Orange Extract/Peel

[kaiserben]

(I thought I'd posted this topic already, but it seems to have disappeared???)

Has anyone used orange extract instead of peel?

I've started making my own orange (and vanilla) extract and would like to use it both in place of peel added at end of boil (for a Belgian style), and also as a turbo charge to flavour/aroma in an American IPA.

Any tips/advice/experience? Would like a ballpark amount of extract to use in place of 30g peel added to boil.

(The extract is made by soaking peel - no pith - in vodka for a few months. Some with the vanilla, which I've already been using quite successfully).

 

[klangers]

Not a great deal of experience, but I prefer adding after krausen has subsided to maximise the aroma retention. I've found that adding to hot wort kills a lot of the flavour. Depends what you're after I guess.

 

[Gigantorus]

kaiserben,

I recently been doing a few citrus peel brews. My first was a simple American pale ale style which I added the peel from 2 x oranges and 1 lemon late in the boil. The intention was to add extra citrus flavour./aroma, which it did to some degree. If I did that again I would double the peel amount.

My last brew was a Grapefruit Marmalade IPA, which turned out real nice. I did my normal IPA extract recipe and added zest from 5 ruby grapefruits and 1 lime late in the boil. I will definitely do this recipe again without any changes.

My next brew will be another American pale ale extract recipe - but this time using the zest & juice from 6 tangelos.

But to your question of citrus extract vs peel. Before I did my first peel brew I did a bit of research on this very topic. What I found out was that peel was the most common form used and the most cost effective. Oils or citrus extracts are expensive and you generally have to use a fair amount to achieve your desired outcome. I remember seeing a recipe that said 14 drops of mandarin essential oil per whole mandarin - and a small 10ml bottle of mandarin oil was A$19 which would be used for one batch of brew. The up side of using oil is that there is little material to cloud-up your brew. But if you go this way you need to ensure you get "Pure" oils - as non-pure oils can contain lots of ingredients you might not want going into your brew. That's why using fresh peel might be a much better option. Though you need to give the peel a good wash/light scrub before you zest it, as fruit packing sheds dip some fruit into solutions to give the fruit a gloss/shine.

Cheers,

Pete

 

[kaiserben]

Cheers!

I'm making my own extract by soaking the peels of 3 oranges on 450ml vodka (and leaving for at least 3 months), but it sounds like fresh zest is the better way to go. Besides the fact fresh zest is way easier, using 450ml vodka isn't exactly cost-effective.

 

[MHB]

I love the flavours that come from Curacao Orange in Belgian Whit Beers.
For me its something that should be subtle adding a note to the beer rather than being right up front and dominating the flavour - But and a big But that's a personal taste issue.
Traditionally the Belgian brewers I have heard talking about using zest mostly put the peel (usually dry) and any other herbs/spice in a bag and hang it in the kettle for the full boil.
The only down side of making your own extract is that some of what you want might not be alcohol soluble, I know that most of the Pure Essential Oils were in the past steam distilled, these days quite a few are CO2 extracts (as are most of the hop isolates we can get)
Both steam and solvent extraction will give a different product to a tincture (and a kettle addition), they will have a lot in common but you wont get exactly the same flavours and aromas, so it might not be possible to translate directly from one to another and get the same beer.
Lots of fun to be had
Mark

 

[Gigantorus]

The grapefruit IPA has been in the bottle now for about 3 weeks and has lost a lot of the marmalade flavours in the past week, which it somewhat usual. The point is that all brews are big on flavour and aroma for the first couple of weeks then mellow out after that. The Grapefruit IPA still have a nice hint of marmalade taste & fragrance to it - just not what was there at the start.

So I guess you need to plan for this and workout what you want from the brew. i.e. If you are planning to drink it in 2 months (maybe for an event), then you might need to up the infusion quantities knowing flavour & aroma will dissipate 2 months+ in the bottle.

Will be doing the Tangerine Dream Ale this weekend, which I'll use the zest & juice from 6 tangelos. I'll be particularly interested to see how the juice works in the pale ale. Time will tell. I'll report back in 3 or 4 weeks.

Cheers, Pete

 

[HBHB]

Quite some time back i boiled a bunch of finely diced navel skins with the pith removed and then distilled it to make a tincture. Turned out to be a case of more is not necessarily more. In fact it was absolutely disgustingly feral - gut churning just doesn't begin to describe it . I just use either the bitter or sweet dried curacao ones now.

 

[Danscraftbeer]

Cheers!

I'm making my own extract by soaking the peels of 3 oranges on 450ml vodka (and leaving for at least 3 months), but it sounds like fresh zest is the better way to go. Besides the fact fresh zest is way easier, using 450ml vodka isn't exactly cost-effective.

When do you add it? I've done that and added it to finished beer into keg. I used one orange zest in 120ml Vodka in a canning jar for at least 5 days. I think its pretty much got the best of zest in a few days but I could be wrong. Leaving longer wont hurt either.
I have added fresh peel to boil/flame out and couldn't detect it much, it changes with heat though. The tincture style into the keg was conservative but detectable. Next time I will zest 2 or 3 Oranges for the dark Chocolate Ale I brew once in a while.

 

[kaiserben]

Quite some time back i boiled a bunch of finely diced navel skins with the pith removed and then distilled it to make a tincture. Turned out to be a case of more is not necessarily more. In fact it was absolutely disgustingly feral - gut churning just doesn't begin to describe it . I just use either the bitter or sweet dried curacao ones now.

That doesn't sound promising for me! I think what I'll do is get an eye-dropper and test it in a glass of beer before I go ruining a whole batch.

When do you add it?

Same time as the priming solution. I've done it with other spices and it's worked well.

 

[peekaboo_jones]

Some good idea's there!
I'm going to do a small boil with about 50-100g of these in my next experimental half batch pale ale or maybe even Saison. I know it's got additives but it should work for the homebrewer

 

[kaiserben]

Same time as the priming solution. I've done it with other spices and it's worked well.

Actually scratch that, I've tried a few different ways now (and had a chance to taste the results side-by-side) and I got better results by adding 3 days before packaging (ie treating a spice tincture addition much like I'd treat dry hops).

 

[kaiserben]

Update: So I tested some of my orange peel extract (now 3 months old) in a american pale ale. I used a syringe to squirt some of the tincture into a glass of beer. And the results were actually very good. We tried various amounts, but worked out that about 2-3 teaspoons per longneck gave a nice burst of fresh orange aroma and orange flavour.

More than 4 teaspoons per longneck was getting too much for my tastebuds.

The next test (when I have a suitable new batch of beer) will be to see if that fresh aroma will survive bottle conditioning. I'd much rather add it before packaging (don't want to grab a syringe if I want to present these beers to other people).