Adding chili peppers to secondary?

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pnj

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I made a batch of Ed's Haus Ale and I'd like to split the batch and add chili peppers to one of the secondarys. I'll have about 2.5 gallons in each secondary. I'll be adding fresh peppers, which I will roast first.

I was thinking 2 Jalapenos and 3 or 4 Anahiem Peppers(green).

I was going to boil them for a second or two before dumping them into my beer.

Thoughts on this? more peppers/less peppers/different peppers/etc?

thanks.
 
Sounds interesting. If it were me, I'd probably de-seed them too. Another idea would be to soak them in vodka for a while and add the pepper-infused vodka to the secondary instead of the peppers themselves.
 
I worked for Twisted Pine for a while and their Billy Chile beer had a wide assortment of chilies to give it more flavor including Habanero's. They did not preboil as the alcohol in the secondary will take care of anything trying to grow. What are you looking for in the beer, flavor, heat, both? It's really going to be an experiment for just 5 gals.
 
The vodka method is excellent. I also like to roast 'em first. I think you have about the right amount of peppers. The combination of jalapeno & Anaheim is a good one...
 
it's a five gallon batch split. with half getting the peppers, so 2.5 gallons of pepper beer.

I'm not going to use Vodka. So do I just need to roast (I use my stove top) and then dump them in the secondary?

FWIW, I'll be leaving the seeds in. I'm looking for a little heat and some flavor. I eat peppers everyday and can kill habanaro based hot sauce bottles in a couple of days.


I guess I'll have to see how hot the peppers are that I'm using and hope I have enough.
 
The peppers will vary from crop to crop, so that is a variable you'll need to consider. I taste the peppers to check the heat. I use 5-7 jalapenos in mine depending...with your taste buds, I'd say at least 7...

I talking about a 5 gal batch for me, so you might not want that many in 2.5 gals. You have to make that decision based on judgement.

I roast the peppers for 20-25 minutes at 300F.

Good luck with it.
 
I roast mine on my stove top. It takes less time and I like the way the peppers come out better. Prolly doesn't matter if I'm adding it to beer though..
 
I roast mine and add them skin, seeds and all into the secondary. The roast flavor is an important component in my chile beers, as is the pepper flavor. Heat is less important to me. It should be there but balanced for the drinker/brewer's personal taste. I use between 500 and 600 grams of New Mexico Green Chile (Anaheim varieties) per 5 gallons. I prefer a mild chile so I can get lots of flavor without the over the top heat.
 
Okay, so I read all these posts and now I have a couple questions. I obviously wanted to start a chili beer but I'm not sure exactly what I'm doing. I want the more heat, less flavor (but would like both) and I want the base beer to to a stout. Is a cream stout a good base beer? It won't be really creamy, but I would most likely use lactose and oatmeal for the cream and body of the beer. I also plan on doing a small batch (2 gallon) of this beer as well, since it's experimental.
 
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