Belgian Candi sugar in a Blonde????

Has anyone had any success/failure with adding candi sugar to a blonde during the boil. I want to up the alcohol content a little and made some candi sugar the other night. I know that candi sugar is generally used in trippels and darker beers but I was just curious.

I was thinking of adding 1lb during the boil, any comments or suggestions are greatly appreciated!

If it's clear candi sugar and you use it as only a small proportion of your fermentables, I don't see any reason why not.

I suppose success or failure would depend on your goal since the impact of adding the sugar is fairly predictable. It is not going to add flavor and you have to consider that it's not going to add body that would be present with a comparable malt addition. Not knowing your exact goals for the beer and the rest of the recipe, it's a bit hard to comment.

Anytime i've made such attempts it came out with a funky 'tangy' flavor. Sure it boosted alcohol, but also made my 5 gallons worthless.

For what it's worth, if you are only planning on using clear candi sugar, you may as well just dump sugar in at the end of the boil. The only thing that turns sugar into cani sugar is heat in an acidic environment; you have that going for you at the end of a wort boil. You could save yourself some $, and time and get the same results by just dumping sugar into your boil.

My goal is just to boost the alcohol a little bit...and use the candi sugar that I made because I'm excited that I found out how to make it. Just wanted to give it a whirl. I'd really like to make a trippel but need to have atleast ONE on tap to drink, so I'll do this blonde and then a trippel a week or so after!

I say go for it and post results!!! sounds like a good idea to me. just keep in mind that MOST candi sugars ar going to inpart some color to the brew.
JJ

I don't mind the color change.. I just don't want to affect the taste. I was thinking of putting 1lb in,???

Dominator6 said:

I don't mind the color change.. I just don't want to affect the taste. I was thinking of putting 1lb in,???

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That shouldn't be a problem. You don't have to be too concerned about the color difference it may impart if you're using clear (light yellow in color) candi sugar. In fact, it will complement the color of a blonde nicely. In the most basic sense, Trippels are just really big blondes.

Dominator6 said:

I don't mind the color change.. I just don't want to affect the taste. I was thinking of putting 1lb in,???

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Well it depends on what percent of your fermentables the sugars comprise. if you have only 3 or 4 lbs DME then the candi sugar may not be what you're looking for. If you're talking 5+ lbs DME then you should be ok.

Rule of thumb: added sugars should compose no more than 20% of your fermentables.

Cugel said:

Rule of thumb: added sugars should compose no more than 20% of your fermentables.

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Unless you're brewing a Belgian, in which case that 20% should be 40% or more.

EinGutesBier said:

Unless you're brewing a Belgian, in which case that 20% should be 40% or more.

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Really - I've never seen that in a Belgian recipe before. <puzzled/> From the recipes I've seen even for the high abv Christmas specials (10-12% abv) they only seem ti have 1-2 lbs of candi sugar for a 5 gallon batch with 9-12 lbs DME.