. This means that caramelized lactose would have a multitude of yummy flavors from the Maillard reactions while table sugar would just taste like caramel. This makes the decision for me... lactose!

I'm feeling smarter and smarter about this

bottlebomber said:

I'm feeling smarter and smarter about this

Click to expand...

Seriously! This is such a great idea and now I am even more excited by it than I was before. I've got to wait just shy of a month before I can try this in a brew, but I am going to make some lactose caramel this weekend and see how it tastes. If all goes well it will end up in my Banaynay Split Imperial Stout.

EDIT: Just to put it out there, apparently the Maillard reaction requires the reducing sugar in the presence of amino acids, so I am going to make it with skim milk to keep the fat out of the beer. I'm not sure how much lactose there is in skim milk, but I'm pretty sure it's not enough to get a good flavor out of the caramel. I'm probably just going to use a standard caramel recipe but use lactose (obviously) and skim milk instead of water.

Last fall I threw together a four pound batch of homemade syrup from the directions in this thread,https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/20-lb-sugar-jar-yeast-nutrient-114837/. I subbed a pound and a half of lactose for table sugar and it made some pretty darn tasty syrup. I made the double cooked syrup and the reactions seemed to happen at a lower temperature than what the recipe indicated. I am wondering if maybe the sugars in lactose don't convert at a little lower temperature. Or maybe my thermometer is off, but something to keep in mind when you make your caramel.
I used my syrup in a Dubbel Style Cider experiment, and it fermented down to 0.995 so I think cooking the lactose broke the sugars down so they were fermentable, but the flavors were there and that is what we are looking for.
The cider turned out darned tasty, btw, better than I dared hope for.

You are correct. In my above mentioned research, I did read that lactose caramelizes at lower a temperature than table sugar. I assume the same is true of the Maillard reactions. Also, it's encouraging to know your syrup came out super tasty.

I like this thread, i was going to attempt a creme brulee stout, but was going to reduce my first runnings, i may use your guys route instead if it turns out to be the best way.

Carmel Amber.. Very first AG brew. Its good til the last couple of drinks,I have a Slight Yeasty after taste,,Over all Very happy with it...

Painty said:

Carmel Amber.. Very first AG brew. Its good til the last couple of drinks,I have a Slight Yeasty after taste,,Over all Very happy with it...

Click to expand...

You used caramelized lactose for this? If so, how much?

bottlebomber said:

You used caramelized lactose for this? If so, how much?

Click to expand...

Made a Syrup out of Table Sugar / Water. Cooked it down till it hit right temp... Became really thick and Carmel Tasting and colored also. Cooked til 290* was hit.

Painty said:

Made a Syrup out of Table Sugar / Water. Cooked it down till it hit right temp... Became really thick and Carmel Tasting and colored also. Cooked til 290* was hit.

Click to expand...

I've out caramel in beer before, and caramelized wort but never lactose. That's what we want to do! Congrats on your first AG beer

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f66/caramel-amber-ale-167880/ This is the one we made.

bottlebomber said:

I've out caramel in beer before, and caramelized wort but never lactose. That's what we want to do! Congrats on your first AG beer

Click to expand...

Thats why Brewing is so great... Doing different methods... TY... I would like to know how it turns out if you attempt a Lactose Carmel~ization..

Painty said:

Thats why Brewing is so great... Doing different methods... TY... I would like to know how it turns out if you attempt a Lactose Carmel~ization..

Click to expand...

Your subscribed. My wife just found my 2 lbs of vanilla beans I hid from myself and I'll get a pound of lactose with my MoreBeer order on Tuesday so it's time to move this baby to secondary. Stay posted for results. I want to do a dry caramel method but I'm a little leery because I'll only have the one pound so I can't mess up, so I'll probably do a wet start caramel.

So I tried doing a lactose caramel with skim milk this weekend. Let's just say I wouldn't want F up perfectly good beer with whatever it is I made. I think the best course of action is going to be to use a straight lactose syrup and caramelize it. Using the skim milk to have proteins present for Maillard reactions didn't work out as planned. Next time I hit up the LHBS I'll grab some lactose and see what I can do with it. I'm excited to hear about your results, bottlebomber.

I just used a pound of table sugar, a few tablespoons of water, and a drop of lemon juice. Heated it slowly until the mixture melted and caramelized, then added it to my wort.

It was hard caramelized, not a syrup. And it dissolved well in the wort.

Lactose caramel sounds interesting. Looking forward to getting more info on it.

nukebrewer said:

So I tried doing a lactose caramel with skim milk this weekend. Let's just say I wouldn't want F up perfectly good beer with whatever it is I made. I think the best course of action is going to be to use a straight lactose syrup and caramelize it. Using the skim milk to have proteins present for Maillard reactions didn't work out as planned. Next time I hit up the LHBS I'll grab some lactose and see what I can do with it. I'm excited to hear about your results, bottlebomber.

Click to expand...

Supposedly you can use DAP to get the necessary nitrogen for a maillard reaction.

I wasn't planning on adding dairy to it. I'll probably use about a 1/2 cup of corn syrup and a few tablespoons of water. One thing I am very interested in is seeing how the sweetness is - lactose is around 1/5 as sweet as table sugar. That is fine, as my beer has stabilized at 1.025, which is plenty sweet to my taste for a big ol' stout. I'm going to do this on Wednesday. I will post pics.

bottlebomber said:

I wasn't planning on adding dairy to it. I'll probably use about a 1/2 cup of corn syrup and a few tablespoons of water. One thing I am very interested in is seeing how the sweetness is - lactose is around 1/5 as sweet as table sugar. That is fine, as my beer has stabilized at 1.025, which is plenty sweet to my taste for a big ol' stout. I'm going to do this on Wednesday. I will post pics.

Click to expand...

17% is the figure, so 1/6 Most of its use in beer is more to add body rather than sweetness, but most homebrewers don't seem to be very aware of that fact.

emjay said:

17% is the figure, so 1/6 Most of its use in beer is more to add body rather than sweetness, but most homebrewers don't seem to be very aware of that fact.

Click to expand...

That's true, it is usually referenced for back sweetening etc but it doesn't really add much perceived sweetness. Like maltodextrine. I'm not trying to use it to increase sweetness, more for an aromatic quality which I am *hoping* it will provide. Splenda is probably a good non-fermentable sweetener but there's no way in heck I'm putting that crap in anything I would serve to a friend.

For some reason I can't remember, I was looking up the Maillard reaction the other day and found some pertinent technical information. Yes the maillard reaction requires amino acids, but caramelization does not. There are two kinds of browning of sugars in cooking, one involving amino acids (maillard) and one that doesn't (caramelization)

I might try to caramelize some straight lactose myself. Sound's like a fun experiment. I caramelize sucrose for my Belgian dark strong.

So I got my stuff today, and I did it. I feel like it was a big success, and it basically accomplished just what I was after. I decided to sack up and use a dry caramel method. I don't know if that was the best idea, as this stuff behaves MUCH differently than table sugar when it is caramelizing. I had crystallization from hell because I was paranoid about burning it, and stirred about 10x more than I would have if I was making regular caramel. In the end I took it right to where I wanted it, just shy of burnt. One thing that I found very strange was that when sucrose is caramelized, it gets perceivably less sweet as it caramelizes. But with this lactose, it seemed the opposite. It tasted bland and chalky while dry, but rich and sweet when caramelized.
I am very happy with the experiment so far, now I just need to see if the flavor will hold up in the beer. When I was done I put about a pint of water back in, dissolved the caramel, chucked 3 Tahitian vanilla beans in and then put it into secondary and racked my brûlée stout onto it.

BTW, I got 2lbs of lactose for $4 at iHerb.com, if anyone is interested. It was some deal for new customers only.

emjay said:

BTW, I got 2lbs of lactose for $4 at iHerb.com, if anyone is interested. It was some deal for new customers only.

Click to expand...

Heck yeah I'm interested! That's like 1/4 if what MoreBeer charges. I haven't checked out that site but I'll bet they had a lot of other things I need.

bottlebomber said:

Heck yeah I'm interested! That's like 1/4 if what MoreBeer charges. I haven't checked out that site but I'll bet they had a lot of other things I need.

Click to expand...

Trying to find the deal I used but I can't find it. I'll keep looking, though.

bottlebomber said:

Heck yeah I'm interested! That's like 1/4 if what MoreBeer charges. I haven't checked out that site but I'll bet they had a lot of other things I need.

Click to expand...

Good grief... That's IP status right there. I guess I was a little excited.

Okay, found the deal, but it actually comes out to $4/lb for two pounds. So it's $8, because the shipping is $6 (though it's free if you spend more than $20). Still good, but without the shipping it'd be a *killer* deal at only $1/lb. You can also get only 1lb for just the cost of shipping ($6), but because 2lbs is the better deal, I'll explain it that way.

So... how to get 2lbs of high quality lactose to your door for $8:

1) Go to the following link: http://www.iherb.com/Now-Foods-Healthy-Foods-Lactose-Milk-Sugar-1-lb-454-g/657

2) Add 2 of them to your cart.

3) Use the coupon code BUY123 (gives $5 off your first order; $10 if you spend over $40)

4) ?????

5) Profit!

As I originally mentioned, the deal (actually a coupon) is only good for first time customers. Not quite as awesome as I originally thought - or even awesomER, depending on what you were expecting - but it's still by far the best price you'll find on lactose. Apparently I bought it just over a year and a half ago, so I doubt there's any urgent need to buy it before the coupon "expires".