Campfire Ghost Story Beer (critique please)

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

teucer

Well-Known Member
Joined
Sep 17, 2011
Messages
136
Reaction score
6
Location
Durham
For Halloween weekend, I'm looking to brew a beer that conjures up the idea of sitting around a campfire swapping ghost stories. I'm looking for something black or nearly so, reminiscent of s'mores in having a toasty base character with strong chocolate notes. I'm also looking to get a muted but woodsy hop aroma, a warming quality, and a little bit of roasted or even smoky flavor, to call up images of a campfire, along with a hard-to-pin-down unusual feature to put drinkers a little bit off their guard - this is a horror beer, after all. I also like the idea of keeping the gravity sessionably low; a good campfire with good ghost stories can last late into the night, and the beer should do the same.

I'm open to suggestions of a different way to do this, but my current thought is a Southern English brown with a little bit of chili pepper for heat. Here's my draft of a recipe:

7# Maris Otter
1# chocolate malt (UK)
1/4# caramel malt 60L
1/4# roasted barley
(estimated OG 1040, color 33L)

1/2oz Northern Brewer 60'
1/4oz Northern Brewer 10'
(18 IBU per Tinseth)

Wyeast London ESB yeast

I'm undecided about how much chili pepper to use, but I was thinking of adding it along with the second hop addition so as to keep the aroma present but understated.

Any input?
 
Southern Brown per the BJCP should have less roasty notes and more caramelly notes. Note that there are a lot of people who argue that the whole Southern/Northern separation between brown ales isn't as clear cut (if it exists at all). This looks more like a brown/robust porter. Which is great, since fall IS porter time.

My recommendations would be:
1) Get rid of the roasted barley
2) Lower the Choc a tad (you are in very roasty brown porter territory here)
3) Up the crystal to 3/4 a pound to a whole pound
4) Don't add chili to this please pretty please.

Biscuit would be a good addition for some graham cracker and nuttyness. Something like half a pound.
 
Southern Brown per the BJCP should have less roasty notes and more caramelly notes. Note that there are a lot of people who argue that the whole Southern/Northern separation between brown ales isn't as clear cut (if it exists at all).

I think the distinction is a lot stronger in BJCP style guidelines than in English real ales, yes.

This looks more like a brown/robust porter. Which is great, since fall IS porter time.

Yeah, this isn't really a beer where I necessarily want to be precisely to style for anything, but I definitely want it to be appropriate to late fall. Brown ale and porter both fit that intention nicely, and if it lands somewhere in that range I'll be quite happy.

My recommendations would be:
1) Get rid of the roasted barley
2) Lower the Choc a tad (you are in very roasty brown porter territory here)

Hm. Since I want something to remind me of fire, wood smoke, and s'mores, I'm definitely trying to get a reasonable amount of a roasty or even smoky character as well as the chocolate notes; I was even thinking about using black patent malt instead of the roasted barley. How about replacing the roasted barley with black patent, and only using an ounce or two? Alternately, losing the roasted barley entirely, how much smoked malt should I use if I want it as a subtle smoky accent rather than making something that tastes like a rauchbier?

3) Up the crystal to 3/4 a pound to a whole pound

At that quantity, I usually want to be using two colors. How about 1/2# C60, 1/4# C120?

The one thing I'm a little nervous about for such a thing is that, while I like the flavors crystal can give me, I still want a relatively dry finish. Something heavier on the dark malts and lighter on the caramels will do that; I'm definitely going to want to keep it to under 10% crystal.

4) Don't add chili to this please pretty please.

I'm not sure if I would like to or not, but if I do it would be a very small amount to get a subtle warming sensation. I'm very definitely not looking to brew a chili beer.

Biscuit would be a good addition for some graham cracker and nuttyness. Something like half a pound.

Ooh. Good call.
 
I only use roasted barley for dry stouts and color in bitters. I have never found it to give any smokyness unless you are using the 500L+ stuff in good dosages. Black patent in small amounts might work, it's your beer after all :D, but I don't see it adding smokyness. Chocolate malt never tasted much of chocolate to me either.

3/4 of a pound of C-60 would do it for me. Split it if you want. I wouldn't bother, but I get heartburns if I see more than 2-3 speciality malts in the Beersmith window :D You can always mash a tad lower, add sugar or just use an attenuative strain if you want a drier finish. My special bitter is 1.040 and uses a shade under 10% of crystal, but I control my attenuation by the amount of sugar I add and the strain I use (I mainly mash at 155F). It always finishes @ 1.009-1.011, depending on the strain.

The chili is personal preference. The beer has enough going on without adding non-beer related stuff in it. I'm far from a Bavarian purist, I use sugar in pretty much all my brews, but I draw the line at chili :D

If I could offer up a yeast suggestion, wy1275 Thames Valley would make a marvelous beer in this, especially if you want a drier finish.
 
I only use roasted barley for dry stouts and color in bitters. I have never found it to give any smokyness unless you are using the 500L+ stuff in good dosages. Black patent in small amounts might work, it's your beer after all :D, but I don't see it adding smokyness. Chocolate malt never tasted much of chocolate to me either.

I've always thought of chocolate malt as tasting like chocolate in the same way roasted barley tastes like coffee - there are some flavors in common, but you're not going to mistake it for a beer that has actual chocolate in it.

Large amounts of black patent taste like ash to me. I'd never use more than a tiny bit for exactly that reason, but it's why I thought of it. Smoke doesn't really seem essential here, though I am considering using some smoked malt. (If I did, it wouldn't be very much - I don't want this to be a rauchbier - and I would definitely leave out the chili pepper.)

3/4 of a pound of C-60 would do it for me. Split it if you want. I wouldn't bother, but I get heartburns if I see more than 2-3 speciality malts in the Beersmith window :D

Heh. I tend not to want to use too many ingredients either, although the Caribbean stout I made had quite a few and came out very nicely.

You can always mash a tad lower, add sugar or just use an attenuative strain if you want a drier finish. My special bitter is 1.040 and uses a shade under 10% of crystal, but I control my attenuation by the amount of sugar I add and the strain I use (I mainly mash at 155F). It always finishes @ 1.009-1.011, depending on the strain.

How much sugar do you use in that? 1.040 and just under 10% crystal seems like about what I'm going for here myself.

The chili is personal preference. The beer has enough going on without adding non-beer related stuff in it. I'm far from a Bavarian purist, I use sugar in pretty much all my brews, but I draw the line at chili :D

My rule of thumb is, everything in a recipe other than the water needs to be targeted to flavors you feel are at the core of the beer. When I use sugar, it's because I'm brewing something that needs a lighter body than its gravity might suggest, such as a strong Belgian; while I'm waffling on the chili in this, if it goes in it's because a warming quality would do well at creating that campfire feeling.

If I could offer up a yeast suggestion, wy1275 Thames Valley would make a marvelous beer in this, especially if you want a drier finish.

I've never used that one, but reading the description on Wyeast's website it looks like an excellent suggestion.
 
If you are after smoke consider adding liquid smoke to the secondary. It is basically water that has wood smoke driven through it. It is commonly used in beef jerky marinates and BBQ sauce. Should be in your local grocery store next to the BBQ sauce.
 
If you want smokiness, how about a little cherrywood smoked malt?

That could be delightful. I don't want a rauchbier or anything else strongly smoky, but a subtle smoke character would be entirely appropriate. I've never brewed with smoked malts before, but one of my local microbreweries has a smoked porter where 15% of the grain is smoked over hickory. That's too much; it tastes like I'm drinking an ashtray (although in a porter some of that may actually be from black patent malt, now that I think about it). But I could see doing something in the 2-5% range.
 
I use anything from 5% to 10% sugar in my special bitters, depending on the yeast strain used, but bitters tend to need a lighter body to get the initial bitter impression and counterbalance the maltyness/crystal.

I use liquid invert, which is very easy to make if you have a good candy thermometer (something I didn't have for my first go and I ended up scorching the sugar):

1) One pound cane sugar, cover with water. 1/4 tsp of cream of tartar is used as an acid.

2) Boil off excess water. Once the temp starts ramping above 235F, you'll know you have boiled off a good chunk of the excess water.

3) Keep between 240F and 245F for 20-30 minutes. This is where the mixture becomes a syrup. If you go above 250F, add water again and keep it at 240-250F for an additional 10 minutes: this will get it "thin" again in the jar.

4) OPTIONAL: you can cook the sugar further by allowing the temperature to raise above 250F. This will darken it and open up new flavours. Ramping up to 325F will produce a good all around amber syrup. You just have to ramp it back down to 240F-250F by water addition and hold it there for a few minutes. It'll get back to syrup form. If not, the syrup becomes a brick that is hard to work with.

Straight cane/demerara sugar will also work: I invert mainly for the color contribution and because I love the process. I have only used invert in the last 3 batches I have done. All my other bitters used cane or even table sugar and they also came out good.

1275 will probably attenute just fine without any sugar though.
 
So here's the current draft of the recipe. It's got a lot of ingredients, but they each have a specific purpose.

6# Maris Otter - because you need a good base malt
3/4# chocolate malt (UK) - for color, and for the rich roast and chocolate notes it clearly needs
3/4# caramel malt, 80L - just dark enough to fit the theme, without being all 120 which seemed a little much to me
1/2# biscuit malt - to give it that bready, graham-cracker undertone
1/4# cherrywood-smoked malt - a couple percent is an accent, rather than making a true smoke beer, but it definitely captures the campfire idea. I may up this to 1/2#.
1/4# rye malt - a friend suggested this one to give it that faintly off (in a tasty way) quality I think makes sense with the ghost story idea. It's not enough rye to taste like rye, but it'll give it the rye mouthfeel. I may omit this entirely.

Same hop schedule. No spices or peppers, and Wyeast 1275 for a dry finish. Thoughts?
 
Omit the rye malt entirely. I get what you are doing here, but you have a lot of other stuff going on, plus 4oz of rye malt won't do anything.

I don't have any experience with smoked malts, sorry.
 
So here's the current draft of the recipe. It's got a lot of ingredients, but they each have a specific purpose.

6# Maris Otter - because you need a good base malt
3/4# chocolate malt (UK) - for color, and for the rich roast and chocolate notes it clearly needs
3/4# caramel malt, 80L - just dark enough to fit the theme, without being all 120 which seemed a little much to me
1/2# biscuit malt - to give it that bready, graham-cracker undertone
1/4# cherrywood-smoked malt - a couple percent is an accent, rather than making a true smoke beer, but it definitely captures the campfire idea. I may up this to 1/2#.
1/4# rye malt - a friend suggested this one to give it that faintly off (in a tasty way) quality I think makes sense with the ghost story idea. It's not enough rye to taste like rye, but it'll give it the rye mouthfeel. I may omit this entirely.

Same hop schedule. No spices or peppers, and Wyeast 1275 for a dry finish. Thoughts?

--I'd skip the biscuit, since the MO base malt will do most of that work for you. Plus, I think you're a bit high on specialty grains in this recipe.
--I would also keep the smoked malt very restrained. I was thinking 2 ounces for a little je nais se quoi, but not enough so a fellow brewer asks you, "hey, did you use smoked malt?"
--Consider flaked rye instead of rye malt. You'll get the flavor contribution, build body, and increase head retention.

Have you considered Fuggles for your hops? That earthiness might be the loamy, earthy flavor you're looking for.

The more I think about it, the more I think you should modify Orfy's Mild Mannered Mild recipe with a bit of smoked malt added. It seems to hit on all cylinders for what you want.
 
Have you considered Fuggles for your hops? That earthiness might be the loamy, earthy flavor you're looking for.

I like the woody quality of the Northern Brewer, but the earthy Fuggles would also be a good fit. I've also thought about Pride of Ringwood if my local shop has them, though I know the variety only by reputation.
 
I'm glad that you took the chili out. If you've ever ordered an IPA with a spicy dinner at a restaurant you know what I mean. One thing that I've wanted to try is to add roasted bell peppers or anaheim peppers to a beer. (Roasted bell pepper = if you have a gas stove, put them directly on the burner -- no pan -- until the outside is slightly burnt so you can peel the skin off and it smells delicious). These peppers have good pepper flavors and would contribute a roasted flavor without the heat. That said, this is something that I've wanted to try -- I've never actually done it.

I'd suggest upping the smoke malt to 15 - 20% based on past experiences with Briess cherrywood malt. Actual campfires are very smoky, not just subtly smoky.

The only other ideas I have for campfire-related beers:
* I ate a lot of cobbler and pudgy pies when I was in Scouts, so if you add cherries or peaches to the secondary that could be a good touch. If you go this route, reducing the smokiness would likely be advisable.
* When backpacking, I like trail mix. If you think more in terms of a nut brown with raisins and chocolate (either from malt or cocoa powder). A beer like this would be tasty by itself, but with a touch of smoked malt it would likely be delicious.
 
I'm glad that you took the chili out. If you've ever ordered an IPA with a spicy dinner at a restaurant you know what I mean. One thing that I've wanted to try is to add roasted bell peppers or anaheim peppers to a beer. (Roasted bell pepper = if you have a gas stove, put them directly on the burner -- no pan -- until the outside is slightly burnt so you can peel the skin off and it smells delicious). These peppers have good pepper flavors and would contribute a roasted flavor without the heat. That said, this is something that I've wanted to try -- I've never actually done it.

Yeah, that's not something to do for this beer, but it's an experiment I'd love to try. (I do my roasted red peppers on the grill. I peel them, puree them, and make risotto out of them.)

I'd suggest upping the smoke malt to 15 - 20% based on past experiences with Briess cherrywood malt. Actual campfires are very smoky, not just subtly smoky.

Hm. I'm not trying to make something where people go "this tastes like smoke," because I want it to be friendly to non-beer-nerd drinkers and because even as an enthusiast I don't care for the smokiest beers I've ever had. But I also don't think I want to get subliminal, with nobody realizing there's any smoke in it at all.

How would you describe the level of smokiness with the cherrywood malt at different quantities, based on beers you've brewed? This will be my first time using smoked malt.

The only other ideas I have for campfire-related beers:
* I ate a lot of cobbler and pudgy pies when I was in Scouts, so if you add cherries or peaches to the secondary that could be a good touch. If you go this route, reducing the smokiness would likely be advisable.
* When backpacking, I like trail mix. If you think more in terms of a nut brown with raisins and chocolate (either from malt or cocoa powder). A beer like this would be tasty by itself, but with a touch of smoked malt it would likely be delicious.

Darker crystal malts might also give me a nice raisiny touch. Maybe I should bump it up from the 80 I have specced now to 120.
 
(I do my roasted red peppers on the grill. I peel them, puree them, and make risotto out of them.)
Doing it on the grill would be infinitely easier.

I've never thought of using roasted peppers for risotto. Thanks for the tip!

Hm. I'm not trying to make something where people go "this tastes like smoke," because I want it to be friendly to non-beer-nerd drinkers and because even as an enthusiast I don't care for the smokiest beers I've ever had. But I also don't think I want to get subliminal, with nobody realizing there's any smoke in it at all.

How would you describe the level of smokiness with the cherrywood malt at different quantities, based on beers you've brewed? This will be my first time using smoked malt.
I don't want to give you the impression that I'm a master of smoked malts as I've only used it twice myself. Before that, the only smoked beers I had were Schlenkerla. To my taste, their beers are too smoky since the smoke completely overwhelms any other flavors. In addition, I can't get over how much the beers taste like meat based on aroma association.

As a result, I limited the smoked malt to 20% of my grain bill the first time I used it (in a smoked stout). You could tell there was smoke in it, but it wasn't overwhelming and I didn't get any sausage associations. My second smoked beer used 32% in a smoked pale ale, and that was even more smoky but it still wasn't overwhelming.

That said, smoke isn't for everyone and tends to induce "love it" or "hate it" responses with little middle ground.
 
Back
Top