Question About Using Maple

I made a batch of this a few months back: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f81/newells-groundhog-cider-woodchuck-amber-clone-85887/

It turned out great, but I'd like to make a maple version. Any advice on how to add maple syrup to the recipe would be most appreciated. I'm apprehensive due to the amount of sugar. A local winery makes a maple cider that tastes great and I'd love to be able to come close to replicating that.

Maple syrup is 100% fermentable, and the vast majority of the maple flavors blow off. A technique I use is to add lower grade (B or C) maple syrup, which has more maple-ness, and add it at high krausen. The maple flavor remains tiny though, and tends to dry out the beer. Consider getting an organic maple extract and adding (careful not to over do it) to a sample, then upscaling the "dose" to the whole batch. That is the only way I have found to get the maple flavor I want.

It takes a couple of tries to find the flavor YOU are looking for.

Thanks for the reply. I suspected as much, or at least, I was afraid of that. I'll experiment with both and see how they turn out.

StoutLover said:

I made a batch of this a few months back: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f81/newells-groundhog-cider-woodchuck-amber-clone-85887/

It turned out great, but I'd like to make a maple version. Any advice on how to add maple syrup to the recipe would be most appreciated. I'm apprehensive due to the amount of sugar. A local winery makes a maple cider that tastes great and I'd love to be able to come close to replicating that.

Click to expand...

You could stabilize your cider once it's done fermenting then adding maple syrup. That way the syrup doesn't ferment at all. I would imagine you would end up with a lot of maple flavor that way, but it would also add sweetness.