Spice Beer Recipe

[pint of lager]

Best place to get them is to grow your own. Eden Seeds sell lots of different types of chillies. All their seed is open pollenated so you can keep your own seed. A bit like saving your own yeast.

 

[Vangleator]

Dried chilli seeds work well too. Place a couple of grams in a S/steel tea (cuppa) ball during secondary ferment for about 4 days to give a nice burn at the back of the throat. :beerbang:

 

[Vangleator]

I've just added a pic of the tea ball in case you wondered what one looked like. I didn't buy it for tea duties, it's great for adding other herb & spice flavours to beer too.

 

[peas_and_corn]

I judged a chilli beer with a whole chili in it last year at Gawler Show and it gushed all over the place. Possibly due to bacteria on the skin helping the ferment out, or ferment not completed before entering show. Had a very earthy flavour though. There were 2 better chili beers there, the sweeter one tasted more balanced and drinkable than the dry, very HOT as well.

[post="125273"][/post]​

Quite possible. I'd be tempted to blanch them for a minute or 2 in boiling water to get rid of the surface bacteria. Unless you are a real chilli freak (like me) a whole jalapeno may be a bit much. Alcohol is a great solvent so it will extract a lot of the heat. It will also get hotter over time so the beer that was great after 1 week may be too strong after 4. You could take the whole chillis and remove the seeds and membranes which is where most of the heat is. That would probably leave you with just enough heat to be interesting but not so much that it is overpowering.

Of course if you ARE a chilli freak like me then ignore the above and break out the habeneros... :blink:

Cheers
Dave

[post="125277"][/post]​

Ooh, I love really hot foods! I had a vindaloo the other night at an indian restaurant (it closes 2am every night! brilliant for me), and it was delicious! But yeah, love it when it's incredibly hot.

 

[Jye]

Sorry this is a bit of topic <_<

Vangleator, Are the tea balls easy to pick up, Woolies, Target? How would it go filled with hops inside of a keg?

Cheers
Jye

 

[Airgead]

Ooh, I love really hot foods! I had a vindaloo the other night at an indian restaurant (it closes 2am every night! brilliant for me), and it was delicious! But yeah, love it when it's incredibly hot.

[post="125478"][/post]​

mmmmmmmm vindaloo...I love vindaloo. A really good vindaloo with that wonderfull sourness behind the heat.... mmmmmm

I used to cook a mean vindaloo. I've had to tone down the spices in dinner since we had kids. A few years ago I forgot and made a nice curry. Our eldest (youngest was still eating mashed vegies at that stage) took one bite and started screaming. I'm slowly ramping the spices up as they get older. I can cook a curry but I have to keep it mild and just add extra chilli sauce to mine (which is just not the same). At indian resteraunts the kids will cope with the medium dishes (not bad for 5 and 3 I suppose) but haven't worked their way up to hot yet.

I also had to puill up some of my more lethal chilli bushes when we caught the kids playing with some haberero savina's they had picked off the bush.

Even for a freak like me I don't think a whole jalappeno in a bottle is that good an idea (at least not after a week or 2). A chilli beer should taste like beer and not just chilli. I like the idea of making a chilli tea but I'd do it from the whole chillis rather than dried seeds so you extract some of the flavour as well as the heat. Make up a litre of nice strong chilli tea and add it drop by drop into a glass to get the dose right. Then you can dose the keg/bottles to the same level.

Cheers
Dave

 

[peas_and_corn]

How about using chillis, but the standard type you get in supermarkets instead of jalapeno? That'll have less 'zing' in it

 

[Airgead]

How about using chillis, but the standard type you get in supermarkets instead of jalapeno? That'll have less 'zing' in it

[post="125484"][/post]​

For a chilli beer the jalapenos would give that distinctive jalapeno tang which would be nice. As an alternative you could try a cayenne which had a more neutral flavour. I'd still be tempted to make a tea rather than just bung a whole one in the bottle though.

In cooking I tend to use jalapenos and a few other varieties (ancho, publano, new mexico, serrano etc) for mexican/south american where the chilli is not just for heat but for flavour as well (salsa ranchero mmmm) and the cayenne for most other things. I also use dried kashmiri chillis to add the red colour to things like rogan josh without adding too much heat.

I used to use a tiny bit of habenero sliced into tiny pieces as part of a seveche. Habenero is best eaten raw (or lightly cooked) as the cooking kills the flavour and just leaves the extreme heat.

Cheers
Dave

 

[Vangleator]

G'day Jye, sorry about the delay but there is just so much to view on this site I've only just got back to this thread. I picked the tea ball up at the Bake'n'Brew' shop at Gawler where they sell tea in bulk.
tea ball

Never looked for them in Woolies though, but a kitchen specialist would probably have them. Maybe even a coffee/tea retail shop.
The ball would hold hops alright in a keg or fementer, not many though, as it can only be half filled before closing it.
Cheers, :beer:

 

[Darren]

Sorry this is a bit of topic <_<

Vangleator, Are the tea balls easy to pick up, Woolies, Target? How would it go filled with hops inside of a keg?

Cheers
Jye

[post="125480"][/post]​

Jye, termimesh is cheap and easy. Just make a little pouch of it and throw them in.


cheers
Darren

 

[peas_and_corn]

Anyway, it's been bottled and I've given one a try... I hope it gets better! I put a little more spice in than the recipe said (apart from the nutmeg), and it dominates WAY too much. It is a little green though, maybe some more time maturing would be good... hopefully.

 

[yardy]

p&c,

i went a bit ott with the whole spice thang for awhile, a good mix i did have success with was...

25gm Coriander Seed (cracked just b4 boil)
1" Cinnamon Stick
1/2 tsp Nutmeg

all in for the last 30 min of the boil.

don't leave the Cinnamon Stick in the primary.

cheers

yard

 

[Wardhog]

I used to cook a mean vindaloo

An idea I've been toying with is using Garam Masala in a beer. GM has a nice cinnamon taste identifiable in it, and there's been a few posts about using cinnamon in beers. Judging by the recommendations about how much cinnamon to use in a boil (1/2 - 1 tsp), I think 1/2 tsp would go ok in a lager. If you're into that sort of thing.

 

[bugwan]

I used to cook a mean vindaloo

An idea I've been toying with is using Garam Masala in a beer.

Holy crap!! :blink:

I'm a lover of all things Indian (at least in the world of food), but I haven't considered mingling my passions quite so intimately!!

Back OT, this talk of cinnamon in beer reminds me of one of Young's seasonal offerings. Namely their Christmas Pudding Ale. It doesn't exactly receive the warmest of reviews on various brewing sites, but I remember it fondly in the depths of winter in London... A curious beer that tasted like, well, christmas pudding...

 

[bconnery]

My current spice ale is in the recipe section.

http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...&recipe=171



At the moment I must say the cinnamon is a little dominant, at least it was a few weeks ago, I haven't had one in a while.

Before that it was classic 'christmas pudding' or 'fig newton' beer as it was variously described.

Hopefully by Christmas, which is when I had planned it for, it will be nice and balanced again, like it was earlier...



I have the strangest feeling I have already replied to this post with the same recipe a while back but it could just be the fact that I've had a few beverages this evening...



Cheers

Ben

 

[hupnupnee]

I was recently in Canberra and made my first visit to the Wig and Pen. That alone was an eye opener, so much to choose from, so little time.

What I did choose was their Winter Warmer Porter. I think that is what it was called. It is not described on their web site unfortunatly. This was the typical chocolatey porter with sultana and prune but they have spiced it up with cloves, bush pepper and star anise, I think I got that right.
It tasted fantastic, really complex and interesting, the porter flavours dominated but where enhanced with what to me reminded me of the Irish Moss cough liquid. Sort of licoricey with a peppery bite. Definitly a "winter warmer" Slowly sipped and rolled around in the mouth.

Also had my first experience of Heffe Weizen there. I'm sold onthat style as well. I must admit I thought the talk of bannanas and bubblegum as mostly wishful fantasy, but by God you can taste those flavours. Very nice.

So I guess I'm sold with the idea of spiced beers, not sure about chillie in my beer but the idea of a christmas festive brew is very appealing.

Floculator

Tim

 

[bindi]

PM sent hupnupnee with a Hefe recipe if you like bannanas and bubblegum I don't like it 'over the top', but if you do <_< try that one.