Beer with bacon?!

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Jaša Ratkai

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Trying to connect things that I love, beer and bacon obviously.
1. What style of beer would be appropriate to be brewed with bacon (I was thinking porter/stout).
2. When to add bacon? During mash, boil or afterwards? And at what times (minutes)
 
Rauchbier, obviously! Though a smoked porter could be very nice.

Might I suggest using hickory powder or some other kind of "dry smoke" to avoid adding too much fat to your beer?
 
There was a show on TV that did it through a custom hop stand rig. I think that I recall that they pumped the wort through the bacon after the boil. I believe they were doing one barrel and ended up needing 200 lbs of bacon.

Northern Brewer used to (has) a bacon beer kit. It used(s) a bacon flavor extract.
 
Just to underline my disgust, here is how you bring real bacon into a beer, which obviously nobody should ever do, because it is utterly disgusting and a almost a crime against humanity. Certainly it is a waste of beer and a waste of bacon a the same time, why waste two such beautiful things!?

Fry the bacon, get rid of some of the fat, chop the rest into small pieces, let soak in vodka for a week or so, filter out the bacon, then put liquid into an open bottle, put a straw inside of the bottle that penetrates the fat layer on top which should have separated by now, put everything into the freezer, fat turns rock solid and the liquid with the flavour inside can be poured out through the hole of the carefully removed straw that went through the fatt layer before freezing.


Again, this is disgusting.
 
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I am really interested/have dabbled in fat washing liquor for extra flavor. Have some butter washed rye, Camembert washed gin, etc. Possible you could fat wash some vodka with bacon and use it for flavoring? During fat washing you remove the fat and just end up with the flavor from whatever you’re using. It’s pretty easy. Maybe this way you don’t worry about as much fat getting in and get just flavor. Really I would never dream of just adding straight bacon to any point of the process. Just trying to come up with idea to add flavor in a mess free way.

Edit: And there you go, process explained just before my post.
 
Thank you for all your anwsers, you saved me from a mess big time!
Hoe much vodka should I use so it wouldn't affect the alcohol percentage too much? Talking about 5 gallon batch.
 
Thank you for all your anwsers, you saved me from a mess big time!
Hoe much vodka should I use so it wouldn't affect the alcohol percentage too much? Talking about 5 gallon batch.

I honestly have no idea as I never tried this because... I ...find.. this...... guess what!


:D

DISGUSTING!!!! :D
 
Brooklyn Brew Shop has quite a successful recipe for a Bacon Dubbel - it's not exactly my thing, but I might try it one of these days. I would guess that the lean, heavily-smoked bacon that is common in your region might be excellent for this. :)

The recipe is in their book, Make Some Beer, and looks pretty straightforward. Judging by the grain bill, I wouldn't mind trying it, with or without the bacon. If you have trouble finding the book on Amazon etc., let me know, and I can probably send the recipe to you.
 
Rather than use actual bacon I would use smoked malt some honey malt for sweetness and perhaps a touch of salt following primary (salt inhibits yeast somewhat) if bottle priming use maple syrup the aroma will accentuate the bacon like flavors.
 
Anyone remember the TV show? It was a couple guys with foreign (to Americans) accents. British or Scottish I think. They went around and brewed strange beers in a town and then had a party for the locals and served the beer.

I don't remember that they went through the steps that Miraculix listed. I seem to recall that it took 200 pounds of bacon to infuse one barrel.
 
Anyone remember the TV show? It was a couple guys with foreign (to Americans) accents. British or Scottish I think. They went around and brewed strange beers in a town and then had a party for the locals and served the beer.

I don't remember that they went through the steps that Miraculix listed. I seem to recall that it took 200 pounds of bacon to infuse one barrel.

Sounds like you're talking about the "Brew Dogs" show, with the guys from BrewDog. I seem to remember one they did with bacon
 
Rather than use actual bacon I would use smoked malt some honey malt for sweetness and perhaps a touch of salt following primary (salt inhibits yeast somewhat) if bottle priming use maple syrup the aroma will accentuate the bacon like flavors.
I was going to suggest this as well. Smoked malts can definitely add bacon flavors.
 
Trying to connect things that I love, beer and bacon obviously.
1. What style of beer would be appropriate to be brewed with bacon (I was thinking porter/stout).
2. When to add bacon? During mash, boil or afterwards? And at what times (minutes)

Use Breiss cherry smoked malt. It's a sweet smoke flavor. Someone else on here made it and entered it in a bacon festival and won Best of Show with that beer. No bacon, but if you use cherry-smoked malt and some other complimentary malts, such as in that recipe below, you'll make a very nice beer that will get you what you're looking for.

See the following thread for more info. Specifically, scroll down to the posts by @DubbelDach

Cherry Beech Smokebeer (Many Awards)
 
Use Breiss cherry smoked malt. It's a sweet smoke flavor. Someone else on here made it and entered it in a bacon festival and won Best of Show with that beer. No bacon, but if you use cherry-smoked malt and some other complimentary malts, such as in that recipe below, you'll make a very nice beer that will get you what you're looking for.

See the following thread for more info. Specifically, scroll down to the posts by @DubbelDach

Cherry Beech Smokebeer (Many Awards)

That would actually be a non-disgusting version of a bacon beer. I highly recommend it!
 
I've done smoked beers using Cherrywood, Mesquite, Oak Smoked Wheat, and Peat smoked. I guess I didn't have the right combination because I never got any bacon from any of them.
 
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