Looking for input on "leftovers" Braggot

[hillhousesawdustco]

I'm heading out of town for a month and a half for work and have four all-grain recipe kits laying around - Czech Pils, Pale Ale, Cream Ale, and American Wheat.

I also have an unlimited supply of honey (water white sweet clover).

Does anybody have any suggestions as to how best to combine one of the recipes with the honey? 5lbs? 10lbs? Hop it out the wazoo? What ya got?

Edit: also have some gambrinus honey malt around, don't usually use very much of it

 

[biochemedic]

First of all, I'm jealous of your unlimited supply of honey...! :rockin:

As I pondered your question, it seems to me that most braggots I've seen/tasted before tend to be based on darker beer styles...I'm not talking stout or porter here, just that most of them are more brown than the styles you have kits for. That being said, I can't imagine that there'd be anything wrong with a pale braggot, and I've had wheatwine that was pretty strong on the honey that was awesome (I guess you could actually say that was a braggot in a sense, so perhaps I have had a paler braggot...anyway...) I'd choose either the Pale Ale or the American Wheat kit to start with....

In terms of amount of honey, I've generally felt that a braggot should be at least 50:50 in terms of the amount of fermentables that come from honey vs malt, so I'd use whatever amount of honey would double the OG of your base beer. I might mash a little higher than you would otherwise just to help retain a little body, as it will be thinned out by all the honey.

You'll rarely get me to argue against going a little overboard with the hops...perhaps you can visualize an "APB" (American Pale Braggot...bittering to gravity ratio of 1:1, and a good pop of dry hops to boot...)

I've always heard that honey malt is a good way to get a honey-like aroma and flavor in a brew. It certainly wouldn't hurt to add a pound to whatever grain bill is in the kit you use...

I'd also suggest that you may consider adding some of your honey in after the primary ferment is starting to slow to a crawl (unless you were planning on pitching yeast and getting out of town, but if you can start a week or so before you leave, and get a portion of the honey in later it will be help the honey aroma/flavor.) Oh, and any honey that is going in primary, add it at flameout.

Good luck...keep us posted on how it turns out!

 

[hillhousesawdustco]

Thank you so much for a well thought out and reasoned reply! I promise you I was expecting lots of advice that had nothing to do with my question.

I often add 1-3 lbs of honey to my beer recipes (my sister and her husband are commercial beekeepers, they live "next door" to me, and I've done a lot of work for them) and I have had my best results in brown ales. But, I don't have the grain for that so it is experimentation time!

I am big fan of hop-forward beers, but have no experience in combining high hops and lots of honey. Any pale ale/ipa I've made with honey had been with just a lb at flameout. Thanks for the advice on mashing high, great suggestion that I would not have implemented without the suggestion.

I'm definitely leaning towards a highly hopped, high abv braggot. Is there a concern about leaving 50+ ibu, 10+% percent braggot on the yeast cake for six weeks? I can use smackpack sweet mead yeast, notty, us-05, or even wine yeast.

Also, if I brew and add half of the honey at flameout and half in four days, will that make a difference from an aromatic or flavor standpoint? I'd love to wait longer, but I have to be on the road and at that point the brew will be on its own, albeit in a temperature controlled environment!
Again, thanks for any advice.

 

[biochemedic]

Thank you so much for a well thought out and reasoned reply! I promise you I was expecting lots of advice that had nothing to do with my question.

I often add 1-3 lbs of honey to my beer recipes (my sister and her husband are commercial beekeepers, they live "next door" to me, and I've done a lot of work for them) and I have had my best results in brown ales. But, I don't have the grain for that so it is experimentation time!

I am big fan of hop-forward beers, but have no experience in combining high hops and lots of honey. Any pale ale/ipa I've made with honey had been with just a lb at flameout. Thanks for the advice on mashing high, great suggestion that I would not have implemented without the suggestion.

I'm definitely leaning towards a highly hopped, high abv braggot. Is there a concern about leaving 50+ ibu, 10+% percent braggot on the yeast cake for six weeks? I can use smackpack sweet mead yeast, notty, us-05, or even wine yeast.

Also, if I brew and add half of the honey at flameout and half in four days, will that make a difference from an aromatic or flavor standpoint? I'd love to wait longer, but I have to be on the road and at that point the brew will be on its own, albeit in a temperature controlled environment!
Again, thanks for any advice.

I have done a couple of hop metheglins, and I think hops, and a high IBU level goes great with mead, and would work in a braggot as well.

I do think you will benefit from adding the honey incrementally for 2 reasons. 1) I do believe it will help preserve aroma and flavor, and 2), it will be less stress on your yeast in the beginning.

Further to yeast, I would avoid the Wyeast sweet mead strain...while I've not personally used it (and I absolutely love the dry mead strain for my meads) that strain has a notorious reputation for being very finicky and for getting stuck. Feel free to do a search on that strain, and you'll see what I mean. I think a robust, clean fermenting ale yeast like 05 would be fine...I would definitely consider your pitch rate carefully with such a high gravity. Assuming an OG of 1.100, Mr Malty says you need 2.1 (11.5 gm) packets of dry yeast for 5 gallons. I'd also make sure you rehydrate the yeast properly...you can debate the merits of rehydration vs dry pitching, but one thing is clear: the manufacturers clearly say you will have a significant drop in yeast vitality without rehydration. I think this effect will be even more pronounced with a bigger, higher gravity wort/must. (I'm also beginning to realize that oxygenation is very important, and I've been very pleased with the improvement in my brews since getting an oxygenation system -- well worth the investment!)

One other thing I would mention is that you will need to take your boil gravity into account when planning your hop additions; ie, remember that you will not have the honey in the boil, so your hop utilization rate will be higher than if you calculated it using all the fermentables. If you're using a brewing software package, delete the honey addition(s) before you figure out the hops.

I think leaving the brew on the yeast cake (or lees, as the vinters/mazers call it) will be fine for that length of time. I've left mead in primary for months, and I recently heard about a mead that was left YEARS in primary with no adverse effect. FWIW, I believe there may actually be some benefit to a longer primary, and I very rarely do secondary for beer anymore, and don't even always do it for mead.

 

[hillhousesawdustco]

Success.

The Hoppy Braggot turned out delicious, and I will be tinkering with the recipe in the future. I'll try to post the original recipe next time I find it....