Adding Oranges to sorghum beer?

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ParkourCat

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I tasted my beer today. 1 week in primary.

It screams "put some oranges in me"

So I wanted to do as I am being told.

The beer needs a few more days to finish fermentation.

When I move it to secondary how do I best add that flavour profile to it?

Do I get 4 or 5 oranges, juice them and pasteurize them and then just add the liquid to my secondary?

It like the summer flavours it has, kinda like a Hefe with some citrusy something on top- on a sunny day.

Any suggestions?

Happy Xmas!
 
I'm going to put orange in my secondary on a chocolate stout. The way I'm going to do it is;
1) I made candied orange peel (got recipe in foodnetwork.com)
2) I'll mix the orange peel with vodka for 2 days
3) I'll drop the mixture in my better bottle and rack on top of it

I figure between all of the sugar and vodka, sanitation should be a non-issue. This isn't a proven method that I know of, it's just an idea I came up with..
 
My sorghum steam beer that I made for my wheat allergic relative for the holidays finished out very tart, a lot like a wheat beer... Honestly it reminds me a lot of Blue Moon, if it were hopped with Saaz.

I think you are on the right track with orange peel, some citrus flavor to go along with the tart character would do it a lot of good.
 
My sorghum steam beer that I made for my wheat allergic relative for the holidays finished out very tart, a lot like a wheat beer... Honestly it reminds me a lot of Blue Moon, if it were hopped with Saaz.

I think you are on the right track with orange peel, some citrus flavor to go along with the tart character would do it a lot of good.

Absolutely. I'd like the recipe too if you dont mind.
 
I'm not entirely happy with it mind you. It really needs some malto dextrine and possibly some oats or something to give it some body. It has a very very weak head to it. Only my first shot at a GF brew.

5 Gallon Batch

6 lbs White Sorghum Syrup
1 lbs Amber Candi Syrup (homemade, not sure on exactly how dark it ended up so far as SRM goes)
1 oz Saaz @ 60min
0.5 oz Saaz @ 30 min
1.5 oz Saaz @ 0 min

Fermented with S-23 for 3 weeks @ 60-65F, 2 day rest @ 72F (not sure if it was needed, just head some bad stories about S-23), 3 day crash @ 32-45F. No secondary, bottled with 160g of Amber Candi Sugar. Ran about 5.5% ABV before bottling.


Again, I'm not overjoyed with it. It also really needs some serious aging, came out extremely green and only now are the hops coming through nicely. Tasted it prior to bottling and if someone had sat a bottle in front of me and made me guess what it was I would have said cider (must be that sorghum twang I've been told about). It has a wonderful aroma which I am very pleased with. Bitterness it right on for me, it is a fairly light beer. Just desperately needs some work on head retention and body. With some work I think it would be a nice hot day mowing the lawn kind of brew.

Moral of the story, don't brew it exactly like I did; the OP is right GF brews scream for citrus. Malto dextrine, orange peel, lactose, oats, orange flower honey, orange juice; I'm going to experiment with a all of them in a few 1 gal batches to see if I can get it the way I want it.

I'm also going to give a Roasted Oat stout a whirl sometime in the next few months when I have an empty fermenter and nothing to do with it. Going to look something like this:

3 lbs White sorghum syrup
2 lbs honey carmalized to ~50 SRM
1 lbs Amber Candi Syrup
1 lbs Roasted Flaked Oats, as dark as my nerves will let me get... I would guess 100-200 SRM
Malto Dextrine and Dexterose into the primary as needed to adjust for how roasting and steeping effects the oat yield and body

1 oz Chinook @ 60
1 oz Fuggles @ 0
 
I just brewed lcassanova's gluten free blood orange, which calls for oranges. In that recipe, which is a 5 gallon recipe, you put the zest of two oranges and the flesh of four oranges (peals and white parts removed) into a half a gallon of water. Heat to 160, let cool, and add to primary.

I don't think it would be too late to do that.
 
I just brewed lcassanova's gluten free blood orange, which calls for oranges. In that recipe, which is a 5 gallon recipe, you put the zest of two oranges and the flesh of four oranges (peals and white parts removed) into a half a gallon of water. Heat to 160, let cool, and add to primary.

I don't think it would be too late to do that.

Did you just use normal orange or blood oranges?
 
I waited and waited for blood oranges to show up in the market, but finally I settled for Cara Cara oranges, which have a pink flesh. I don't know what is going on with the blood orange crop, but I have not seen any sign of them yet.
 
in Washington, blood oranges dont hit until january at the earliest. i've made that blood orange beer the last two februarys and its aweseom, very well received.
 
I've zested oranges and used the zest in a GF beer we call Sunshine in a Bottle. I put the zest in at the end of the boil after the wort has come down to 160*. I hold it there for about 10min, then chill the wort. When I make the non-GF version of this I also use the zest of one lemon. But with the citrus flavor often so present in sorghum based beers, I skip the lemon zest for the GF version.
 
5 Gallon Batch

6 lbs White Sorghum Syrup
1 lbs Amber Candi Syrup (homemade, not sure on exactly how dark it ended up so far as SRM goes)
1 oz Saaz @ 60min
0.5 oz Saaz @ 30 min
1.5 oz Saaz @ 0 min

Fermented with S-23 for 3 weeks @ 60-65F, 2 day rest @ 72F (not sure if it was needed, just head some bad stories about S-23), 3 day crash @ 32-45F. No secondary, bottled with 160g of Amber Candi Sugar. Ran about 5.5% ABV before bottling.

did you ever find a way to add body? i might copy this...
 
I'm not entirely happy with it mind you. It really needs some malto dextrine and possibly some oats or something to give it some body. It has a very very weak head to it. Only my first shot at a GF brew.

I agree with plumbob: I just sampled my first attempt at a GF beer (which has been bottled for a week) and the head was almost non-existent. I used Safale US-05 dry yeast in a yeast starter. Does anyone have an idea as to why there's little to no head? Would aging will help?

In addition, added about 10 oranges (fresh juice / peels) to this brew in primary fermentation...little to no orange aroma or taste came through. Perhaps the sorghum syrup is over powering? Any thoughts/ideas?
 
For head, I'd try adding a pound or two of some malted GF grains. I've had great luck with that in all my batches.
 
Yeah, adding grains definitely makes a difference in head retention. Particularly grains with some protein (quinoa, oats, buckwheat have all yielded good results so far for me).
 
Thanks for the advice...I did steep about a 1/2 lb of malted oats in the brew kettle. Waiting another week after bottling (2 weeks total) seemed to improve head retention.
 
Careful with matled oats though. There could be cross contamination if they'r stored/ processed with barley. I, myself, haven't had any issues but someone who is very gluten sensitive/ intolerant could. I'd go with 1 lb of malted quinoa or millet.
 
Careful with matled oats though. There could be cross contamination if they'r stored/ processed with barley. I, myself, haven't had any issues but someone who is very gluten sensitive/ intolerant could. I'd go with 1 lb of malted quinoa or millet.

I'm worried about cross-contamination too, as I'm making the gluten-free beer for my sister with Celiacs, so I may have ruined it (for her at least). I'll have to try the malted quinoa on the next batch...I'm not sure if my home brew store has this, but I may have seen them at whole foods.
 
No, a homebrew store won't have malted quinoa. You'd have to buy quinoa at some place like the whole foods bulk bin and malt it yourself. For a pound or two, it's not too much of a pain to do, but once you start malting 10+ pounds, it becomes a hassle.
 
Back to the zest/head retention parts of this post... My experience with citrus zest - orange or lemon - is that it's an absolute head destroyer. There it a lot of oil in citrus peels. I wash mine in hot water, squeeze and roll them in my fingers (you can see the oil spray out here), wash them again, lightly roast them in the oven, then wash them again, then let them dry out. They're somewhat woody at this point, and can be saved in a paper bag for later use.
 
I'll have to post a pic of my grapefruit IPA...plenty of head on that one, yet with the zest of half a grapefruit added at flameout to a 3-gallon batch! Maybe it was all the maltodextrin I added, but heck, I didn't even use steeping grains and it gets a nice head. It could stand to have a bit longer retention, but it does foam up (and lace!) pretty well.
 
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