how do you caramelize honey???

I was thinking about using caramelized honey in an extract recipe, but I don't know exactly how to caramelize honey... I did find this link but it doesn't exactly tell you how much honey they are using but gives exact measurements of other ingredients ie 1 tbsp water, few drops of lemon...
I was planning on using;
1 pound honey (not sure if I should caramelize the entire pound??? most likely only half)
4 pounds Briess Golden Light Extract
and I haven't decided on the hops yet...
Cascade &/or fuggle... just because thats what I have on hand...
ANY advice would be much appreciated!

Once honey gets boiled, it loses all of it's honey-ness and basically just becomes sugar syrup. I don't suspect caramelized honey will turn out terribly well, but I encourage you to give it a shot and to let us know how it goes

MalFet,
Crud, I read that caramelizing it will retain some of the honey-ness...(??) But I have zero experience with this as I have only read about it
Anyone have any experience with this?

sh00t said:

MalFet,
Crud, I read that caramelizing it will retain some of the honey-ness...(??) But I have zero experience with this as I have only read about it
Anyone have any experience with this?

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A bee keeper explained to me the more you raise the temperature of honey, the more you alter its flavor and not for the better either.

I agree w/above, pretty much put honey in at flame out, or even better during cooling of wort, or during bottling. Any and all subtle flavors are driven off at high temps.

Look up "burnt Honey" mead---honey boiled until it turns dark brown, almost black. It still tastes some like honey, also has caramel and toasted marshmallow flavors. I recently made a brew similar to yours (pale malt and caramelized honey) ended up with a floral flavor with a nutty or toasty flavor. The head on a glass is an interesting pale brown color.

tim

Ok here's what I went ahead and brew'd up;
1 pound "caramelized" honey
4 pounds Briess Golden Light Extract
1/2 oz fuggle 30 min
1/2 oz fuggle 10 min
1 oz fuggle flame out
and this is how I caramelized the honey......... low for about 50 min before it started to simmer... then I added it to the wert at flame out....
Cooled and pitched notty and its bubbling the air-lock as we speak... I'll let you know how it taste in about a month

• To begin with you will need a heavy-bottom saucepan, a wooden spatula, 1tbsp water, few drops of lemon juice, and honey (of course)

• First combine water, lemon juice and honey together. The water prevents the honey from scorching, while lemon juice prevents the caramelized honey from hardening or crystallizing.

• Now cook the honey over low heat, stirring the honey constantly with a wooden spatula.

• Once the honey begins to simmer stop stirring and cook the honey for just 1 or 2 minutes more.

• As soon as the honey reaches a golden brown color and starts to emit a nutty aroma, remove the saucepan off the heat. Swirl the pan to distribute the color and flavor evenly and transfer the contents into another container. Your caramelized honey is ready to be savored.

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This is from my initial link which can be found at http://www.ifood.tv/blog/how-to-caramelize-honey

sh00t said:

Ok here's what I went ahead and brew'd up;
1 pound "caramelized" honey
4 pounds Briess Golden Light Extract
1/2 oz fuggle 30 min
1/2 oz fuggle 10 min
1 oz fuggle flame out
and this is how I caramelized the honey......... low for about 50 min before it started to simmer... then I added it to the wert at flame out....
Cooled and pitched notty and its bubbling the air-lock as we speak... I'll let you know how it taste in about a month

This is from my initial link which can be found at http://www.ifood.tv/blog/how-to-caramelize-honey

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I'm sure it will be tasty. Did you taste any of the honey after caramelizing it? Did it taste any different than caramelized table sugar?

I didn't taste it... which is odd for me because I usually taste everything I put in.... I guess I was just extremely happy I kept it from crystallizing.......

How did this turn out? I'm thinking of making an IPA/Braggot with carmelized honey.

In the future, honey malt adds a much more natural honey flavor to beer than real honey does. Weird, but true. Real honey is just going to ferment out and leave your beer dry.

0.5 lbs of honey malt per 10 lbs of grain bill is the typical rate to get a good honey flavor without all of the carmalizing hijinks.

Dead post revival! lol

Im going to have to disagree with those that say that caramelizing honey loses its characteristic. I have made several meads based on the poster who mentioned caramelizing until almost black, and it indeed adds a delicious marshmellow flavor to the mead. I will agree that you lose most (if not all) of the traditional sweet honey flavors, but you it is a way to gain a very unique, and I would say delicious marshmellow/caramel flavor.

I just ventured into braggots last week and used the caramelized honey approach. Ofcourse I can't vouch for it without tasting it yet, but in my mind when I combined the flavors it should* be delicious. If I don't rave about it in a few months then you will know how it turned out

nolimit333 said:

Dead post revival! lol

Im going to have to disagree with those that say that caramelizing honey loses its characteristic. I have made several meads based on the poster who mentioned caramelizing until almost black, and it indeed adds a delicious marshmellow flavor to the mead. I will agree that you lose most (if not all) of the traditional sweet honey flavors, but you it is a way to gain a very unique, and I would say delicious marshmellow/caramel flavor.

I just ventured into braggots last week and used the caramelized honey approach. Ofcourse I can't vouch for it without tasting it yet, but in my mind when I combined the flavors it should* be delicious. If I don't rave about it in a few months then you will know how it turned out

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I couldn't agree with you more. I don't know how I missed this thread when it came out. But I've recommend folks carmalize honey for years. Thats really the only way to get good honey flavor out of honey. Without using honey malt. The caramelization is what doesn't ferment out and actually give it the honey flavor.

Many of us have gone and made Brochet, medieval burnt mead. There's a tread about it here.


It's an amazing process, and stopping at anytime before true black will give any brewer who want intense honey flavors in their beer plenty to work with.

I tried this recently for my first born brew (now 3 days overdue!)

Anywho, I did a far shorter "boil" than the original poster (35 minutes around 200 degrees) and reduced about 12 oz to 8 oz in the process (Just a guess...I have no idea what the results were in terms of volume...this is also for a 2 gallon batch that I split for fermentation then blended). I actually didn't think I did it correctly as the color change was not black at all in the honey...or so I thought.

Fast forward to this week...I cracked open a few only to find that my IIPAs were very dark! Definitely got this rich toasted flavor, caramel came second, followed by a honey finish...I could tell this method would not be for everyone but I enjoyed the change to one of my usual recipes...hated the purple/black color of the beer though...very "muddy"

Still, it was a simply way to add some complexity to a common brew of mine and I really enjoyed the change...only a 6er left and I am torn between letting them age and pass them around to celebrate.

As with just about any idea I've read or heard in brewing...I highly recommend you give it a go. You never know what you will get and how you will like it until you try. And I LOVE honey in any way, shape or form in my brews so its constantly being experimented on with me




PS- Why does everyone say honey ferments out completely? I may be misinformed but I thought it was around 90% (yes its 100% fermentable) on average...doesn't beersmith list it this way?

I added 3 pounds (pre-boil) of caramelized honey to a bach a few months ago. The final character of the beer was altered in that it had a sweet/butterschotchy/nutty character as apposed to a batch done previously without. It turned out drinkable, but likely too sweet for a lot of folks' taste. If I do it again, I will probably up the hops to ballance some of the sweetness...

sh00t said:

I was thinking about using caramelized honey in an extract recipe, but I don't know exactly how to caramelize honey... I did find this link but it doesn't exactly tell you how much honey they are using but gives exact measurements of other ingredients ie 1 tbsp water, few drops of lemon...
I was planning on using;
1 pound honey (not sure if I should caramelize the entire pound??? most likely only half)
4 pounds Briess Golden Light Extract
and I haven't decided on the hops yet...
Cascade &/or fuggle... just because thats what I have on hand...
ANY advice would be much appreciated!

Click to expand...

As a honey-head who has tried multiple ways to get a stronger honey flavor in his beer (even dumping a pound of honey in my keg and clogging my dip tube), I found the best way to get a strong honey flavor is using honey malt. When I want a strong honey flavor in my beers, I up the honey malt in my grain bill so it composes 10% of the total. Anything more, I think even pooh would cringe.

...and yes, I just made a Winnie-the-pooh reference.