home made candy sugar

[technobabble66]

Hey mark, did you also use another protein or amino acid source, or just relied on the nitrogen from the ammonia?

 

[Markbeer]

Just the ammonia bicarbonate.

 

[technobabble66]

Cheers!

 

[technobabble66]

Alrighty then. Time for the next update.
I appreciate i'm going into EXTREME detail in my posts. Apologies for the gross excess, but i kinda want to put all the info out there as i go so others starting on this "journey" might see what i've done (wrong, mainly :unsure: ) and hopefully avoid much of the faffing i've gone through. I've generally found the lack of info out there on this adjunct that's kinda critical for a few styles of beer to be difficult and frustrating. It's also kinda frustrating the number of confidently presented posts/blogs/webpages that in hindsight turn out to be basically just wrong - the mis-information minefield. So i partly wanted to present my info/understanding and then results as i go, so others can assess for themselves what's going on; rather than just say "do this".
Anyway, that's my excuse for the walls of text :lol:

.....

More reading has occurred.
I'm now guessing the big difference in caramelising (i.e.: ~ burning) temps between Glucose (~160°C), Fructose (~110°C) and Maltose (180°C) could be part of the problem i've had with acridity in some of the previous samples. I'm sure the Belgians work around this somehow through careful temp &/or pH control. However, i'm guessing the low caramelising temp of Fructose might be making it harder for me - namely as soon as i'm pushing the temp over 110°C, once the pH drops down, the fructose component will probably start carbonising significantly.
This also neatly fits in with Markbeer's suggestion to cut out the Inversion step and just use Dextrose - cheers, Markbeer!
Similarly, i came around to the idea of using less Lye to neutralise the acidic pH, thus producing less salt in the syrup. (i.e.: acid + base = salt)

The previous sample using Ammonia Carbonate seemed to turn out ok, maybe a bit more like molasses and much less sweetness than a regular syrup. But basically fine, so i think the Ammonia Carb is a good nitrogen source.

FWIW, i'm still not convinced on the idea that a simple Nitrogen source like AC or DAP is everything that's required in the Maillard reactions, as opposed to regular Amino Acids that have the rest of the (complex) molecule attached to the other side of the Nitrogen (aside from Glycine, of course). I'd be pretty sure the rest of the amino acid would have to have significant effects on the chemistry of flavour compounds.
So i'd be tempted to mix in at least a little DME for future batches, but i'll leave that for later.

Anywho, the last batch i've done seems to have turned out well. I used:
500g Dextrose
1 cup water
Heated to 105°C
1 tsp Lye water (was enough to hit pH9)
1/4 tsp Ammonia Carbonate
Heated to 115°C
Added 1/8 tsp Ammonia Carb
pH was dropping close to 8, so added a 1/4 tsp Lye.
Heated to 120°C, added another 1/4 tsp Lye & 1/8 tsp Ammonia Carb.
Gradually heated up to 130°C, then added 1/4 cup water. Temp dropped to 115°C.
Heated back up to 120°C
Added another 1/4 cup, heated for another few minutes (~117°C), then left to cool.

This was then tested for colour (4g in 100mL is ~equivalent of 1kg in 23L, so i could compare to Belgian syrups in ianh's spreadsheet).
This sample was ~equivalent of a Light Amber Syrup, which coincidently matches SnickasaurusRex's yardstick of 270°F(132°C) producing Light Amber.
For the record, it produced a colour ~14 EBC.

I couldn't help myself, partly because i wanted a slightly darker syrup, and more noticeable caramel flavours (the initial syrup was very mild in caramel flavour).
So i went through 2 cycles of:
Heat cold syrup (slowly) up to 115°C. Add 2 tbsp water (temp drops). Heat (slowly) back up to 115°C. Leave to cool.
Each cycle takes ~5-10mins.
I did this partly in reflection of I believe the Belgian Candi Syrup manufacturers heat the syrup through various cycles over a period of a few days.

FWIW, the syrup darkened slightly (maybe ~16-18 EBC) but produced noticeably better caramel flavours.

This ended up being ~475g of syrup, though it had a little more water left in it to ensure "pourability".

So essentially, the process produced a syrup i'm definitely happy to use, and will continue to tweak this version.

Thanks to Markbeer for the suggestions of Ammonia Carb & Dex :icon_cheers:



The dubbel was pitched last night in anticipation...

 

[gap]

Have you tested your results against the Belgian Candy Syrups available commercially?

 

[technobabble66]

Nope. Bit a drive to get any and I'm too much of a cheapskate.

So obviously there's not much of a comparison going on [emoji57]

I'm working on the basis of knowing what I want to detect in the syrup (ie: caramel, raisins), at least as a starting point. And hoping that translates into the beer (again, caramel and raisins/plums), or finding out how/what does.

However there's a good chance I'll eventually get to try Belgian Amber and D2, then wonder wtf did a bother for [emoji6]

 

[technobabble66]

Actually, grain & grape have it at $20 per kg.
Not too bad, but still way more than I like paying for ingredients. However I'll prolly have to stump up for a kg at some stage to compare.
It sounds like I'm aiming for something like Amber and/or D1.

 

[Markbeer]

Tehnobabble66 glad you made something you'll use using my tips.

I might make some soon and post photos. Mine was very very dark.

Remember for those raisin flavours to try some Special B, aromatic and melanoidin malts.
a couple of craft belgian beers made with Spec B only and no syrup to save on money. They tasted pretty good, for them the cost of syrup can be a factor.

A good yeast does make all the difference. But again one of the craft brewers only used T58 and it was quite good.

I do have a couple kg of D2 just sitting there for over a couple of years. Maybe should do a Belgian soon.

 

[technobabble66]

Use. The. D2. !!

I'm on to the Spec B. I'm curious to see how it'll compare to CaraAroma and Dark Crystal.

The Dubbel recipe i did was:
81.5% Pils, 3.6% Spec B, 1.2% Acidulated.
~800g Amber-ish syrup.
Hall Mitt of 14 IBU at FWH, EKG+Select+HallMitt into the cube for 6 IBU.
Should be ~OG=1.065, FG=1.010, alc=7.6%, 20 IBU, 28 EBC.

Yeast of choice is WLP-550.
[Chosen for being FREE!! 1 year stored in the fridge. Resurrected by the Yeast Forge (TM) stir plate - awesome piece of kit!]
Suggested to be OK but not the typical choice for a Dubbel, so we'll see how it goes.

 

[technobabble66]

Fantastic,
Apparently no-one can tell the difference between home-made and commercial Candi syrup. Brulosophy says so.

Only 11 out of 27 correctly identified the 2 brews made from the different types of Candi Syrup. (needs 14 to be statistically significant).

Oh, apart from the 9 out of 10 that, after being informed what they were sampling, correctly differentiated the 2.


Interesting to note the brewer could easily tell the difference between the 2 forms as syrup, but struggled to tell the difference in the resulting beers.
Also interesting to see he basically just did the Sugar+DME combo, with Lye added after hitting 143°C(!!).

 

[Jack of all biers]

Technobabble (and others). Coincidently I made my first invert sugar last week for a stout. Mine was mixture of raw and demera sugar and I used cream of tartar for my acid. Near the end I put in four spoonfuls of molases as I wanted colour and the liquorice flavours for a stout. I used a combo of the methods already posted here. http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=12754 and http://www.unholymess.com/blog/beer-brewing-info/making-brewers-invert

Anyway, I saw this thread today and remembered that since I made my invert sugar I did a bit of internet searching for different recipes and ways to do it and I saw the below u-tube video that your method of adding a base reminded me of. Not sure if you have seen it already, but I found it a good explaination and he seems to get the desired results by using LDME, distilled water and food grad lye (Calcium Hydroxide). He then raises his to 150C to get it to harden after he pours into silicon trays. Seems similar to what you have been doing, but slightly different (he doesn't use acid at all). Infact he states that one shouldn't use acids at all. Once he adds the lye he takes it up to 135 - 145C. He goes through all the stages of plum, raisin flavours to roasty flavours and makes a black candi syrup that he turns to hard candi. At the end he shows three different ones he made (clear, red and black). Very informative and worth a view.
It's an 18 minute video so make some time and grab some popcorn (or :drinks: )



EDIT - Oh yeah he makes the black (dark) candi in 45 minutes!

2nd EDIT - and his two blog spot that I have read since posting the above. http://suigenerisbrewing.blogspot.com.au/2013/09/making-belgian-candi-sugar.html and http://suigenerisbrewing.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/belgian-candi-sugar-ii.html as well as his solutions to problems people found with this original video http://suigenerisbrewing.blogspot.com.au/2015/01/quick-simple-invert-sugar.html, Finally he posts his resultant beer http://suigenerisbrewing.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/42-belgian-dark-strong.html.

 

[Jack of all biers]

Ok now I'm getting like Technobabble and getting into it. From the above's second blog post. http://suigenerisbrewing.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/belgian-candi-sugar-ii.html

The Step-By-Step:

1. Measure out the desired amount of table sugar (beet or cane, they are equivalent). You need approximately 10% more than you want in the end, to cover the losses during preparation
2. For every kilogram (2.2lbs) of sugar, blend in 1 tablespoon (15ml) of DME.
3. Dissolve the DME/sugar mix into heated water - 250ml/1cup per kilogram of sugar. Heat gently, avoiding boiling, until the sugar is completely dissolved.
4. Once the sugar is dissolved, increase the temperature to 125-135C (260-275F) to begin inversion. Hold at this temperature or 30 minutes by adding cold water, 1 tablespoon at a time, to the hot sugar mix and stirring. Try not to over-cool the sugar mix.
5. After the 30 minute inversion period let the temperature increase to 145C (295F), at which point add your food-grade lye or pickling lime, pre-dissolved in water. Add slowly as to not drop the temperature below 135C (300F). You will require ~20ml dry lime (pickling lime) or lye (food-grade) per kilogram (2.2lbs) sugar.
   • Lime/lye should be pre-dissolved into a minimal volume water and decanted off of any solids
   • WARNING: these solutions are highly caustic, so use eye protection.
6. Hold alkalized mixture at 135-145C (300-330F) until the desired colour and flavour formation is complete. If required, additional lye-lime can be added to drive additional flavour formation.
   • Avoid adding excess lime or lye, as minerally flavours can be created.
7. Increase temperature to 150C. At this point sugar can be cast into a silicone pan or onto a parchment paper. Alternatively, you can hold at 150-165C/300-330F to produce additional roast flavours.
8. Cast into a silicone pan or parchment-paper lined pan, let cool, and the brew!

........

1. 
   
   This post has received a number of hits from a Dutch homebrewing page. I don't speak Dutch, but I thought it would be worth answering a few points brought up in their thread (as translated by google translate):
   
   The question they raised is why didn't I use diammonium phosphate (DAP) - commonly found in yeast nutrient - for my sugar. In many ways DAP is ideal - it is mildly basic when dissolved (pH 7.8-8.0), and decomposes into ammonium which can then drive the Malliard reactions. It seems like a better option than DME + a strong base. Indeed, the DAP method is one of the more widely used, including in the 'Ryan Brews' blog post I linked to above.
   
   The answer as to why I didn't use DAP is simple - chemistry. DAP provides one substrate for Malliard reactions - ammonium ions. This greatly limits the range of Malliard products that can be produced. DME, in contrast, contains proteins which undergo hydrolysis (breakdown) during the inversion step. Protein hydrolysis will create hundreds, if not thousands, of products that can then participate in malliard reactions - everything from individual amino acids (23 in all), to hydrolysis products of those amino acids, to partial protein degradation products (peptide chains, di-peptides, etc). As with painting, having a larger molecular ' palette' provides you with a more diverse and interesting end-product.
   
   In my trials I did try DAP, using the method outlined in Ryan Brews (i.e. DAP + lye). The process was much faster than the method I outlined here - it took about half the time to develop the desired degree of flavour. But compared to the method I outline here the quality and complexity of the DAP-based candi was less than the DME-based candi. The DME candi had a broader range of flavours - plums, nuts, caramel, coffee and chocolate, while the DAP-based candi was mostly the roast coffee/caramel flavour. Moreover, the DAP had a chemical-ish (ammonia-like) tone to its aroma, while the DME-based candi was pure fruit & roast aromas.
   
   I hope that clarifies things.
   
   

 

[technobabble66]

Yep, agree: Sui generis is probably the best overall site for info on this that I found - great info, well explained & set out.
It was Sui generis that convinced me to try DME in one of my earlier batches. I still had a variety of other things go wrong but I wondered at the time whether the result was better than it could've been, as a result of the (comparatively) positive impact of the DME. The last batch or 2 were decent/good successes that've given me a bit more confidence that most of the rest of my process is about right, so the plan is to use a tablespoon or so of DME into the Dex next time - try to improve the complexity/range of flavours. As mentioned in an earlier post, I've struggled with the claim by many that a simple -NH2 group is all that's required for the complex flavour results we're after. It doesn't make sense from neither a chemistry nor an historical perspective.

So I think for the next batch I'll probably stick to Dex, plus a bit of DME, add the lye after it's sat at a high temp (for a little caramelising) for a bit, crank the temp, add a little Ammonia Carbonate for additional reactions, hit target temp, maybe cycle it a few times, and see what happens. Then do the same without any Ammonia carbonate. Then try it with straight sugar.
The experiments continue!

Thanks v much for going to the effort of transcribing/summarizing it all here.
It'll make it a truckload easier for other AHBrs to get on top of this and avoid the (huge amount of) misinformation out there.

 

[jphowman]

I thought I’d add my process, just in case anyone is interested.

I was trying to make invert sugar to brew a recipe adapted from the Toothey’s Oatmeal Stout recipe in Bronzed Brews. I tried the process over at unholy mess, but I didn’t get any darkening of the sugar beyond concentration. I checked the colour of the syrup I had boiled for >2 Hours against a syrup of the same concentration made straight from the sugar, unboiled, and the colour was identical.

So I checked out this thread and a few other websites and put together my own process. I’ve done it twice and in both cases got some good darkening, to about an amber colour without any acrid flavours.

Process:
For the inversion step add these ingredients to a saucepan and bring to the boil.
1kg of Raw Sugar
480ml Water
1.3g of Citric Acid

Boil for 10mins. Then neutralise the acid with Calcium Carbonate and add some DAP.
1g of CaCO3
0.5g of DAP

Continue to boil for however long is necessary. Use a solution of Calcium Carbonate, DAP and water to keep the temperature below 115 degrees (ish, I was aiming to stay around 105 but it got hot sometimes)
40ml of water (plus extra when I ran out later on)
2g of CaCO3
2g DAP

Check out the gallery with the images

 

[technobabble66]

Good to see another attempt at this, franks. Looks like you've had some good success!

FWIW, the colour you've achieved seems fairly light. So it'll be fine for a bit of depth in a stout, or for a lighter Belgian ale; however, the real test, in my experience, is when you try to push it to a much darker colour - that's when i found out whether my process was flawed or not (though i'm still puddling around like a noob myself with this stuff!).

Why the use of CaCO3 instead of the other alkalising options? Not suggesting it's bad, just curious - in fact it may well be better than anything i've used so far
What temp do you think you were consistently hitting/holding at for most of the "darkening" boil? Or did it vary a fair bit between 105-115°C?



FWIW, my dubbel has come out a rosy red (so nowhere near as dark as i thought!), using 2 of my 500g batches of darkish syrup. Tasting like its waaaay too young (i.e.: its a bit rough!) but shows some signs of promise - some caramelly elements have come through a bit more within just 2 weeks since its carbed up (i.e.: going from 2 to 4 weeks in the bottle). I think they're commonly pretty terrible until they get to 6-12 months, when the mellow and balance properly, so i'm prepared to be patient!

 

[technobabble66]

For the record, I posted some updated tasting results of my dubbel at 4-5 weeks here:
http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/index.php?/topic/89987-Belgian-Strong-Red%2C-recipe-critique/page__view__findpost__p__1380507
Tasting pretty darn good already.

 

[barls]

my first batch is bottled now and is in the nsw case swap. made a second one yesterday with raw sugar, dark brown and palm sugar. had a really good colour and flavour looking forward to brewing with it.

 

[technobabble66]

Just discovered that suigeneris posted an update on his process in March this year:
http://suigenerisbrewing.blogspot.com.au/2016/03/belgian-candi-sugar-part-iii.html

The main bulk is:

"The changes I have made seem to address the issues others (and I) have noted - namely an occasional acrid/burnt character. An issue was also brought up by one commenter which I think is worth addressing here.
The changes I've made to my method:

1. I've greatly reduced the amount of DME used, as the amount of protein in previous batches was excessive. For 1 kg of sugar (2.2 lbs), I am currently using 2.5 ml (~1/2 tsp) of DME. Previously I was using 1 tbs (~15 ml)
2. I avoid mixing the sugar as much as possible - I mix to dissolve the sugar into water, and I mix when adding the lye, but I do not otherwise mix.
3. I am much more careful and slow with my temperature changes. Most of the mixing I did previously was to add cold water to cool the sugar if I overshot the desired temperature.
4. I now usually add corn sugar (fructose) at a rate of 1% volume/mass (i.e. 1 ml corn sugar per 100g sugar). This does not change the flavour of the final candi, but does reduce crystallization. It is easier to then blend the mix into a syrup or cast rocks with the non-crystallized sugar.

These changes have led to a candi which is much closer (to my palate) to commercial candis, one without the unpleasant flavours some of the previous batches had. Others on the thread have mentioned using pressure cookers and other methods with great success. Hopefully, as a collective we will be able to formulate a better method of producing a consistent and flavourful candi sugar for home brewing.



The "Issue":

An issue brought up the commenter 'Chino' in the Brulosophy thread was that the 30 minute inversion time that I recommend is insufficient to completely invert the sugar, with individuals over a Reddit working on ways to get improved inversions. I partially agree with what Chino states - given the rate of the reaction and the fact that it is an equilibrium reaction, a 30 minute inversion period without the addition of something to accelerate the process (e.g. acid) will only invert 8-10% of the sugar. Where I disagree with Chino is that I don't think this matters. Mallard products comprise a pretty small portion of the final sugar - assuming 100% of the protein added via the DME is converted to Mallard products, the Mallard products would comprise about 0.07% of the final candi by weight. Although multi-step reactions, the formation of most Mallard products requires only one sugar molecule per amino acid, meaning that you need "only" 0.07% inverted sugar to be able to (in theory) produce the full array of Mallard products. The 8-10% inverted sugar is a huge excess compared to what is required - this does offer an advantage in terms of reaction rates, but its hard to imagine that increasing inversion to 25% (theoretical maximum using heat alone) or 50-75% (theoretical maximum using acid) would offer further improvements."
-----------------------

FWIW, i also noticed he never posted the tasting notes of the Belgian Dark Strong he did in 2013 to test his candy sugar.

 

[technobabble66]

Which segues into what i've been up to last last 2 days.

Spring is here, so back into candi syrup experiments!!
More reading & thinking/wondering has been done.

I'm currently inclined to believe that:

1) DME is (definitely) a better source of protein/amino's - this is simply because i believe it'll more likely mimic the natural aminos in the beet sugar that the Candi Syrup manufacturers use; cf: ammonium carbonate, DAP, etc (as outlined in an earlier post of mine, as well as suigeneris in his 2013 posts).

2) Both Beet sugar & Cane sugar "should" be ~99.9% sucrose.
So cane sugar "should" be an equivalent source of sucrose for homemade candy syrup - means i don't need to try to source beet sugar (almost impossible here in Melbourne). I'd guess the beet sugar may have some impurities from the beet (i.e.: equivalent to molasses) however, i've read that the molasses from beet sugar processing isn't suitable for human consumption (probably because it precipitates out with calcium carbonate; apparently darker forms of beet sugar is made by adding cane sugar molasses to it!), so i'd guess that the sugar used in candy syrup is probably fairly low in molasses-like impurities. There's also reagent impurities that could be passed into the initial stage of syrup manufacture - e.g.: calcium carbonate, acids, etc. I'm hoping/assuming these would more just affect pH, which i can adjust in other ways.
The selection of beet sugar for candi syrup manufacture may simply be an economic one - based on the easy access to beet sugar the traditional manufacturers would've had in the previous couple of centuries due to it being grown (relatively) locally, compared to cane sugar that had to be imported from the Americas. This would be less relevant now, but may still play enough of a role to maintain the selection of beet sugar for Candi Syrup manufacture. So subsequently, i'm less obsessed with sourcing beet sugar as it's use *may* not relate to any unique flavour impact it has compared to cane sugar.

3) To allow/compensate for various impurities that may be passed from initial beet sugar purification into the syrup manufacture, I believe the addition of a little dark brown sugar (or something like it with a ~high level of molasses contaminant) should suffice. This also importantly adds various minerals that typically act to significantly enhance caramelisation reactions.

4) Cream of Tartar seems like a better acidulant for the inversion, and not much is needed.
CoT is normally used in candy manufacturing apparently, and it adds a slight honey-like flavour to the inverted syrup. Sounded good to me, so i'll go with that from now on. Also, only a tiny amount is needed, so the inversion step shouldn't result in a pH that is too low, and a reasonable amount of inversion should occur. And as stated in the suigeneris post i transcribed above, only a small amount of the reducing sugars (glucose & fructose) are technically needed for the Maillard reactions. 1.5-2.5g per 1kg sugar is supposedly the range used by many manufacturers. I'll go with 1.5g/kg CoT for now.

5) I'm more inclined to believe the candy syrup manufacturers don't push hard for Maillard reactions, and we're over-thinking this.
i.e.: maybe we're heavily over-engineering this aspect, in trying to manipulate the chemistry to maximise these mallard reactions in the belief that they are super important in producing the flavour compounds we're after in the syrup (NB: "we" might be just me :lol: ).
I'm starting to think that traditional candy processes have generally been fairly simple, and seem to be developed decades/centuries before the chemistry was slightly understood. Also, it seems plausible that the majority of flavours in the syrups could come simply from the complex caramelisation reactions. So basically, i'm taking a step back to focus mainly on the caramelisation process.
This rethink has partly occurred as a result of changes in my brewing philosophy (damn you manticle, et al!) - i.e.: instead of trying to add truckloads of ingredients to specifically achieve a variety of flavours in my beers, i'm starting to appreciate that a minimal number of the right ingredients can still achieve a myriad of flavours, and importantly doesn't "muddy" the waters so you can actually taste them all clearly. A bit like the difference between the more muddied and generic flavour of blended scotch compared to a fine single malt scotch that might have several prominent flavours that evolve on the tongue, even though only one malt (& one barrel-type) was used. Does that make any sense? :huh:

 

[technobabble66]

So the stuff above has led to the latest batch:
500g white (cane) sugar
50g DME (may be v excessive)
20g Dark Brown sugar

Inversion step:
0.55g Cream of Tartar
200mL water
Brought to boil, simmered for 10mins with lid on to maintain temp by reducing water boil-off (@~109°C).
Turned heat off, and left sit for 5mins.

Caramelisation:
Turned heat back on, rose to 120°C fairly quickly (~1min)
Added some water to drop down to 116°C, held for ~5mins, and gradually rose up to 126°C, where it seemed to sit for a few mins.
Allowed to rise to 135°C, and held for 5-10mins, then added water to drop to 127°C for 10mins.

Then ensued a variety of raising and dropping the temps - all temp adjustments by simply adding some water, generally ~1/4cup each time. One peak hit 145-152°C for ~1min. Most were ~125 to 135°C.

A sharp acidic aroma developed, so after leaving the lid on for a minute, collected some of the condensate to discover it was very sour and acidic, tasting like acetic acid. So the lesson here seems to be NEVER LEAVE THE LID ON. Always try to encourage the vapours to waft away - hopefully this reduces the acids in the syrup itself, similar to allowing DMS to boil off in wort boiling.

Next day (today), repeated a few more peak temp cycles, again, mainly 125, 127 & one to 135°C.

Will continue tonight, so far the syrup seems really good. Maybe a slight burnt element, but not necessarily bad, more like a dark toffee etc.