Mesquite Molasses Beer

You pitched on wood? Or am I mistaken?

The syrup is local to Tucson, but that does not signify the source subspecies. If it is desert harvesters as suggested then it has a good pedigree if you will.

I am told the chaff from the annual mesquite flour milling by desert harvesters here in the old pueblo is worth steeping for sugars. They mill in November so I'm going to grab some for the next round.

CeeJay said:

You pitched on wood? Or am I mistaken?

The syrup is local to Tucson, but that does not signify the source subspecies. If it is desert harvesters as suggested then it has a good pedigree if you will.

I am told the chaff from the annual mesquite flour milling by desert harvesters here in the old pueblo is worth steeping for sugars. They mill in November so I'm going to grab some for the next round.

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Yes I fermented on mesquite wood. I do this often with pieces of wine barrel staves. I used mesquite as described in Jack Keller's blog -
http://winemaking.jackkeller.net/wineblog6.asp
Scroll down to August 17th 2005.

Yes to make the syrup, the chaff is what you want to use.

GTG

I checked the ingredients of their mesquite syrup -
sugar, juice from mesquite beans and pods, apple juice, lemon juice, citrus pectin, citric acid. I also put in an inquiry to their site to see what types of mesquite they harvest from.

GTG

Their syrup tastes like syrup. There's some mesquite flavor in there but not like when you roast and make your own extract.

GTG

GTG said:

I checked the ingredients of their mesquite syrup -
sugar, juice from mesquite beans and pods, apple juice, lemon juice, citrus pectin, citric acid. I also put in an inquiry to their site to see what types of mesquite they harvest from.

GTG

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She gets a lot of her mesquite as chaff from the Desert Harvesters after their big events. People have the option to take the chaff from their milling or not, and most choose to only take home the flour. That means it's likely a mix of the trees found here in Southern AZ (mostly velvet). A lot of people know better than to harvest from the south american varieties, so there's probably not a lot of those pods in the mix, but there will be some.

GTG said:

Their syrup tastes like syrup. There's some mesquite flavor in there but not like when you roast and make your own extract.

GTG

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Yep, I've met the owner and spoken with her at farmers markets a few times. All of her products are simply lightly flavored with the local ingredients, none of them have substantial quantities. I had her syrup at one of the desert harvesters pancake breakfasts, and it tasted as much like apple juice as it did mesquite to me.

GTG said:

So I put my pods in the oven tonight at 350 as the article suggests. In about 10 minutes I had smoke billowing from the oven. SWMBO was not happy. I did get some roastiness on the pods, some more than others.
GTG

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I just did exactly the same thing with exactly the same result. I should have re-read this thread before starting, not while the smoke clears from the kitchen.
But they do taste intriguing. I'll use a batch next weekend to brew a pale ale and then a rye ale.

corkybstewart said:

I just did exactly the same thing with exactly the same result. I should have re-read this thread before starting, not while the smoke clears from the kitchen.
But they do taste intriguing. I'll use a batch next weekend to brew a pale ale and then a rye ale.

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I'm guessing that you tried doing this with completely dry pods. The article mentions rinsing before roasting, as do my instructions earlier in the thread.

I always wash mine really well just before roasting or smoking them. Let us know how the beers come out. I've brewed a stout, a wheat, a few different saisons and a really good mesquite smoked, mesquite brown that goes really well with BBQ. I've harvested about 6, 5 gallon buckets of pods this year and am looking forward to creating more new beers with them.

GTG

So mine has been steeping at 150F for 5 hours and show an OG of 1.012. I know it will thicken when I condense it but how long should I steep it to get the max sugars out. I can leave it overnight if I need to.

I would not continue further unless you want to make syrup. Use your steeped liquid as is to add your malt extract to or as your mash water. It sounds like your trying make syrup since you mention it thickening. Just as a steeped extract, it will not be thick unless you want to boil it down and store it as syrup. Do you have a copy of the Zymurgy article about this procedure?

It's that time of year again! Anyone in the southwest with plans for mesquite brews this year?

I have about 10 pounds of dried pods. Planning an English Premium Bitter
Maris Otter
Biscuit malt
mesquite syrup replacing the caramel malt

Kent Goldings
Wyeast ESB yeast

still need to fine-tune the recipe, but trying to accentuate the biscuit/cookie aromas I am getting from the mesquite pods

I do a mesquite smoked, mesquite porter with mesquite honey, fermented on mesquite wood. I think my third try at it may be what I'm aiming for. My first try got a silver at a local competition. I als am planning on using some in a mesquite, Belgian golden with some local mulberries.

GTG

Here’s a bump to revive a dead thread. I can’t wait to harvest my beans