Spicing Amounts

I'm making a Christmas Ale in a week or so and have formulated a strongly spiced recipe.

It's a 5 Gal AG with pale and crystal malts and a pound each of torrified wheat and flaked oats.

I developed this spice mix, which I am set with, but wasn't sure about the amounts.

Add .25 Cup of Cinnamon in Mash.

In the last 20 min's of boil add:
.25 Cup Fresh Orange Zest
.5 Cup Crushed/Shredded Vanilla beans
2Tbsp Fresh Cinnamon
4Tbsp Nutmeg
4Tbsp Allspice
4Tbsp Aniseed
4Tbsp Cloves

5 min's of boil left to go add:
.25oz fresh peppermint
.1 oz Crushed Pine Needles
.25oz Fresh sliced ginger

Rack to Primary with 2 Cups of Spice mix in same ratio minus orange zest and Vanilla bean; but adding 2 oz vanilla extract.
Rack to secondary with .5 Cup Orange Zest.


Does that sound like too much spice? I want it to be strong but not undrinkable.

Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much spice!

Cut back to about 1 tsp of each ground spice.

Maybe more like this (added at 10 mins):
1 tsp Cinnamon
1 tsp Nutmeg
1 tsp Allspice
1/2 tsp Aniseed
1/2 tsp Clove

Use 1 oz of orange zest max.

Use 2 vanilla beans max, and add them at flameout, along with the ginger.

When racking, taste it before adding anything. Spice to taste at that point.

IMHO, skip the peppermint altogether - it's not going to help much, and I bet the pine gets lost, too.

EDIT:
Completely missed the mash spicing - skip that, too.

Spices loose their effectiveness the longer they are in the boil. I would think you don't even need to add the 1/4 cup in the mash. I don't think the flavors would even come through after a 60 minute boil as you would boil off all of their aromatics. Also, do what Yuri suggested and cut waaayyy back on the amounts. Also try to add them just at the very end of the boil.

Listen to the podcast on holiday beers on the following site:

http://thebrewingnetwork.com/jamil.php

Brewpastor said:

Listen to the podcast on holiday beers on the following site:

http://thebrewingnetwork.com/jamil.php

Click to expand...

Yeah, good show. He also talks about spices in the spice beer show, it was last year I believe.

Thanks for the tips, and that podcast was helpful as well.

I'll make the changes as needed.

Holy GOD, that there beer would be like opening up your spice cabinet, pouring a bunch of stuff into your mouth, swirling with water, and swallowing.

Especially the FOUR tbsp of anise seed. Be especially careful with that stuff. 2 or 3 star anise pods are enough to give my barleywine a particularly pungent licorice taste...so you can imagine what 4 tbsp of seeds would do to a regular old pale ale.

Like others said, cut back, waaaaay back.

I'm basically stating the same thing, but you definitely need to cut back on the spices. Between the 4 tbsp anise, allspice, and cloves I think your sinuses would disintegrate. All three of these spices are VERY potent. I know that with cloves, 2-4 whole cloves will handle a 5 gallon batch nicely.

definitely watch the cloves - i put 3 in my maple pumpkin ale and it was just clove ale for 6 months