Mesquite Molasses Beer

[JuanMoore]

I'll have to take that into consideration.

I was also thinking of only punting in 2-4 pears. Instead of a full half pound.

The flavor from the pears is pretty mild, almost melon like, so even using 1/2# it would be hard to tell it's there. It will add some great purple color even in small quantities though.

 

[vegas20s]

My buddy told be about barrel cactus fruit. If I can find some I might use that instead. The description was lemon and kiwi flavors. Definitely more of the saison type of flavors.

 

[TripleHopped]

Barrel cactus fruit is a little different than the Prickly Pear fruit. The Barrel cactus fruit is hollow with a bunch of black seeds in the center. The seeds are edible , not much flavor to them, but a good source of protein. The flavor is subdued. Some of the guys I work with were not that impressed with the flavor of the fruit. Here is a pic that I found on the web from someones blog when I was looking for a pic to post here.

I'm going to start colleting mesquite beans this next week and see how things work out.

 

[vegas20s]

Barrel cactus fruit is a little different than the Prickly Pear fruit. The Barrel cactus fruit is hollow with a bunch of black seeds in the center. The seeds are edible , not much flavor to them, but a good source of protein. The flavor is subdued. Some of the guys I work with were not that impressed with the flavor of the fruit. Here is a pic that I found on the web from someones blog when I was looking for a pic to post here.


I'm going to start colleting mesquite beans this next week and see how things work out.

Subdued is ok as long as you have enough. What was the taste like though? would it go well with the mesquite beans?

 

[TripleHopped]

Subdued is ok as long as you have enough. What was the taste like though? would it go well with the mesquite beans?

I haven't tasted any processed Mesquite yet. I've only chewed on a bean pod or two quite a while ago. I don't think it was from any of the three that seem to have the most flavor (Honey, Screwbean or Velvet). And just my luck none of the 7 to 8 Mesquite trees on my property are the flavorful ones.

I don't want to side track this thread. Let me just say that the flavor of the ones I have eaten had a faint taste of lemon/kiwi, and would probably be best crushed up in the secondary.

 

[corkybstewart]

This is a great thread. I have about 120 acres of mesquite and cactus across the street from my house and for years I've been interested in finding ways to use both cactus and mesquite for food. Even living here in New Mexico there is little info to be found on ways to consume mesquite and cacti, aside from Prickly Pear mead or jelly.
How do you tell the species of mesquite? All of these are "native" I guess. I can't imagine anybody bringing non-native mesquite to this area.
BTW prickly pear is essentially flavorless, but it is colorful and will ferment nicely.

 

[JuanMoore]

How do you tell the species of mesquite? All of these are "native" I guess. I can't imagine anybody bringing non-native mesquite to this area.

They are most likely honey mesquite in your area. Honey mesquite have larger leaves with more space between them, and wider pods that dry to a honey color. Velvet mesquite have smaller leaves that are very close to each other, and thinner lighter colored pods that can sometimes have pink or purple streaks. Screwbean mesquites are easy to identify from the corkscrew shaped pods. The Chilean mesquite looks a lot like the honey mesquite but has lighter colored pods and much longer thorns.

 

[GTG]

I have a copy of the article here - http://arizonahikers.com/GTG/Sower2002HomebrewingIndigenousBeveragesoftheSouthwestZymurgy.pdf
If anyone needs it. ( I think JuanMoore sent it to me a while back? )

I was planning on the toasting and making extract per the instructions but wanted to use 2 lbs of pods for a barley wine recipe. I just wonder if that will leave it too sweet?

GTG

Evanos, You wouldn't have that Zymurgy article in pdf form would you?

 

[JuanMoore]

I have a copy of the article here - http://arizonahikers.com/GTG/Sower2002HomebrewingIndigenousBeveragesoftheSouthwestZymurgy.pdf
If anyone needs it. ( I think JuanMoore sent it to me a while back? )

I was planning on the toasting and making extract per the instructions but wanted to use 2 lbs of pods for a barley wine recipe. I just wonder if that will leave it too sweet?

GTG

Even roasted the sugars will be pretty fermentable. IMO 2-3# is about right for a 5 gal batch.

 

[NorthBay]

wow. great information.
I remember reading something about Pinole in the past, but I never thought about brewing with mesquite pods.

Thanks for a great thread.

I grew up in Pinole! Graduated from Pinole Valley HIgh.


For those who don't know:

Pinole is a Spanish translation of an Aztec word for a coarse flour made from ground toasted maize kernels, often in a mixture with a variety of herbs and ground seeds, which can be eaten by itself or be used as the base for a beverage.

 

[Hell_Fish]

I have been thinking about this a lot. I have a ton of mesquite on my land. I made jelly last year and it reminded me of honey. Im thinking about trying a honey brown recipe minus the honey and include a mesquite syrup.

 

[C-Rider]

Kiawe beans on the ground here. Might begin to harvest some real soon.

 

[GTG]

So I put my pods in the oven tonight at 350 as the article suggests. In about 10 minutes I had smoke billowing from the oven. SWMBO was not happy. I did get some roastiness on the pods, some more than others. I'm going to give them a try in any case. Between the mix of dark and light, I should get a decent in between roast taste. I think I will get another bucket full to put away to make another batch or two this coming winter though. I'm pretty certain mine are honey mesquite from th information that I've looked up. If anyone out there is interested in them and don't have them available in your area, I'd be happy to gather some up for a trade.

GTG

 

[GTG]

Here's a picture of my results. You can see a pod in the middle of the picture that shows the pod color before toasting. -

I'm going to try these in a brew and see what I get.
More information - I've been drying these for a while in the garage, the garage smelled like cookies for a while because of them. I've had mesquite cookies and tortillas and these pods smell the same as them. This should make for an interesting ingredient. My first recipe is for a dark wheat hybrid and my second recipe will be for a mesquite barleywine hopefully.
GTG

 

[wolfstar]

I am definitely going to give this a shot. I have several mesquites on my propert, and probably have an endless supply with thousands of acres of BLM land less than 3 miles from my house...Excellent thread, thanks for the info!

 

[GTG]

As the Zymurgy articke suggests, the honey and velvet mesquites seem to have a very high sugar content. I have tasted a number of pods and those two do seem to be sweeter.

 

[corkybstewart]

On my way home for lunch I noticed that the mesquites have large green pods on them right now, but only in a small area. The rest of the mesquites are barren. I can probably get plenty for a batch of beer but is this normal?

 

[GTG]

Quite normal, there are many different types of mesquite that all flower and fruit at different times.
According to the article listed above, your best results will be from pods that look like this -
Honey Mesquite

Or Velvet Mesquite -

When you bite into one, they will taste sweet. When you have a bunch of them in a bucket they will smell like cookies. I'm sure the other types of mesquite pods will work, they just don't have the sugar content.

GTG

On my way home for lunch I noticed that the mesquites have large green pods on them right now, but only in a small area. The rest of the mesquites are barren. I can probably get plenty for a batch of beer but is this normal?

 

[GTG]

I'm going to make a mesquite wheat today. I'll post up results.

GTG

 

[GTG]

Steeped the 2 lbs of pods in 1 gallon of water at 155 for 90 minutes.
Topped up to 2.5 gallons
3 lbs Wheat DME at start of boil
1/2 oz Mt Hood
1/2 oz Hersbrucker
1/2 oz Mt Hood
3 lbs Wheat DME at 15 min to go
.75 lb piloncilo sugar at 15 min to go
Trappist Yeast

 

[JuanMoore]

Steeped the 2 lbs of pods in 1 gallon of water at 155 for 90 minutes.
Topped up to 2.5 gallons
3 lbs Wheat DME at start of boil
1/2 oz Mt Hood
1/2 oz Hersbrucker
1/2 oz Mt Hood
3 lbs Wheat DME at 15 min to go
.75 lb piloncilo sugar at 15 min to go
Trappist Yeast

Sounds good. I brewed up 12 gal of mesquite ale two weekends ago, which used up the last of my pods. Need to find some time to harvest some more before it's too late for the year.

 

[GTG]

Here's my 2 lbs of pods in various shades of roastness.

Here's my results after creating the extract from them.

The extract had a great aroma and had flavors of coffee and vanilla.

GTG

 

[Henrythewound]

Just read the whole thread, and I may be too late, but I'm in Tucson and someone mentioned late September might be a good time to harvest pods. I have been planning on doing something like this but have procrastinated on researching until now. I think I'll take a hike and look for some nearly dried beans on the tree (natural Tucson grown mesquite not any in the yard, hoping for the Honey or Velvet variety, don't recall ever seeing the screwbean around here). Any opinions from the Tucson folk on here about whether or not I'm too late?

 

[JuanMoore]

It seems that the trees are on different schedules all over town this year, but I know I've seen some good pod loaded trees as recently as a couple days ago. You should be able to find plenty if you do some searching.

 

[GTG]

Got mine out of our neighbors yard, our kid's neighbor's yard and some corner lot of as church. With permission of course.

GTG

 

[Henrythewound]

Found some trees today out near the S end of Houghton, two varieties, some yellow and some with reddish streaks. Are the red beans from the Velvet Mesquite? I made sure to only pick from naturally growing mesquite as I wanted the native flavor and not the landscape varieties that some here have said may taste chalky. Got em drying in the side yard, will probably try to grab some more over the next week.

Thx for the info, I'm looking forward to trying a few different ways of prep for these beans. I plan on oven roasting some as mentioned in this thread and maybe getting some processed later this month by the local hammer mill folks. I am surprised it took me this long to try doing somethng with mesquite other than sweeping up the dropped beans.

 

[JuanMoore]

Found some trees today out near the S end of Houghton, two varieties, some yellow and some with reddish streaks. Are the red beans from the Velvet Mesquite? I made sure to only pick from naturally growing mesquite as I wanted the native flavor and not the landscape varieties that some here have said may taste chalky. Got em drying in the side yard, will probably try to grab some more over the next week.

Thx for the info, I'm looking forward to trying a few different ways of prep for these beans. I plan on oven roasting some as mentioned in this thread and maybe getting some processed later this month by the local hammer mill folks. I am surprised it took me this long to try doing somethng with mesquite other than sweeping up the dropped beans.

The red/pink streaks are a common occurance with pretty much all varieties. I think it has something to do with soil and water conditions. The trees you were harvesting from are most likely velvet mesquites. The local hammermill people (desert harvesters) have some good info about harvesting and storage on their website. They also have an annual mesquite pancake event and milling every Nov near dowtown/UofA that's a lot of fun.

http://www.desertharvesters.org/mesquite-in-the-kitchen/harvesting-processing/

 

[Hell_Fish]

How did any of the brews come out?

 

[GTG]

How did any of the brews come out?

My mesquite wheat came out great. I've got one champagne bottle left. May drink it this weekend as I brew up a roasted mesquite/black sphinx date stout. Everyone that tried the mesquite wheat raved about it. In hindsight I should have saved some for a contest but then there's always next year. My step son and his wife really enjoyed it, I'm sending them enough pods to do a batch soon.

GTG

 

[GTG]

I have also brewed and bottled a roasted mesquite stout with local grown black sphinx dates. I'll update with tasting notes as it matures a bit. If anyone is interested, I have been scouting local trees and will be harvesting pods starting in late summer as they begin to ripen. If anyone is interested in using some that doesn't have access to them, I will be happy to work out trades with them for other brewing ingredients/equipment. If there's some interest, I'll take it to the Classifieds forum.
Thanks,
GTG