Bacon Beer

Hey everyone!

I really want to try to make a bacon beer. I love beer and I love bacon, so why not both together?

I wanted to get anyone's thoughts on what type of beer would make the best bacon beer and then anything else you think would make it awesome.

Let me hear it! Thanks!!

Check the "similar threads" down there VVVVV Or search as well, search is your friend.

A Rauchbier or smoked porter.

Or maybe something with maple syrup. Maybe make a pancakes and bacon beer that has wheat, maple and bacon. Well...I don't know how you get bacon in the beer, I think you want to stop short of adding meat to your fermenter, but I'm sure you can figure something out.

This may be dumb, but what if you put bacon fat into the fermenter? It won't ferment, but I would think it might impart a flavor? Although it could add a strange variable since it won't mix with the wort...

I'm sure some more brew-ducated dudes around here will shoot that down...

I love em both too. Sounds very interesting, you'll have to let us know how you do it and how it turns out.

I've always wanted to market a bacon scented air spray. Make your house smell like bacon every morning without calling the EMT's for a triple stent angioplasty procedure.

Just what I need, a way to make beer even tastier..... From what I've read, the fat won't allow the head to form when you pour.

Dry hop with bacon? lol

People make bacon vodka. IIRC, the alcohol can dissolve the fat for the taste? I don't know if beer would have enough ABV for that though since vodka is generally 40% alcohol and beer is 4%.

Some West Coast/Rockies mirco brew/brew pub did this. Very popular as a 'novelty' so popular they made a 2nd batch. Wait a quick goole search and I got http://***********/component/resource/article/2060-breakfast-beers-bacon-beer so there is some food for thougt ...

Mmmm Bacon.. it's not just for pancakes anymore..

The great bacon flavor comes from smoke and salt. You don't want salty beer, but you can add the smokiness with smoked malt.

My gut says that if you use real bacon, it'll mess up the head retention.

I was at a beer fest in Boston over the summer and sampled some bacon beer made by Berkshire Brewing Company (I think) and it was the second worst beer I've ever had. You might want to try some before you make 5 gallons. I really wanted to like it but it was just too much.

This recipe seems to have done pretty well for a few as a bacon beer. DubbelDach won a first place at some sort of bacon festival with it.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f77/cherry-beech-smokebeer-157818/#post1818961

Jsamp said:

Dry hop with bacon? lol

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Or Dry Hogging... I love that term...can't take credit, it was in a BYO article a little over a year ago.

JonM said:

My gut says that if you use real bacon, it'll mess up the head retention.

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I'd agree with this. Lipids (fats) are generally greasy, and grease does bad things for head retention.

That being said, I'd definitely go for a darker beer (stout, porter, maybe even a dunkelweizen) otherwise the bacon could impart overwhelming flavors that may not be intended. Also adding some maple syrup in secondary could help bring out the flavors you are looking for.

One of the oddest beers I've had would have to be three floyds ham on rye. Not exactly bacon, but if you want to taste piggy in your beer they have simulated the taste very well.

Mikkellers Beer geek breakfast "bacon" I had this a while back in Belgium and it was extreme smoky stout and it was awesome....Just in small amounts I wouldn't do a 5 gal batch of it...

six row brewing in st louis make a bacon porter. as far as i understand it, they takea slab of fresh smoked & cured bacon, trim off all the fat, and plop it in a cask for a few hours, then start pouring. people say it tastes awesome, never tried it myself as they have only ever done it twice, and both times the cask was empty extremely quickly.

I did a video beer review on this with my friend ' the bag lady ' HAHA beer geek bacon or on my bottle it says rauch beer breakfast [ame]http://www.youtube.com/user/epicbeerdude?feature=mhee#p/u/0/2CGoOmsb3aQ[/ame]

I think "Fagedda bout it". Drink real beer and have some of this as a chaser..

Sorry.. not sure how to post a smaller pic.. but, hey, this makes me drool too

I second the Rauchbier, it won't be an authentic "bacon" beer, but it will have the same smokey taste that bacon has, add some maple syrup, possibly condition with it and you're good to go.

I had this same dream for a while until I tried the smoked wheat beer from this brewery: http://www.schlenkerla.de/rauchbier/sorten/sortene.html

It's the closest I've had to a "bacon beer" without actual bacon. Tasty but it can get old quickly. The one bar near me has bottles of it, glad to have tried it but it has satisfied my desire to make said beer

frydogbrews said:

six row brewing in st louis make a bacon porter. as far as i understand it, they takea slab of fresh smoked & cured bacon, trim off all the fat, and plop it in a cask for a few hours, then start pouring. people say it tastes awesome, never tried it myself as they have only ever done it twice, and both times the cask was empty extremely quickly.

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I had it and it was great! I talked to the brewers and they had the bacon cured and dehydrated in a special way that removed all the fat out of it. It was very tasty and did not last long, only a couple of hours!

I made a bacon bourbon porter that turned out very well. First I infused bourbon with bacon and bacon fat for about a month. Then I filtered the bourbon through a coffer filter and poured it into the porter (already fermented). At first the bacon flavor was not very noticeable, but after a few months the bottle the bacon flavor really came out.

on my birthday we made a smoked porter from AHS, after primary was done we bought a pound of Shoulder cut salt cured bacon, then we baked it on parchment paper. tried to get out as much fat as we could. we then put the bacon in a corny keg and racked the beer on top of it and let it age for a week. bottled it almost three weeks ago and have stolen 3 bottles to see how its coming along. so far its tasting really good.

I would probably roll with a smoked porter. And infuse it the way Pivovar Koucky stated he did his. I would think this would give you good odds of a successful bacon porter.

Hernando said:

I would probably roll with a smoked porter. And infuse it the way Pivovar Koucky stated he did his. I would think this would giv eyou good odds of a successful bacon porter.

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Turned out really well for me, but save a couple bottles for a few months and you'll really be impressed with the bacon flavor.

I dry hopped with bacon. Flavor was too intense so I diluted it with another beer. Came out pretty good but took a long time to taste good, tasting it early had me worried that I'd made the worst beer ever.

You can also do really cool infusion (i.e. Bacon Bourbon) using the iSi cream whipper. Change out the CO2 for an N2O cartridge. It is one of the most efficient ways to do an infusion of any kind and you can really get creative with it. The process using this method is called cavitation. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cavitation

You would throw a fully cooked bacon slice in with some Bourbon, charge the canister, release the pressure as rapidly as possible. And, you have Bacon Bourbon without the wait or mess. I would also think this would reduce the amount of oils you would add to your beer and give you the most control on how much bacony flavor you could add. You could do this with vanilla, coffee beans, cocoa nibs, mint, strawberries, melon, basil, etc... using any alcohol (or oil for non-beer projects/experiments)

Just another thought for infusing.