Iron Brewer Competition

[StarrHill]

My local club is having an Iron Brewer competition (like Iron Chef). The main ingredient is sweet potatoes. The anciliary ingredients, of which you have to use at least 2/3, are ginger, lime, and dried ancho chiles. The beers are to be submitted at our post-holiday party on 1/23, and are judged by vote of members. The criteria is best all-around, balanced beer in which the ingredients are perceptible.

I'm kicking around two options right now. One, which I think of as sort of the more traditional option, and which may be similar to what other competitors do, is a brown or porter with sweet potato, really trying to acentuate the sweet potato flavor, and spiced with ginger and chiles.

The second, which I perceive to be the more creative option, that might get more style points for thinking outside the box, is a lime-ginger saison brewed with sweet potato. Here, I'd be expecting color and maybe a hint of aroma from the sweet potato, but the ginger, lime, and saison yeast would be the real stars of the show.

I guess a third option is to brew 3 gallon batches of both of them and see which turns out better. Any thoughts, ideas? Has anyone brewed with these ingredients before?

 

[FatCat11cz]

Second option.

 

[jekeane]

I have mashed with about 10lbs of roasted sweet potato and gotten minimal if any sweet potato character. Saison base.

Good color but no real flavor.

 

[feinbera]

Heh, yeah, sweet potato suffers the same problem as pumpkin – it's just kinda sweet, starchy, and bland, all the flavors you associate with it are actually the stuff that gets put on it to make it remotely palatable.

Go with the saison, and try not to go too far over the top with the yeast/lime/ginger, in the hopes you don't get d/q'ed for not having any perceptible sweet potato flavor at all...

 

[StarrHill]

Saison seems to be a popular option! So, then, I'm thinking of this for a 5g batch:

7.5# belgian pilsener
1# white wheat
8oz caramunich
8oz flaked oats
5# roasted sweet potatoes (chopped? pureed?)

Mash at 150F for 60 minutes
Boil for 60 minutes

1oz strisselspalt @60
1oz strisselspalt @15
5g grated fresh ginger @15
zest of 1 lime @15

3711 for 2weeks @ 72F


Thoughts? Especially about the special ingredients? I've never brewed with any of these things before.

 

[bkboiler]

I would treat sweet potatoe like pumpkin.
If you're intending to use it in the mash, make sure to add some rice hulls to avoid a stuck sparge.
many of the successful pumpkin recipes I've read prefer it in the boil (having roasted it in the oven first to convert the starch to long chained sugars).

if I were doing it, I'd do saison like you've picked and go with a slightly spicy saison yeast with sweet potato in the boil.
I'd roast the chilis to mellow out the spiciness and do them in secondary with kefir lime leaves. just enough to get the aroma, not enough to change the pH.
my $0.02.
Love the idea of a saison, good on ya for taking it seriously and being creative especially with those ingredients!!

 

[bkboiler]

brew this one yet?