Honey malt- too much?

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Pharmguy

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I think the guy at my HB store may have steered me in the wrong direction. Just decided at the very last minute to brew on tuesday and made up a honey ale for the summer. I was just going to add some honey at the end of the boil but he talked me into steeping a pound of honey malt. Now I'm reading a pound is .....ALOT!:( What kind of taste will I be in store for? Is this something that will mellow with prolonged conditioning?
 
Honey malt imparts more of a "honey" flavor than honey does.

1# is a lot though. I would have probably stepped down to 1/2 or 3/4 of a lb.

I do use a lb. in my honey wheat, but when I first started using that malt, I started out at 4oz. and stepped it up over a series of batches to distinguish what character I really wanted.
 
Do you mean honey malt imparts an actual sweet honey flavor?

OP: If that's the case, then it will taste absolutely nothing like adding honey to beer. Honey is almost all fermentable, so what's left after fermentation is a lot of the acidic compounds that protected the honey in the first place, resulting in a noticable "tang." It's good, but it's not "honey" flavored.
 
If you're referring to jmulligan's thread, she was also using a pound of crystal malt and a ton of base malt, in an IIPA she didn't want to be too sweet. Honey malt is fairly potent, but it could well be fine to use a full pound depending on the rest of the recipe and what your intentions are. Just remember that honey malt IS a crystal malt, if you're using it AND other crystals, they can add up.
 
Yeah, I saw it in several threads. Atleast in those threads, any more than 0.5lbs was a bad idea. I did not use any other crystal. Just 6 lbs of DME and 1 lb of honey malt. 1 oz of NB at start of boil and 1 oz of golding at end boil.
 
Sounds tasty...I wouldn't worry about it. I'm one of the people that says honey malt is best in small quantities, but i think the lack of other grains will give it just the right amount of character.
 
Agreed. It'll probably be noticable, but that's not a bad thing. Not too much else to make the beer overly sweet, and the late hop addition should help keep things in balance. Should be good.
 
Thought it would be appropriate to re-open this thread as I am now drinking this beer. I was way off, the 1 pound of honey malt actually seems like its not enough. I dont get any kind of honey/ sweet flavor at all. Justs tastes like a pale ale. Finishes rough as well....in fact, alot of my beers do. Start off nice but finish kind of rough. Could this be the extract twang I keep reading about? Time to PM me thinks!
 
Sounds like the honey malt didn't contribute much, because when I've used it, the older the beer, the more the flavor comes out.

PM would be good...I think this malt needs to be mashed.
 
An off-topic question if you don't mind: Will this contribute body and amount of head like CaraPils would?
 
I don't think it would contribute body like caraPils, but I've only used it a couple of times where it has added, primarily, a bright sweetness that fades to a somewhat honey-like flavor once the beer is properly conditioned.
 
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