Brewday came early--MEXICAN BLACKBIRD!

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Dude

Supporting Member
HBT Supporter
Joined
Jan 15, 2005
Messages
8,768
Reaction score
143
Location
Ramstein-Miesenbach
Well, plans changed and I had some free time so I'm doing it.
I've been formulating this recipe for a few eeks, it came to fruition finally, and the grist is in the mashtun right now.

Its a complete experiment. I had the name first (thank you ZZ Top!) and tried to make a recipe around it. Its gonna be a real puta! A 27 SRM jalapeno pepper beer.
I cannot wait to try this. I just hope it works out!!!!

Check out the specs of the recipe and please, DISCUSS!


Mexican Blackbird
A ProMash Recipe Report

Recipe Specifics
----------------
Batch Size (Gal): 3.00 Wort Size (Gal): 3.00
Total Grain (Lbs): 6.23
Anticipated OG: 1.052 Plato: 12.95
Anticipated SRM: 27.4
Anticipated IBU: 36.6
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70 %
Wort Boil Time: 75 Minutes

Grain/Extract/Sugar
% Amount Name Origin Potential SRM
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
43.1 2.68 lbs. Pale Malt(2-row) America 1.036 2
31.4 1.95 lbs. Pilsener Malt Germany 1.038 2
4.4 0.27 lbs. Black Patent Malt America 1.028 525
4.4 0.27 lbs. Flaked Corn (Maize) America 1.040 1
8.0 0.50 lbs. Crystal 120L Great Britain 1.033 105
4.4 0.27 lbs. Honey Malt Canada 1.030 18
4.4 0.27 lbs. Wheat Malt America 1.038 2

Hops
Amount Name Form Alpha IBU Boil Time
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
0.50 oz. Cascade Whole 6.55 24.2 60 min.
0.25 oz. Cascade Whole 6.55 6.2 30 min.
0.25 oz. Czech Saaz Whole 3.00 1.9 20 min.
0.25 oz. Mt. Hood Pellet 3.40 2.3 20 min.
0.25 oz. Cascade Whole 6.75 2.1 5 min.

Yeast
-----
WLP060 American Ale Blend

ADDITIONAL INGREDIENTS:

2 LBS. Chipotle peppers (Add to secondary)
 
Quick noob question...how do you plan to sanitize the chiles, or is it necessary? I'm planning on doing something similar this weekend but with chiptoles, hopefully similar to Rogue Mexicali. I'm still debating whether to just boil them in the wort or toss them in the secondary.
 
good luck brother man! that one will hurt the coming out!!!!!

"....the wings of the blackbird will spread like an eagle for you....."
 
WOW! Two pounds of Chipotles in secondary! I would think that by the time you place them in secondary, you really won't need to sanitize them.

I'd be interested to see how you like the WLP060 American Ale Blend. I never knew it existed until your post, then I went to the White Labs website to look it up. Looks interesting!
 
All--I'm not fully decided on how much chipotle chiles to put in. I'm going to start with a pound, and taste if after a week or so in secondary. I'll add more if necessary. I don't want it to hot. I want to be able to taste the chiles like in the Rogue beer, but not have a 3 alarm fire in my mouth every time I crack one of these open. I plan on blanching the roasted chiles briefly and tossing them in secondary--I'm not too worried about infection cause the alcohol in the fermenter will inhibit nasties. I hope.

Brewday problems: I missed my efficiency on this one, so I had to add some DME. Its not near as dark as I wanted it to be. It looks like a Brown ale. I'm wondering if I can remedy that somehow. I want this sucker black. My thief took a dump. I started taking a pre-boil sample from the brew pot and wort started flowing out through a hairline crack. I'm assuming this is going to happen to my autosiphon soon as well, as cracks are developing in that too.

Otherwise brewday went smooth. I pitched right onto that slurry of WLP060 that housed the Gravedigger ale up until today. Its been locked up for an hour and no activity yet. I'll bet its bubbling quite furiously before I hit the sack tonight. :D

This whole batch is getting bottled. I can't wait to have one with a nice rack of ribs. :cool:

Rhoobarb said:
I'd be interested to see how you like the WLP060 American Ale Blend. I never knew it existed until your post, then I went to the White Labs website to look it up. Looks interesting!
I asked my LHBS owner what those yeasts were, cause the Whitelabs site isn't very informative about it. He assumed it was American Ale 1 (chico) and 2 (who is that?), and the East Coast Ale (Sam Adams). That rocks.....

Oh yeah... "Go find a Mexican Blackbird and send all your troubles back home...."
 
i once picked my nose after i had cut up habenaro peppers... not a very good idea.. my nose ran for twenty minutes... :D i think if you slice em up, the acid should keep anything nasty from growing...

in addition to the secondary, did you ever think about just dropping one pepper into each bottle, then bottling it? i read that somewhere on this forum before.
 
I haven't been able to get that song out of my head all day.

"They all call her puta, 'cause no one really knows her name."

LOL
 
chipotles are smoked jalepeno peppers, therefore already cooked, so wouldn't blanching them make them lose some of their flavors? plus you have to add salt to blanch, so will that have an affect? if it was me, i'd just use fresh jalapeno's in the secondary. if you want more heat, expose the veins inside the pepper. that's where the real heat comes from!!!!!! just curios to how it'll work.....

Chili Beer from Arizona (or New Mexico) just has the peppers in the bottle. tastes like
drinking pickled jalapeno juice from the jar :~( wasn't too impressed, but maybe it was an old beer? plus, it's a lager style brew......

".....oh, this is gonna be so fine....."
 
I've had some jalapeno beer that was good, but I specifically want some of the smoky flavors from the chipotles. If you acquire a true chipotle it will be dried and I would think blanching it would really just rehydrate it a bit. The ones in cans in adobo sauce are already hydrated, and I'm not sure what affect blanching would have on them. Perhaps just steam blanching would be the way to go.

Blanching times for fresh peppers vary from 90 seconds to 3 minutes, so it would be relatively quick and hopefully wouldn't do much to the flavor.
 
Hey man,
I am new here but not to brewing. One of my signature recipes is a jalepeno ale. The first time I brewed it I used 5 large jalepenos in the secondary for 2 weeks. ( I boiled them to sanitize them) and that one came out fire hot. I was the only one who could drink it. Everybatch after that I put the jalepenos in the secondary one week before bottling and got a nice jalepeno taste with no heat.
I think you might want to start with a 1/2 pound of chipotle first. JMHO.
 
t1master said:
i once picked my nose after i had cut up habenaro peppers... not a very good idea.. my nose ran for twenty minutes... :D

One learns quickly to wear rubber gloves when working with this stuff. Married guys in particular usually only need to be beaten once (by SWMBO) in order to learn this lesson. :eek:
 
Rhoobarb said:
Nice selection - I really liked that. Might have to pick that CD up!

Definately pick the CD up...I haven't heard rock-and-roll like this in thirty years. I'm pretty sure track 7 was written about me ;)
 
Wayne Havens said:
Hey man,
I am new here but not to brewing. One of my signature recipes is a jalepeno ale. The first time I brewed it I used 5 large jalepenos in the secondary for 2 weeks. ( I boiled them to sanitize them) and that one came out fire hot. I was the only one who could drink it. Everybatch after that I put the jalepenos in the secondary one week before bottling and got a nice jalepeno taste with no heat.
I think you might want to start with a 1/2 pound of chipotle first. JMHO.


Roger that--thanks for the advice.

Also I figured out how to fix my dilemma with the color. A product called Sinamar. Very interesting stuff, BYO had an article about it not too long ago.
 
If I may...

Take some red jalapenos (the red ones are the ripe ones) and coat them with olive oil, ten put them on the grill until the skin peels off like plastic. Let them cool, and remove the skin and most of the seeds from inside. The skin and seeds are the source of the heat, so leave in as man as you want, but the more you leave in, the hotter the product.

Alternatively, tr to use Poblano peppers. They look like large jalapenos. Use the same technique as listed above.

You'll end up with a nice smokey pepper that's not too hot. Consider using wood chips on your fire if you really want to add some character.

NOTE TO PEOPLE USING PEPPERS:

Don't DON'T DON'T go to the bathroom after working with peppers. Refrain on using your fingers on any sensitive part of your S.O. unless you want to lose that hand and your chances to have sex for years to come.
 
Cheesefood said:
You'll end up with a nice smokey pepper that's not too hot. Consider using wood chips on your fire if you really want to add some character.

NOTE TO PEOPLE USING PEPPERS:

Don't DON'T DON'T go to the bathroom after working with peppers. Refrain on using your fingers on any sensitive part of your S.O. unless you want to lose that hand and your chances to have sex for years to come.


LOL...and how are we familiar with this, may I ask? :eek: :p
 
ORRELSE said:
LOL...and how are we familiar with this, may I ask? :eek: :p

I eat a lot of hot food. More than once, I've underestimated my peppers and over estimated my need to recycle beer. It's a pleasant feeling at first, but quickly goes towards the unpleasant.

As for the other part of my statement... best left undiscussed. She didn't find it pleasant at any point.
 
Well, I dumped 1/4lb of chipotles (the actual dry ones, not the canned ones in adobo) in the secondary last night after steaming them for 10 minutes (house smells nice). The beer was in the primary for a week, the secondary for a week, and I figure I'll start sneaking samples each day now and rack to the keg when it seems 'right'.
 
Seeing the first batch was fukked, I'm attempting this again. The recipe got totally revisited and rewritten.

I've been dying to do a chile beer so I want to get this one going. I know it doesn't fit the whole "summer beer" theme, but it should definitely be a "winter warmer"!

I'll post the recipe and tell you all about brewday after it is done!
 
Wow. Anyone need a good cream ale recipe? The base beer for this Mexican Blackbird version 2 is a cream ale, and I tasted it when I racked it. It is just like a BMC!!! I'm not kidding--I had a whole group of people taste it Saturday to make sure I wasn't going nuts. The recipe has 2 pounds of corn in it. :p

I wanted this beer to be like a mexican lagerish type flavor, with a roasted chili bite at the end. We'll, I certainly got the lager flavor out of it. I even left the carboy uncovered during primary so it would skunk up a little bit. It worked. :D

I'm adding sinamar and the roasted peppers Wednesday, then after 2 weeks it is going to get bottled.
 
ORRELSE said:
I'm adding sinamar and the roasted peppers Wednesday, then after 2 weeks it is going to get bottled.
What's sinamar?

Are you doing the peppers different this time from last?
 
El Pistolero said:
What's sinamar?

Are you doing the peppers different this time from last?


I never got a chance to even put peppers in the last batch. It got nasty before that. :mad:

I'm going to roast them on the grill, peel the charred skin, and then chop them and add them to secondary (or tertiary in this case).

SINAMAR
 
I wish I could find my pictures of Paul Curry roasting chilies: Gas-tight goggles, rubber gloves and breathing mask. And after watching this operation (from the other side of the yard), he wanted us to try his con carne!
 
What about just making a tea to add to the boil kettle? Anyone try this? It will also add some of the peppers natural colors. Just curious as to how this would work...
 
I've made several batches of Chili Beer.

Mostly I just washed off the jalapenos, cut the bottoms off, put several slices down the outsides and placed one in each bottle.

Man, were they ever hot! I was never able to finish 1-12 oz bottle. It was just too damn hot. A good novelty though. :D
 
WOOHOO!!!!

This stuff rocks!!!!

I just took a sample of it after leaving some fire roasted jalapenos in secondary for 5 days.

It has more pepper taste than the Rogue Chipotle ale, but hardly any heat. I'm going to leave this sucker on the jalapenos for another 5 days I think, and then bottle it.

I'm really impressed with how this came out. Right now, Mexican Blackbird v.2 is considered a resounding success IMHO. :D *pumps fist*
 
Congrats!!!
I really want to try this once I get fully confident in my brewing abilities. I love spicy stuff, and really love jalapenos...
 
Well, I'm revisiting this recipe, in hopes of brewing another one soon. I've been thinking, why does it have to be black to call it mexican blackbird? Why can't it just be a chile beer?

Well, I'm taking the sinamar out of the recipe and brewing it as is. V.3 is going to be hotter though.
 
Baron von BeeGee said:
Did you see the chile beer in the Replicator in the latest version of BYO? They put chiles in the boil. I'm going to brew mine again this year, too, and might incoroporate some kettle chiles.

Me too! I'm also going to use all home smoked base malt as well. Should add another dimension to go with the chiles.
 
I got tons of smoke from the chipotles...perhaps too much. I'll probably keep them but cut them way back and augment with other chiles. I did a brown ale last time, but will probably go with some type of pale ale this time.
 
Back
Top