Apple pie cream Ale - spice addition - Question

[Braumeise]

So... ADD Squirrel that I am - I talked myself out of brewing Lager just yet and into: you have to brew something else other than witbeer...

Pretty proud of myself for creating my first very own recipe (I will post once I have brewed and tasted it) and my home brew store Guys calling it: looking really good.

so I am fairly excited about brewing it and pretty (in a British sense) proud of myself for coming up with it.

We are basically talking a normal cream ale
(Golden Promise, Crystal, Munichlight, flaked rice) and I'll use Wyeast 1056

haven't entirely made up my mind on hops but will probably be Willamette and crystal (maybe a hint of Hallertau blanc or lemondrop but I am still debating that with myself)

I would like to get "apple pie" Ale

I was thinking of ~4 Granny smith cut in slices added to boil T-15 and 1 ~ 2 inch cinnamon stick as well as 2-3 all spice and maybe 1/4 teaspoon of nutmeg

Not sure if that will leave me with enough apple flavor though.

Aslo entirely not sure if my amounts of spice will be overwhelming for a 5 gallon batch.

i am reluctant to add apple to the fermentation because I want to avoid it coming out to "apple cider-like"

I was also going to leave 1-2 vanilla beans in the sugar I am going to use for priming right when I start fermentation, so the sugar can pick up the vanilla aroma.

Depending on how intense the sugar will be I can always mix it with regular sugar. So that is the least of my concern.

The cinnamon/allspice/nutmeg and apple are tough since I never did anything like that.

Comments welcome.

Thanks for reading.

 

[Genuine]

You might get away with it by just using Apple Pie Spice, sort of how people use Pumpking Pie Spice in Pumpkin Ales. Whatever sugar is in the apples should be highly fermentable and since it's beer, you don't have to worry about back sweetening it like Cider. Does sound interesting though for sure!

 

[Braumeise]

I especially don't like that about pumpkin beer when there is ZERO pumpkin taste to it.
I am also adding a small amount of acidulated malt (just saw I didn't put that in OP)

My other thought with the apple aroma was maybe adding a spice extract (cinnamon, nutmeg, all spice) but not extracted with Vodka but with Calvados or maybe Apfelkorn before bottling?

That might get me to the apple aroma.

Any thoughts on the amount of spices? Looks good to me - but as I said I've never done this so I could be way off. And I don't want to ruin it by over doing the spices.

 

[mirthfuldragon]

Missing cardamon - which to me is what makes apple pie, well, apple pie. Glancing through the pumpkin beer recipes, they look to use 1 to 1.5 teaspoons of spice total, so I would use that as a baseline. Go out of your way for fresh spices - and make sure your cinnamon is actually ceylon cinnamon, and not cassia.

Hallertau blanc and lemondrop both point to citrus and berry, which to me seem out of place against apple pie. Brewer's gold jumps to mind, and maybe hallertau mittlefruh. Glacier and Brambling Cross could work too. I would look for spice, plum, and wood, and move away from floral and citrus.

Flaked oats and lactose also come to mind when I think apple pie beer, but then we're moving away from the cream ale style towards either an apple pie NE IPA (. . . . hmmm . . .) or porter/stout territory. Cream ale and apple cider (hard apple cider especially) seem to both fall on the same spectrum in terms of amount of flavor (but different flavors), mouthfeel, clarity; in other words, I think a cream ale and a hard cider are a lot more similar than say, a cream ale and an stout or NE IPA.

Something else you may want to look at is dry-hopping the spices or apples in secondary. I have not done any research in that area, but worth a look.

Small Town Brewery in Wauconda, IL (realtively near me) does a beer called "Not Your Mother's Apple Pie". My cursory search did not find anything on cloning it (using a clone as a baseline), but something else to go look at.

Good luck. Now excuse me, I have to think about an apple pie NE IPA for a while . . .

 

[treacheroustexan]

I just kegged my apple spice ale, and I used 1 tbsp of apple pie spice in the boil and another at kegging.

A few years ago I did an apple ale which was 4 gallons of wort and 1 gallon of fresh juice I got from running a bushel of apples through a juice. All of that fermented out and it tasted really good. I also added a little apple extract at bottling. That was also the first beer I entered into a competition and it scored a 30.

 

[Braumeise]

Missing cardamon - which to me is what makes apple pie, well, apple pie. Glancing through the pumpkin beer recipes, they look to use 1 to 1.5 teaspoons of spice total, so I would use that as a baseline. Go out of your way for fresh spices - and make sure your cinnamon is actually ceylon cinnamon, and not cassia.

always Ceylon and never ground always in sticks (I am a bit of a spice nerd)

cardamon seems off for me in apple pie - never use it when making actual apple pie. But almonds are usually a part of my pies.

Also citrus since I use lemon juice to keep the apples from going brown after they have been cut.

Hallertau blanc and lemondrop both point to citrus and berry, which to me seem out of place against apple pie. Brewer's gold jumps to mind, and maybe hallertau mittlefruh. Glacier and Brambling Cross could work too. I would look for spice, plum, and wood, and move away from floral and citrus.

I agree on the floral issue of Blanc and lemondrop. Wasn't sure if I want to use them however I can imagine that the "sauvignon blanc" notes could meet the apple quite well... not sure yet though.

Flaked oats and lactose also come to mind when I think apple pie beer, but then we're moving away from the cream ale style towards either an apple pie NE IPA (. . . . hmmm . . .) or porter/stout territory. Cream ale and apple cider (hard apple cider especially) seem to both fall on the same spectrum in terms of amount of flavor (but different flavors), mouthfeel, clarity; in other words, I think a cream ale and a hard cider are a lot more similar than say, a cream ale and an stout or NE IPA.

I am also going to brew a stout so the flaked oats and lactose have to go there.

Something else you may want to look at is dry-hopping the spices or apples in secondary. I have not done any research in that area, but worth a look.

Small Town Brewery in Wauconda, IL (realtively near me) does a beer called "Not Your Mother's Apple Pie". My cursory search did not find anything on cloning it (using a clone as a baseline), but something else to go look at.

Good luck. Now excuse me, I have to think about an apple pie NE IPA for a while . . .

lol like that idea as well...

I found a recipe here: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showpost.php?p=7739078&postcount=3 that sounds reasonable.

will need to go to my home brew store again since no pectase and no sulfur dioxide in my house.

I guess I'll ask them as well.

Thanks for your thoughts and the 1.5 tablespoon "rule" seems reasonable

I am so excited to brew this

 

[Braumeise]

I just kegged my apple spice ale, and I used 1 tbsp of apple pie spice in the boil and another at kegging.

A few years ago I did an apple ale which was 4 gallons of wort and 1 gallon of fresh juice I got from running a bushel of apples through a juice. All of that fermented out and it tasted really good. I also added a little apple extract at bottling. That was also the first beer I entered into a competition and it scored a 30.

I was entertaining the idea of a last addition before bottling.

Thanks

It sounds actually awesome what you made there

 

[Braumeise]

Just finished brewing.

It smelled awesome while boiling and the wort tastes promising.

I cut 2 green apples and roasted them with almonds. Added them with the spices (3 Pieces of cinnamon sticks each 3cm 3 seeds of all spice a dash of fresh ground nutmeg peel of 1/3 lemon taken off with very fine rasp) not sure if that is the right word for that tool lol. I did ground the cinnamon and all spice in a mortar.

used Willamette and Crystal and added 7 gr. of Blanc 15 min. before end of boil.

This could come out really, really nice.