Smoked Habanero IPA

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Maddbobbs

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Playing around with the first beer that I want to have ready for the spring, and wanted to get a little feedback.

I was looking around at some different recipes, and wanted to try a bit of a Smoked IPA. My ideal would be to have a subdued smokiness underneath the flavor of hops and spice.

Here is the current recipe I am working with:

11# Briess Pale
1# Weyermann Smoked
1# CaraHelles (for head retention - and to be honest, chosen for the 'Hell' tie in to the peppers instead of basic carapils)
1# Briess Crystall 20L

1oz Summit Mash Hop
60 min -
.5 oz Mt Hood
1 oz Horizon
30 min -
.5 oz Mt Hood
.5 oz Horizon
Flameout -
1oz Summit

Ferment 10-14 Days with WLP01 CA Ale Yeast @ aprox. 64F.

Dry Hop in Secondary - for 12 days
1oz Simcoe
2oz Summit

Dry 'Pepper' for 5 days with 6 grams of deveined/seeded habaneros.

Current thoughts are that the hops might dominate in this recipe, and the smokiness might be a totally moot point...

Also, pepper ratio for this 5 gallon batch size?!? Thoughts on that? I will char them to add a little more smokiness, then soak in vodka and add the whole concoction and strain out the peppers later.

Thanks for any and all feedback!!
 
I can't speak to the smoke in your recipe as both of the smoked beers I've done previously have 20-25% smoked malt in the grist. Not sure what sort of smokiness the 1# in your recipe will lend.

However, I can say that a pepper ratio of 1 good sized, diced, pithed habanero (with seeds) to 5 gal for 7 days post ferment works really nicely. I brewed a Zombie Dust clone and then added the pepper to it, and the hab really played nicely with the tropical fruit from the hops. The heat/sting was manageable, mostly in the back of the palate and throat, but exciting. Adds a great dynamic to the beer.
 
CaraHell is Crystal 10... Don't double up on Crystal 10 and 20. White or Red Wheat also offers head retention you know. And it does a better job without the added caramel sweetness.

Summit and Simcoe might get in the way of the chile notes. Odd choice to use Mt. Hood here, but okay. A perfect hop combo for this beer would be Amarillo & Citra. I can also see Citra playing well with its tropical notes, which would bolster the inherent tropical nature of the habanero.

I would use fresh habaneros. Four of the orange ones should do. Roast them over an open flame until charred and they become slightly less spicy and more smokey. Directly after the roast, slit them with a shallow incision and let them "float" in the secondary. No need to chop them up, soak in vodka, devein or deseed them.
 
I think this looks like a smokin good recipe, let us all klnow how it turns out!
 
Thanks for the initial feedback folks. Perhaps a better way for me to pose this is as a theoretical of what I want to accomplish.

I am looking for a peppery sweetness with a smokey finish. The hop profile would be subtle, some bittering characteristic.

I picked Mt. Hood for that quality - bitter and lower aroma. Horizon as I have read is a substitute for Magnum, and has that same quality...lower aroma. Summit for that quality as well. Simcoe is the only aroma hop that I had on the list. Slight citrus, but I am afraid any grapefruit characteristics won't fit well will the spice. Can't think of any grapefruit character in hot sauce or food of any sort that would exemplify that.

So my thoughts right now are this -

1) Add some more smoked malt and take out some of the pale malt to compensate. Get closer to a 10% or so, and get some smokiness from the roasted peppers.
2) Sub out the Mt. Hood for something else, and maybe up the amount and replace the Simcoe as well?
3) Use some wheat over CaraHelle. I do want to avoid 'wheatiness' in the final product though.
4) Roast the peppers and throw them straight in, seeds and all.

Thanks so much folks!
 
Just some generic advice....

Whenever you use a really strongly flavored "extra" in the secondary, you should sample it daily or even twice a day. It can build really quickly on you and overwhelm the beer completely.
 
Maddbobbs said:
Horizon as I have read is a substitute for Magnum, and has that same quality...lower aroma. Summit for that quality as well.
Click to expand...

Horizon is underrated and actually has a good deal of aroma as well as excellent high alpha bittering potential. I wouldn't vs. it against Simcoe or Citra, but it's still fairly fragrant and citrusy. So is Summit.

Maddbobbs said:
I do want to avoid 'wheatiness' in the final product though.
Click to expand...

You won't really taste 5-10% wheat. It definitely won't be "wheaty". Have you had Lagunitas A Little Sumpin' Sumpin'? As a comparison, that has about 50% wheat and it's still all about the hops.
 
depending on what kind of heat you're looking for, I've had success with dry "peppering" with whole (dont cut them open) habs for 7-10 days. you can always experiment with pepper strength by simulating your dry peppering in a glass of water for an amount of time, and scaling from there.
 
I brewed a smoke Habanera beer, called Peppers Away, on September 9. For 10 Gallons:
18 lbs 2-row
2 lbs smoked malt
0.5 lbs carmel 60L
1 lb carmel 40L
0.5 lbs Carafoam
1 lb biscuit malt

2 oz Palisade 7.60% at 60 mins
1 oz Palisade 7.60% at 30 mins
2 oz Palisade 7.60% at 15 mins

10 Habaneros quartered at 15 mins

0.25 tsp Irish Moss at 15 mins

10 minutes at 122F, 60 mins at 152F, and 10 mins at 170F

OG was 1.054
FG is 1.016

The beer is very good, but no smoke aroma or taste. I was going to use 4 lbs of smoke malt but I was afraid that was too much. Big mistake, it needs more smoke to compliment the sweetness and heat from the peppers.

The heat is NOT over powering at all, but we all like hot food and I understand that this is very subjective. You can taste the sweetness of the peppers at the beginning, then the heat kicks in at the back of the throat. Kind of unexpected for me.

I will brew this beer again, but more peppers and more smoked malt. I would like to hear how yours turns out. I put the peppers in the boil because I have concerns adding anything to the fermentor (unless it's hops.)

Mark
 
goo-gone said:
I've had success with dry "peppering" with whole (dont cut them open) habs for 7-10 days.
Click to expand...

Hard to believe, being a chef and all and understanding how ingredients work. You should hardly get anything at all from just tossing in untouched whole chiles. Halving them or, (better yet) just giving it a small/shallow incision and floating them in the beer will go a very long way at delivering the desired heat... without going so overboard with the heat level by mincing them up. You could also "juice" the chiles with some vodka, or pre-fermented wort, and then add that strained tincture to the main volume to taste. There's also the option of a very basic hot sauce addition, but you have to worry about the other typical ingredients like salt, vinegar, guar gum, etc.
 
lopatkam said:
I brewed a smoke Habanera beer, called Peppers Away, on September 9. For 10 Gallons:
18 lbs 2-row
2 lbs smoked malt
0.5 lbs carmel 60L
1 lb carmel 40L
0.5 lbs Carafoam
1 lb biscuit malt

2 oz Palisade 7.60% at 60 mins
1 oz Palisade 7.60% at 30 mins
2 oz Palisade 7.60% at 15 mins

10 Habaneros quartered at 15 mins

0.25 tsp Irish Moss at 15 mins

10 minutes at 122F, 60 mins at 152F, and 10 mins at 170F

OG was 1.054
FG is 1.016

The beer is very good, but no smoke aroma or taste. I was going to use 4 lbs of smoke malt but I was afraid that was too much. Big mistake, it needs more smoke to compliment the sweetness and heat from the peppers.

The heat is NOT over powering at all, but we all like hot food and I understand that this is very subjective. You can taste the sweetness of the peppers at the beginning, then the heat kicks in at the back of the throat. Kind of unexpected for me.

I will brew this beer again, but more peppers and more smoked malt. I would like to hear how yours turns out. I put the peppers in the boil because I have concerns adding anything to the fermentor (unless it's hops.)

Mark
Click to expand...

I see it was ten gallons, but you didnt get any smoke flavor at all? I am looking into brewing a smoked/peppered porter as well someday, but I do want the smoke flavor prominent
 
No,none of us could smell or taste any smoke at all. I tried the malt before I milled it and it was VERY smokey. Actually, we all joked that I should put some out in a bowl on my bar! But sadly, the final product had no indication that any smoked malt was used.

About four or five months earlier, I made a sweet cherry stout. I had five ounces of cherry extract. Everyone told me that two, maybe three ounces would be enough. Well, what does a guy do? If three ounces is good, five must be better! I ended up dumping something that more closely resembled cough syrup than beer. This unfortunately lead to my timid reaction to adding all 4 lbs of smoked malt.

The old saying holds true in beer; success is a poor teacher.

Mark
 
lopatkam said:
No,none of us could smell or taste any smoke at all. I tried the malt before I milled it and it was VERY smokey. Actually, we all joked that I should put some out in a bowl on my bar! But sadly, the final product had no indication that any smoked malt was used.

About four or five months earlier, I made a sweet cherry stout. I had five ounces of cherry extract. Everyone told me that two, maybe three ounces would be enough. Well, what does a guy do? If three ounces is good, five must be better! I ended up dumping something that more closely resembled cough syrup than beer. This unfortunately lead to my timid reaction to adding all 4 lbs of smoked malt.

The old saying holds true in beer; success is a poor teacher.

Mark
Click to expand...

True about the success as a teacher, and sorry to hear about your misfortune with the cherry beer. I made a cherry beer this summer and I only used the cans of Oregon cherries with juice. About 7 cans to be exact and it had a good cherry flavor, not exactly sweet though.

I think Ill try a 5 gallon batch of the smoked pepper beer in a while and I will go ahead and use 2 lbs of smoked malt in it.
 
Maddbobbs said:
Playing around with the first beer that I want to have ready for the spring, and wanted to get a little feedback.

I was looking around at some different recipes, and wanted to try a bit of a Smoked IPA. My ideal would be to have a subdued smokiness underneath the flavor of hops and spice.

Here is the current recipe I am working with:

11# Briess Pale
1# Weyermann Smoked
1# CaraHelles (for head retention - and to be honest, chosen for the 'Hell' tie in to the peppers instead of basic carapils)
1# Briess Crystall 20L

1oz Summit Mash Hop
60 min -
.5 oz Mt Hood
1 oz Horizon
30 min -
.5 oz Mt Hood
.5 oz Horizon
Flameout -
1oz Summit

Ferment 10-14 Days with WLP01 CA Ale Yeast @ aprox. 64F.

Dry Hop in Secondary - for 12 days
1oz Simcoe
2oz Summit

Dry 'Pepper' for 5 days with 6 grams of deveined/seeded habaneros.

Current thoughts are that the hops might dominate in this recipe, and the smokiness might be a totally moot point...

Also, pepper ratio for this 5 gallon batch size?!? Thoughts on that? I will char them to add a little more smokiness, then soak in vodka and add the whole concoction and strain out the peppers later.

Thanks for any and all feedback!!
Click to expand...

I really am anxious to hear how this turns out for you!
 
So the final recipe I am in the process of brewing is:

10# Pale Ale Malt
3# Smoked Malt
1# Crystal 20L
.5# Flaked Wheat

I added the wheat in for a little body instead of CaraHelles or White Wheat, to avoid too much wheat flavor.

60 min at 154F
10 min at 168F

I am a touch worried though as the current hop schedule, I am adding 1 oz of Summit as first runnings hops. It is adding almost 50 IBU points, putting the beer to 117 IBU's!!! I am thinking this will dominate everything. Anyone have feedback on that? I was thinking of backing off of that, but want to retain nice bitterness to keep an IPA profile to it.

Thanks!
 
Final thoughts. Smells pretty hoppy going into the carboy. Smoke 'scent' is subdued, but was pretty prominent coming out of the mashtun. Fell a little short of my target OG - 1.063 (aiming for 1.070), but it was in part because I didn't hit my target mashout temp.

I will keep folks posted as it progresses for those interested.
 
Let it sit in primary for a little extra time as it kept bubbling away. First taste is not bad, a nice balanced IPA flavor, with a little bit of residual smokiness underneath it which is just what I was going for. Added in the 2 oz for the dry hop - thinking it might dominate the final flavor, cover up the smokiness, but since the smoke is in the malt I think it will hold up well under the floral hop flavor.

Next step is to char some habaneros and throw them in next week, then let it sit for a week with those in place. All in all coming along nicely.

THanks everyone for input and thoughts
 
bobbrews said:
Hard to believe, being a chef and all and understanding how ingredients work. You should hardly get anything at all from just tossing in untouched whole chiles. Halving them or, (better yet) just giving it a small/shallow incision and floating them in the beer will go a very long way at delivering the desired heat... without going so overboard with the heat level by mincing them up. You could also "juice" the chiles with some vodka, or pre-fermented wort, and then add that strained tincture to the main volume to taste. There's also the option of a very basic hot sauce addition, but you have to worry about the other typical ingredients like salt, vinegar, guar gum, etc.
Click to expand...

*shrug*
float a hab in a glass or jar of water for a week or two and see if it pulls any flavor out.
 
goo-gone said:
*shrug*
float a hab in a glass or jar of water for a week or two and see if it pulls any flavor out.
Click to expand...

I'm not really sure what you're getting at, or what you didn't understand. I never said just to throw a habanero into a glass of water and then wait a week, nor to I see how doing this would be the equivalent of what I proposed. You were actually the person who said just throw them in whole, without taking any steps of cutting them open or roasting them first. By doing that, you would add absolutely no flavor or heat.
 
bobbrews said:
I'm not really sure what you're getting at, or what you didn't understand. I never said just to throw a habanero into a glass of water and then wait a week, nor to I see how doing this would be the equivalent of what I proposed. You were actually the person who said just throw them in whole, without taking any steps of cutting them open or roasting them first. By doing that, you would add absolutely no flavor or heat.
Click to expand...

He's telling you to test HIS method, which you said didn't work.
 

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