Orange blossom honey

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8dannyB2

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I want to make a green tea ipa with orange blossom honey. I know that honey is very fermentable ad often times completely ferments out. So how can I use it and still get that honey aroma and flavor to complement the tea? Could I use it when kegging? I know I can use honey malt, but the use of the orange blossom is intriguing. Any thoughts?
Cheers
 
8dannyB2 said:
I want to make a green tea ipa with orange blossom honey. I know that honey is very fermentable ad often times completely ferments out. So how can I use it and still get that honey aroma and flavor to complement the tea? Could I use it when kegging? I know I can use honey malt, but the use of the orange blossom is intriguing. Any thoughts?
Cheers
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Honey aroma and flavor comes mostly from honey malt. The orange blossom overtones of the honey will still have some effect on the flavor profile, but there's really nothing you can do to make honey less fermentable. It'll ferment out and you're left with your grainbill and hops to drive the flavor profile. Citra is a hop that has some orange flavor so you might consider using it. Honey malt: fair warning...a little goes along way. It's sweet and it's dark.
 
That being said, is that how breweries get the honey flavors in brews like a honey wit or a honey wheat?
 
8dannyB2 said:
That being said, is that how breweries get the honey flavors in brews like a honey wit or a honey wheat?
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Quantity, quality, and control.

The more you add the more flavor you get. 10% - 20% will really bring through the honey flavor. Quality is very important. There are literally hundreds of brands of honey at stores that are actually not honey at all. Google fake honey to see what I mean. Find a quality brand and stick with it. Finally, the later the better. Some do it at flameout, some as fermentation dies off, others in a secondary. Finally, bottle with it as well.

Personally, I think orange blossom provides the best flavor but it is not the strongest in terms of potency. Buckwheat works the best in my experience but I did not enjoy the flavor as much. Many breweries do honey beers without honey malt and they are very well done. So its possible but takes work.
 
Calichusetts said:
Quantity, quality, and control.

The more you add the more flavor you get. 10% - 20% will really bring through the honey flavor. Quality is very important. There are literally hundreds of brands of honey at stores that are actually not honey at all. Google fake honey to see what I mean. Find a quality brand and stick with it. Finally, the later the better. Some do it at flameout, some as fermentation dies off, others in a secondary. Finally, bottle with it as well.

Personally, I think orange blossom provides the best flavor but it is not the strongest in terms of potency. Buckwheat works the best in my experience but I did not enjoy the flavor as much. Many breweries do honey beers without honey malt and they are very well done. So its possible but takes work.
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Did the buckwheat end up adding a lot of molasses-y flavors? I bought a lb of buckwheat honey for some future beer, didn't really have anything in mind, but when the farmers market is on during the summer I just grab a lb of honey every other week anyway, just grabbed the buckwheat that time.

I'm trying to think of something to use it in, and might just do it in a basic wheat beer nothing fancy. Potentially an Imperial Wheat if the buckwheat will be able to hold up and not get lost in hops and esters.
 
ArkotRamathorn said:
Did the buckwheat end up adding a lot of molasses-y flavors? I bought a lb of buckwheat honey for some future beer, didn't really have anything in mind, but when the farmers market is on during the summer I just grab a lb of honey every other week anyway, just grabbed the buckwheat that time.

I'm trying to think of something to use it in, and might just do it in a basic wheat beer nothing fancy. Potentially an Imperial Wheat if the buckwheat will be able to hold up and not get lost in hops and esters.
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Imperial wheat sounds perfect. I found buckwheat to be a little funky...maybe even barnyard-ish. Slight molasses but not much IMO.
 
I recently brewed an orange blossom cream ale (used 1 lb @ flameout as the adjunct in a 5 gallon batch). The aroma and flavor is really nice-i think it really works great in a cream ale. I think it could also work well in an ipa, although you might want to dial back the finishing/dry hops a bit to keep them from overwhelming the honey. I know a lot of people will tell you to not boil/heat the honey, but it's a lot easier to just add it at flameout, and I still have plenty of aroma and flavor in my beer.

Personally, I probably would leave out the honey malt, just to keep things simple, and to see if the OB honey is coming through on it's own.
 
Calichusetts said:
Imperial wheat sounds perfect. I found buckwheat to be a little funky...maybe even barnyard-ish. Slight molasses but not much IMO.
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The barnyard-ish makes me think of a saison, might be a fun experiment. :fro:

To be on subject of the thread though, recently did an extract kit for my father (I don't know why the difference of 20 dollars wasnt convincing enough for him to let me do all grain) of a honey wheat ale. For accuracy sake, it was American 1010 1 smack pack, 1 oz of saaz or sterling (a hop that starts wtih an S, I wasn't paying that much attention that day evidenced by almost burning the house down during this simple brew). And 1lb of honey, I don't it was orange blossom since it was so friggin dark, added at flame out.

Moral of the story, just bottled on sunday and the final hydrometer sample I took after cold crashing down to like upper 30s, it had a very sweet honey tinge to it that was very delicious, and once the bottles are fully carbonated the sweetness will get cut by the carbonation. I fermented very very warm at 74-76, basically sat it next to a baseboard heater and let it ride (lots of delicious banana notes). So the honey will survive, just depends on a lot of factors.
 
Awesome input gents. I appreciate it. Certainly a lot to think about. I should be brewing this in a few weeks once I nail done a recipe and a plan for the green tea and honey. For the tea I think I'm just going to brew it separately and add it at kegging (the same way I would if adding coffee). The honey, I'm leaning toward adding as fermentation settles down. I don't want to hike up the ABV. Looking for something in the 6-6.5 range. So I figure if I add it late it shouldn't add much, if any, and it should optimize the flavor and aroma im looking for from the honey. My concern with that though would be the consistency of the honey and it just settling to the bottom of the carboy or the honey coagulating. So to avoid that I was thinking of heating up some water and trying to dissolve or at least "thin out" the honey before adding it.
 
As said before, Honey Malt will emulate that flavor pretty well. You can get a better honey flavor from real honey by adding it directly to the fermenter when fermentation slows down since the characteristics of the honey aren't boiled off.

This absolutely does carry some risk of infection, but a lot of people do it anyways. Honey is not really a tremendously good environment for bacteria, although raw honeys can contain some odd things including wild yeast. You can attempt to pasteurize the honey to just over 170 to try and avoid burning it off, but I have not personally tried it.

I will say that honey added to the boil at practically any point in the boil adds nothing more than gravity, at least to my tongue, but I am not a BCJP 10th level Grand Master, either.
 
I just brewed a Red recently that called for 1 lb of honey at flameout. Being that my wife and I both love Orange Blossom, we decided to use that. The flavor is definitely noticeable in the finished product. It added a whole new kind of flavor to the Irish Red that I'm used to. I bought the honey in a 3lb jar from a homebrew store, so it seemed like it was pretty decent quality. Not to mention, the left over honey=mead. We thought the 1lb of orange blossom left the perfect amount of flavor and sweetness. It's been ready to drink for about 2 1/2 weeks, and all i have left is a six pack. Everybody that has tried loves the flavor that it brought to the beer. Good luck with your IPA
 
8dannyB2 said:
Awesome input gents. I appreciate it. Certainly a lot to think about. I should be brewing this in a few weeks once I nail done a recipe and a plan for the green tea and honey. For the tea I think I'm just going to brew it separately and add it at kegging (the same way I would if adding coffee). The honey, I'm leaning toward adding as fermentation settles down. I don't want to hike up the ABV. Looking for something in the 6-6.5 range. So I figure if I add it late it shouldn't add much, if any, and it should optimize the flavor and aroma im looking for from the honey. My concern with that though would be the consistency of the honey and it just settling to the bottom of the carboy or the honey coagulating. So to avoid that I was thinking of heating up some water and trying to dissolve or at least "thin out" the honey before adding it.
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You will absolutely be adding the same amount of fermentables if you add honey, no matter what part of the process you add it. Whether it's at the tail end of fermentation or at flameout it will be the same gravity boost. A nearly finished fermentation honey addition will merely wake up the yeast and they'll go to town eating the sugars from the honey until the sugars are gone. This is how many people get big beers like Belgian darks to finish out. It's a wake up call to the yeasts.
 
The first homebrew I ever had was a honey hefeweizen and it was awesome. I imagine that if you subbed honey for priming sugar in your priming solution more honey flavor would come through.
 
Mindsculptor said:
The first homebrew I ever had was a honey hefeweizen and it was awesome. I imagine that if you subbed honey for priming sugar in your priming solution more honey flavor would come through.
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I used honey for priming in well over 100 batches. You will get a subtle aroma from it but if its a "powerful" beer like a hoppy IPA, it will overpower the honey.
 
I wouldn't worry about the coagulation to be honest, unless its a lager and you put the honey in the fermenter when you've got it in the 40s.

Even then I think if its piling at the bottom, it'll just fall into all of the yeasties sitting at the bottom. The yeast will just dog pile the honey and eat it all up. Imagine it like swimming in a pool and someone turns on a firehose of beer, youll stand up and start drinking the beer as its coming in.

OK, its not like that at all, but I had a dream like that once.
 
jbaysurfer said:
You will absolutely be adding the same amount of fermentables if you add honey, no matter what part of the process you add it. Whether it's at the tail end of fermentation or at flameout it will be the same gravity boost. A nearly finished fermentation honey addition will merely wake up the yeast and they'll go to town eating the sugars from the honey until the sugars are gone. This is how many people get big beers like Belgian darks to finish out. It's a wake up call to the yeasts.
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Well, doesn't that somewhat depend on what yeast your using? If you're using a yeast with a fairly low alcohol tolerance, chances are if you wait until the yeast is about at it's limit, alcohol-wise, and add the honey then, you'll have a sweeter, honey-flavored brew. At least that's the way it seems to me.
 
Newsman said:
Well, doesn't that somewhat depend on what yeast your using? If you're using a yeast with a fairly low alcohol tolerance, chances are if you wait until the yeast is about at it's limit, alcohol-wise, and add the honey then, you'll have a sweeter, honey-flavored brew. At least that's the way it seems to me.
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I think you would only need to worry about that in the upper reaches of beer, over 10%.

Someone else will have to keep me honest on this. But it was my impression that yeast can start to acclimate themselves to the higher alcohol content, so some of the higher alcohol beers even if theyre not using a tolerant yeast can be slow coaxed up to a certain point.

Once they ferment out whats available they go dormant, add more food, they wake back up and so long as the yeast is healthy they can be worked up past their "limit" but only a couple a points.
 
ArkotRamathorn said:
Once they ferment out whats available they go dormant, add more food, they wake back up and so long as the yeast is healthy they can be worked up past their "limit" but only a couple a points.
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But that's just my point. Sure you'll add a little more alcohol, but probably not significantly more, unless you're using an alcohol-tolerant yeast strain. :)
 
Newsman said:
But that's just my point. Sure you'll add a little more alcohol, but probably not significantly more, unless you're using an alcohol-tolerant yeast strain. :)
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So what would be a good yeast strain for not only an IPA, but one that would also lend itself to doing a "late fermentation" addition of the honey?
 
8dannyB2 said:
So what would be a good yeast strain for not only an IPA, but one that would also lend itself to doing a "late fermentation" addition of the honey?
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That depends on how high up the ABV scale you're going, how (un)balanced you want the beer, and the attenuation rate.
 
Mindsculptor said:
That depends on how high up the ABV scale you're going, how (un)balanced you want the beer, and the attenuation rate.
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I'm looking to be somewhere in the 6.5-7% range. Right now with my first draft of the recipe I'm at 66 IBU. I figured between the green tea and the hop additions, it would be a bit on the bitter side, so I was looking to compliment that with the sweetness from the honey.
For the recipe, this is what I have:
6# Marris Otter
5# 2 row
.75 Crystal 20
.5 Carafoam
1oz Pacific Gem @60 min
1oz Cascade @ 20 min
1 oz crystal @ 15 min
1oz Hallertauer @ 15 min
1oz Sorachi Ace-dry hopped
And either dry hopping the teas leaves or cold brewing the tea and adding at kegging.
 
Newsman said:
Well, doesn't that somewhat depend on what yeast your using? If you're using a yeast with a fairly low alcohol tolerance, chances are if you wait until the yeast is about at it's limit, alcohol-wise, and add the honey then, you'll have a sweeter, honey-flavored brew. At least that's the way it seems to me.
Click to expand...

Sure, but I assumed since its an IPA he'd be using an ale yeast. And he said he was looking for the 6.5-7% range, so my advice is still pretty solid.

I've plenty of experience brewing big beers with honey, and I'm not trying to be argumentative, or looking for an academic debate, but you're just not going to get all that much flavor from honey itself in a beer like the OP is making. IME, you have to use honey malt if you want a notable honey flavor in an ale with moderate to high levels of hops.

8DannyB2,

The lowest alcohol tolerant ale yeast I know of is WLP008 East Coast Ale. But it's still going to wake up to a late fermentation addition of honey at the abv you're targeting. My best advice to you is above.

:mug: to everyone.
 
jbaysurfer said:
8DannyB2,

The lowest alcohol tolerant ale yeast I know of is WLP008 East Coast Ale. But it's still going to wake up to a late fermentation addition of honey at the abv you're targeting. My best advice to you is above.

:mug: to everyone.
Click to expand...
I will definitely give the honey malt some serious thought. I know that it is the easiest way to get the honey flavor but knowing how stubborn I am I just might stick with the orange blossom. I enjoy doing more challenging brews.
 
Well, I would suggest White Labs WLP023. One of its flavor notes is clover honey. It's going to be a balancing act, though, because I have a hard time seeing you loading the recipe down with so much honey that the yeast kills itself from excess alcohol production. And if you do, you're going to have to force carb it.

What you could do, however, is use honey malt, WLP023, and honey together. I have no idea what orange clover tastes like, but I know that the contributing factors for the taste of non-pasteurized non-clover honeys are in the other stuff besides the yummy sugar we all love. I would also suggest that, if you can manage to compartmentalize the honey's flavor profile, that you select hops which will accentuate the honey flavors.

Finally, tea is a great addition to this beer, in my view. Honey goes awesome with tea, however I have a couple final suggestions. First, don't use cheap black tea, find a good blend from a place like Teavana and order four ounces. Second, if your tea is bitter you've over-steeped it. Third, maybe try steeping the tea in your HLT kettle and let the boil down concetrate the flavors.
 
Mindsculptor said:
Finally, tea is a great addition to this beer, in my view. Honey goes awesome with tea, however I have a couple final suggestions. First, don't use cheap black tea, find a good blend from a place like Teavana and order four ounces. Second, if your tea is bitter you've over-steeped it. Third, maybe try steeping the tea in your HLT kettle and let the boil down concetrate the flavors.
Click to expand...

Looking at WLP023, I will more than likely use this yeast. Sounds awesome and perfect for what I'm trying to accomplish.
As far as the tea, I ordered tea from an online retailer similar to Teavanna. I forget the name at the moment. My initial thought with the tea was to do as you were suggesting and basically brew it in my HLT and use it for my mash and sparge, but was concerned about how the boil would affect the tea. I've read that boiling tea can impart unwanted bitterness, tannins and off flavors. (I'm sure this refers to the brewing process, but didnt know if boiling it after brewing it would have the same effect.)
I'm really excited about this brew and can't wait to get started on it.
 
8dannyB2 said:
I will definitely give the honey malt some serious thought. I know that it is the easiest way to get the honey flavor but knowing how stubborn I am I just might stick with the orange blossom. I enjoy doing more challenging brews.
Click to expand...

So do I. But I also tend toward the right tool for the job. In fact, I've got a few gold medals on "challenging" beers. ;)

FWIW, I like a hint of honey flavor in my IIPA, and I use 2oz honey malt per 5G along with 1lb of Orange Blossom honey to dry it out. Works great.

I'm curious why the yeast, hops, tea, is all negotiable, but a handful of honey malt is absolutely the last thing you'll consider? It's all good though, it's your brew, brew it how you want to brew it. :mug:
 
jbaysurfer said:
So do I. But I also tend toward the right tool for the job. In fact, I've got a few gold medals on "challenging" beers. ;)

FWIW, I like a hint of honey flavor in my IIPA, and I use 2oz honey malt per 5G along with 1lb of Orange Blossom honey to dry it out. Works great.

I'm curious why the yeast, hops, tea, is all negotiable, but a handful of honey malt is absolutely the last thing you'll consider? It's all good though, it's your brew, brew it how you want to brew it. :mug:
Click to expand...

The whole concept of the brew came from the green tea w/ the orange blossom honey. Ultimately I wanted to build a recipe around the tea and honey. It's just a matter of figuring the best way to utilize both.

After reading your previous comment about adding a little honey malt along with the tea and the actually honey, I really liked that idea and I think that's what I'm going to do. And I like the 2oz honey malt and 1lb honey. That's pretty much what I had in mind.
 
8dannyB2 said:
The whole concept of the brew came from the green tea w/ the orange blossom honey. Ultimately I wanted to build a recipe around the tea and honey. It's just a matter of figuring the best way to utilize both.

After reading your previous comment about adding a little honey malt along with the tea and the actually honey, I really liked that idea and I think that's what I'm going to do. And I like the 2oz honey malt and 1lb honey. That's pretty much what I had in mind.
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Nice...I hope you're happy with it since I've argued so convincingly :mug:

It's muted, but there's definitely a hint of honey. The orange blossom does remains somewhat IME even after the honey itself ferments out.
 
jbaysurfer said:
Nice...I hope you're happy with it since I've argued so convincingly :mug:

It's muted, but there's definitely a hint of honey. The orange blossom does remains somewhat IME even after the honey itself ferments out.
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You were quite convincing in your argument. Lol. But that's why I posed the question to begin with. I have zero experience brewing with honey. And that's what I love about this forum, inevitably anything you try to brew, someone on here has probably tried it at least once.

I'm really excited about this brew. It's by far the most unique and challenging brew for me yet. And to me anyway, the concept sounds amazing. Just hoping I execute it and pull it off.

Now that I have a good idea with what I'm doing with the honey, I just have to figure out what to do with the tea. Lol. I have to decide whether I want to brew it in my HLT and use the tea as my water for the mash, sparge and boil or if I just want to cold brew it and add it at kegging.
 
8dannyB2 said:
I have to decide whether I want to brew it in my HLT and use the tea as my water for the mash, sparge and boil or if I just want to cold brew it and add it at kegging.
Click to expand...

The reason I suggested the HLT is because if the tea is anything like those from Teavana, there's specific water temp and brew times. I think that would be easier to control in an HLT previous to an infusion mash or boil. Also, the temps for tea brewing tend to be higher than those needed for a mash, so using it during the mash risks losing out on flavors.
 
Mindsculptor said:
The reason I suggested the HLT is because if the tea is anything like those from Teavana, there's specific water temp and brew times. I think that would be easier to control in an HLT previous to an infusion mash or boil. Also, the temps for tea brewing tend to be higher than those needed for a mash, so using it during the mash risks losing out on flavors.
Click to expand...

The tea leaves I got are the same as Teavanna leaves. I think it's an awesome idea to brew it in the HLT, but would eventually boiling it after the mash and sparge be "detrimental" to the flavors of the tea?
 
8dannyB2 said:
The tea leaves I got are the same as Teavanna leaves. I think it's an awesome idea to brew it in the HLT, but would eventually boiling it after the mash and sparge be "detrimental" to the flavors of the tea?
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No. Tea, like coffee and what's extracted from malt, is essentially a suspension, so if anything all those nice flavors are going to be concentrated. Like I said, I think four ounces should do it, but be sure to use a sanitized cheese cloth instead of a tea ball.
 
Awesome! Thanks mind. It's settled then, I'll definitely go that route.
 
8dannyB2 said:
Awesome! Thanks mind. It's settled then, I'll definitely go that route.
Click to expand...

Yeah, the warning you were reading about involved having the tea actually in the water. Once it's out, you're free and clear (probably). As a side note, please understand this is all based on my understanding of basic chemistry, I can't actually guarantee that the result is going to be what you would want or I would expect, but I think it's the best option you have.

I have put some thought into making a Chai Porter using BierMuncher's basic Black Pearl recipe and what I suggested is the process I intend to use. If you hit a snag, which I don't expect, please let me know.
 
Ok cool. Will do. I'll let you know how I make out with everything. I should be brewing this in a couple weeks.

My plan is to brew the tea in my HLT for my mash, and the resteep the 4oz of leaves for the sparge water. The tea I got says that you can resteep them up to 3 times. And I order a little extra, so if I'm not getting the flavors I'm expecting I could always just add some at kegging time.
 
8dannyB2 said:
Ok cool. Will do. I'll let you know how I make out with everything. I should be brewing this in a couple weeks.

My plan is to brew the tea in my HLT for my mash, and the resteep the 4oz of leaves for the sparge water. The tea I got says that you can resteep them up to 3 times. And I order a little extra, so if I'm not getting the flavors I'm expecting I could always just add some at kegging time.
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Are you by chance using an oolong tea?

If so the delicate floral notes of some oolongs will get lost real quick if you blend first second and third steeps. You will end up with something a lot more minerally. One idea could be to infuse the leaves in a decent vodka and just add post fermentation.

I would almost think if you want to keep the tea flavors forward and clean you wouldn't want to do the steeping before boiling, not that I can speak from experience or anything, I just feel like the tea flavors would get lost during the boil.

If the steep temp is high enough adding the tea leaves at flame out should sterilize everything, just wait till the temp comes down a little. Using a big muslin bag for steeping grains and hanging the bag from a handle or something, then you can take the bag of leaves out before they over steep.
 
Good honey,as in local,fresh,seasonal,particularly aromatic/flavorful is really key. Adding it as late as possible-like secondary and probably drinking it somewhat young is your best bet with getting the most out of goodhoney. As well as adding more,but it can really dry out a beer and have a pretty low finish the more you add. Honey character is like hops but more like spice sometime it can be there and then start disappearing soon. Overall its pretty mild most of the time,and my experience with some not so great fresh/quality honey is that it gets kind of funky sometimes or blandish. That said,Im a fan of honeymalt as it doesnt dry the beer out when I dont want it to. Although I would like to make a barleywine type braggot someday, think Ive had my share of making lighter type honey ales even though I got an unitended 7+% on a beer that finished way too low in a 30% honey ale. Was kind of hot/dry tasting with poor honey aromatics/taste,not knowing what good honey was at the time. Doesnt seem to really age that well either. I noticed its not as good when it warms up either,like good beers usually do. Some of the mildly weird offness comes out.
 
jonmohno said:
Good honey,as in local,fresh,seasonal,particularly aromatic/flavorful is really key. Adding it as late as possible-like secondary and probably drinking it somewhat young is your best bet with getting the most out of goodhoney. As well as adding more,but it can really dry out a beer and have a pretty low finish the more you add. Honey character is like hops but more like spice sometime it can be there and then start disappearing soon. Overall its pretty mild most of the time,and my experience with some not so great fresh/quality honey is that it gets kind of funky sometimes or blandish. That said,Im a fan of honeymalt as it doesnt dry the beer out when I dont want it to. Although I would like to make a barleywine type braggot someday, think Ive had my share of making lighter type honey ales even though I got an unitended 7+% on a beer that finished way too low in a 30% honey ale. Was kind of hot/dry tasting with poor honey aromatics/taste,not knowing what good honey was at the time. Doesnt seem to really age that well either. I noticed its not as good when it warms up either,like good beers usually do. Some of the mildly weird offness comes out.
Click to expand...

I am going to try and get the honey from my LHBS. I figured they would have a good quality honey, specifically for brewing.

So if the later the addition the better for the honey, lets say I add it as fermentation dies down or even at secondary, do I just dump the honey in "as is" or do I need to try and get the specific gravity of the honey closer to the SG of the beer?
 

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