Brewing with 6+ month old raw honey

[LittlejohnBrew]

Brewing with honey for the first time in a 5 gal batch of a DIPA. I've got about 8 oz of raw honey that was given to me about 6 months ago by a friend that is a beekeeper. I realize this amount of honey probably won't have much of an impact, but I'm only looking for a subtle honey note in the finished beer.

I read adding it during fermentation without pasteurizing gives the best results for flavor/aroma. It sounds like its relatively low risk of infection. However, this honey has been sitting in my pantry for 6+ months in an old spaghetti sauce jar and has honey all around the rim and outside of the jar. Its clear sanitation wasn't really thought out whenever my bud was putting the honey into the jar.

So given the age and messiness of the jar am I at a greater risk of infection with this honey? Adding it to the boil seems to not provide much value besides the fact that I can tell my friend I brewed with his honey.

 

[RPh_Guy]

Honey literally never goes bad if its moisture content is kept low enough, so the storage period is not a problem.

Raw honey contains a fair amount of wild yeast, bacteria, and mold from the bees themselves and not just from all stages of harvesting and packaging. Sanitizing the jar would be like sanitizing a flowerpot before filling it with dirt.

It's just a roll of the dice whether those wild microbes will have an impact on your beer. I generally recommend against adding unpasteurized ingredients, particularly if bottling.

You may consider pasteurizing it and then adding it toward the end of fermentation. 150°F for 30 minutes would be plenty.

8oz isn't much, so I pretty much guarantee you won't taste the honey in a 5 gal DIPA regardless.

Cheers

 

[Velnerj]

I've heard an easy way to pasteurize honey is to run it through a dishwasher cycle. Just make sure it's sealed up tight. I think I heard this from James Spencer from basic brewing radio.

 

[odie]

why not take about a pint of finished beer and dissolve the honey into it in a saucepan? heat it to a simmer or hot enough to kill any bacteria, then put it in the keg and rack your fermenter? let it keg condition a few days with the residual yeast?

 

[bobeer]

honey is pretty much 100% fermentable so you wont notice it at all in the finished DIPA. All it'll do is dry it out some. Best bet is to use honey malt next time, just a little though because it goes a long way, if you want the sweet honey taste.

 

[odie]

How about priming the keg with honey?

 

[LittlejohnBrew]

Thanks for the suggestions all. I ended up getting too busy to pasteurize the honey and after a week of fermentation decided to leave it out. My guess is I actually had less than 8 oz of honey and sounds like it would have almost no impact on the beer.

 

[Still Brewn]

As said above, honey does not go bad. Honey has been found in ancient Egyptian tombs that was still good. Honey, to a certain extent, will not add flavor, the honey flavor you are looking for anyway. If you add buckwheat honey you will get that flavor in your beer. Honey has been used since ancient times as a disinfectant on wounds, that said all of the wild yeasts can cause unwanted fermentation profiles or a runaway fermentation. There is also the risk of Clostridium botulinum bacterium spores being introduced to your beer this is the same reason you don't give honey to infants.
For honey flavor use honey malt. To boost abv or dry out a beer add honey. You can get specific flavors from honey by using specific types of honey but it will not impart the honey flavor people expect. I have used wildflower and buckwheat, wildflower gave a flowery flavor but ever so sleight and buckwheat was just plain awful. I believe there is a thread on a buckwheat honey on here somewhere.

Your best bet when using honey is to add it during the last 5 minutes of the boil. I use honey all the time because I get so much every year for free or at a very low cost because of people we know that are beekeepers. I find it great to use and lowers my grain bill on those stronger brews. Even if your honey has crystallized it is still good to use. You can add water to it and shake it to dissolve the sugar crystals, just scrape out the container or what I do is pour boiling wort into the container several times to get all that honey goodness.
1# of Honey adds 1.032 to 1 gallon of wort
1# of Honey Malt adds 1.034 to 1 gallon of wort

Hope this helps

 

[RPh_Guy]

Clostridium botulinum bacterium spores

FYI Clostridium is a non-issue in beer.

buckwheat was just plain awful.

What was bad about buckwheat?
It is pungent. Maybe you used too much.

Wish I had so much free (or even inexpensive) honey!

 

[ScrewyBrewer]

The other day I brewed with two pounds of local honey that sat in my garage for almost four years. One pound was as solid as sugar cubes but heating them in near boiling water for a while they both poured like syrup. The honey smelled and tasted great. Last year I used some of it for brewing and the beer came out awesome.

 

[Still Brewn]

FYI Clostridium is a non-issue in beer.


What was bad about buckwheat?
It is pungent. Maybe you used too much.

Wish I had so much free (or even inexpensive) honey!

True on the botulism to certain extent there are no known human pathogens that can survive in beer but there is always going to be an exception to the rule somewhere..... (and this is just because I am interested and would rather error on the side of caution and not to start an argument) what happens if you have an extremely low hopped beer, unusually high spore count and no boil of the honey?

The buckwheat I got from my son, he brought it back with him while he was home on leave so I I don't know exactly where it came from. If I remember correctly it was a 3 lb. Jug (or maybe more)I used in one 5 gallon batch. So yeah, probably too much. I didn't have time to do any research on the recipe for buckwheat honey because my son was only going to be here for one day and at the time my family wouldn't let me brew by myself so it was a one shot deal to brew.

When I do buy honey from somewhere other than a beekeeper I get it from Costco they have very good prices and usually have multiple kinds at my location . Although I have never seen buckwheat or wildflower but I have seen orange blossom once but I forgot to go back and grab it.

 

[RPh_Guy]

what happens if you have an extremely low hopped beer, unusually high spore count and no boil of the honey?

If you dump Clostridium spores into an unhopped beer, the oxygen prevents Clostridium growth until the other bacteria and/or yeast lower the pH.
Hops are an added layer of proportion, and even low amounts inhibit Clostridium.

....
Yeah, I think that's too much buckwheat.

Cheers