How much sugar...

[ILurvTheWhiskey]

Today at the store I came across the different types of brewing sugar available at my local brew store. I know that the different Abbeys and some of the craft companies use different types of sugar adjuncts and I'm curious as to what or how much should be used.

Two of the sugars that I saw were dextrose and Belgium rock candy. If I understand correctly, the Belgium stuff has been pre-inverted, correct?

I'm trying to brew a dark Abby style ale with a kick to it and am wondering what's the maximum I could use without imparting off flavors to the beers, this is on a 5 gallon basis).

Any ideas? I posted this after having a few and I'n not sure the sentense sctrurte is turning out as well as I would hope. Will come back into tomotrrow and straighten this up.

thanks folks. I'm going to bed...

 

[Kauai_Kahuna]

Most recipes I see call for 1 to 1.5 lbs of Belgium rock candy. I have made a chimay red label clone with 1 lbs light rock candy, and half a pound of cracked sugar. (boil water, add sugar, let cool, it cracks) Same as rock candy but a lot cheaper.
Belgium rock candy will impart a sweetness and flavor to your beer even at just 1 lb. It is not an off taste and the style calls for it. It's just "different".

 

[larrybrewer]

Most recipes I see call for 1 to 1.5 lbs of Belgium rock candy.

Past this amount you can experience flavor problems with the sugar overpowering the beer and creating a thin effect.

 

[larrybrewer]

Two of the sugars that I saw were dextrose and Belgium rock candy.

Dextrose is for priming - same thing as corn sugar. If you put that in your wort or fermenter it will turn to alcohol but it will screw up the flavor. Brown sugar is a better alternative for boosting gravity in something like a barley wine or imperial IPA. The Belgian sugar is (of course) the best for a Belgian style beer.

 

[ILurvTheWhiskey]

Thanks again. I've not got an exact recipe that I'm looking at but I appreciate the help. I'm going to guess that 1 pound of rock candy is in a 5 gallon batch, right? I think I'll check some of those Chimay recipes. Every thanksgiving I partake in a bottle to help the turkey go down. Thanks.

 

[Saccharomyces]

You can go up to 20% of the grainbill for a Belgian or for an IPA. Helps to dry things out.

I have used corn sugar, turbinado sugar, straight table sugar. All work fine. Corn sugar or inverted table sugar (you can invert yourself using citric acid and heat) are completely neutral. Turbinado contains some molasses so it imparts a slight color and flavor. If you are doing a dubbel or abbey ale the amber or dark Belgian candi sugar syrups will add a flavor component you can't get from straight sugar. The rock stuff everyone seems to agree is just a waste of money, it's nothing more than regular sucrose (table sugar).

 

[PseudoChef]

Dextrose is for priming - same thing as corn sugar. If you put that in your wort or fermenter it will turn to alcohol but it will screw up the flavor. Brown sugar is a better alternative for boosting gravity in something like a barley wine or imperial IPA. The Belgian sugar is (of course) the best for a Belgian style beer.

Couldn't be further from the truth. Corn or Cane sugar, when utilized correctly, will impart no flavor or "cider-like" tastes to a beer. Jamil's Belgian Golden Strong has 3 lbs of regular cane sugar and takes home national awards. I'm not saying "use his recipes" or "this is the end all be all" but adding sugar in a balanced recipe is different than adding it to a crappy malt extract kit that calls for straight sugar as half of the fermentables.

Moreover, in a recent edition of Zymurgy, there was an experiment with a bunch of different types of sugar. For the beginning samplings, they said that Brown Sugar was the worst.

 

[ILurvTheWhiskey]

I've seen a couple of you mention heating up sugar or adding citric acid to it to invert it. Can you give me a little more info on that, or point me in the right direction? I don't wanna screw this up. Thanks.