Brew night tonight! Cream Ale Round 2

Not a huge concern since i have finished it out once, and for the record it was a fantastic beer. More of a standard beer since i have friends come around that dont have the pallet for many flavors, but this turns out to be a light golden beer with an almost fruity finish (no fruit added though) and turned out at 5.6% so it still had quite a bit of flavor.

Ok heres my question... thinkin about adding a little honey to the secondary once its ready to move. Any opinions if it the yeasties will all come back to life and take all my honey flavor away? I was thinking by putting it in the secondary that i will leave some in the initial trub and by that point the %ABV would be high enough the yeast wont be able to take all the flavor out.

Just curious on the opinions here.

Thanks! Cheers to all.. its gonna be a good night!

I could be wrong about this but I have always heard that honey will not actually add any flavor to the beer, but it will "feed" your yeast and allow the beer to finish with a lower gravity ending up with a dry'er beer. Then again I haven't personally tried it. If a honey flavor is what you're after, you might consider a small addition of a honey malt though as well.

Can you post your recipe? Is it extract, partial mash or all-grain? If you want to add some honey-sweetness and this is either a pm or ag recipe you could add 4-6 oz of honey malt to the grain bill. This may give you what you are lloking for but it is hard to know w/o seeing the rest of the recipe.

Sure i can post the recipe - (Makes 5 Gallons)

4 1/2 lbs. light malt extract
1 1/2 lb. Brewery Grade Corn Syrup
1 lb. domestic six-row pale malt (extract)
1/2 lb. cara-pils malt
1/2 lb. flaked maize
1 oz. U. S. Hallertauer hops (bittering)
1/2 oz. Cascades hops (flavoring)
1/2 oz. Cascades hops (finishing)
1 pkg. Burton water salts
Yeast: White Labs Cream Ale Blend WLP-080
1 pkg. Bru-Vigor (yeast food)

It is an malt extract/grain combination.

I agree on all counts (from experience) with using honey, but that was during the boil and in the primary when all the yeast was hungry and active. My thought was that by waiting and adding it later (in the secondary) there shouldnt be as much yeast left to consume the honey and perhaps leave more flavor to remain. So thats my hope, just curious if anyone had any experience with adding honey to a secondary

Really either way its not a loss... the beer was great the first time, if it doesnt pan out, it will just be a little bit drier and stronger, and might not be quite as good but im sure it will still go down smooth.

The remaining yeast will still ferment the honey and dry the beer out. If you want to retain honey flavor and/or aroma in the final beer, I suggest using a very aromatic variety, such as wildflower or orange blossom, over a more neutral honey like clover.

Also, look into using some honey malt next time around. Honey malt is a very unique malt that adds, as the name suggests, a strong perception of honey-like sweetness to the beer. Good stuff!

Hope this helps a little bit!

I was intending on trying out orange blossom honey...

Damn, i was hoping this would work better. What if i tried a different flavor? Ie a fruit of some sort?

srl135 said:

I was intending on trying out orange blossom honey...

Damn, i was hoping this would work better. What if i tried a different flavor? Ie a fruit of some sort?

Click to expand...

I would suggest just dosing the beer with honey, fruit juice, syrup or whatever else comes to mind when you actually serve it. Or you could turn it into a fruit beer by fermenting fruit or fruit purees in a secondary fermentation, but remember that you'll get none of the fruit sweetness, since the fructose ferments out.

if I were you, I'd add honey malt to the grain bill, and if you're bottle conditioning, prime it with wild flower or orange blossom honey instead of your regular priming sugar.

I don't use honey because once it ferments, it can leave a weird taste. I second the use of honey malt. That's what I use when I want the taste of honey.