I recently had a friend bring up a very valid point to me:
When it comes to adding spices, fruit, etc… there seems to be about 45 different ways people on blogs and forums and books tell you.
Ex. I was researching on how to add coffee to my imperial stout recipe and I read about grinding it up, keeping it whole, adding it during the mash, adding it during the boil, adding it during primary, adding it during secondary, “hopbacking” it, frenchpressing it into an extract, letting it sit in highproof, making a cold brew out of it and the list goes on. 95% of the sources didn’t explain why, how, or the flavor contributions especially when it comes to the acidity of coffee. I find this to be true in a lot of additions to beer, there seems to be a lot of gaps as to why certain methods are used over others when it comes to sanitizing and adding adjuncts, as well as their overall effects on flavor, aroma, and color.
Are there any reliable resources (preferably one spot, such as a book) that explain adjunct additions in depth? thank you
There’s a reason for that - in brewing there are multiple ways to do many things. Hopping, adding coffee, spices, etc, can be used in different ways to satisfactory results. Steve is right - it comes down to experience with multiple approaches to find the one you like best. No one publication has the ‘right’ way to do everything because it’s subjective. For example, I like to coarsely crush coffee beans and add them at the end of fermentation, sample each day untilthe flavor is where I want, then package. As for hopping, I like to whirlpool hop/steep, and dry hop in the keg. Other brewers here have different approaches.
Ask the guy who makes the best version of whatever it is that you have ever tasted, and ignore all others. Everyone has an opinion, but only the best guy knows the best way. Or gal, of course, of course.
My ROT is that if the addition is for flavor or aroma (as opposed to only fermentables) add it as late as possible. For something that has sugar, add it to a secondary fermenter. For something like coffee or liquor, add at packaging. For coffee, I use 2 methods…I add some coarsely cracked beans to a secondary, which gives me aroma and a bit of flavor. Then at packaging I add strong espresso to taste. By doing it that way you don’t have to guess at the amount to add.
The reason you see so many options is because there’s isn’t one right answer. Coffee is a really good example. There are a lot of ways to add it to beer. They all work and will give different character. OTOH some potential additions have a more limited range of useful preparations or techniques.
This is one of those topics where explaining what you want from the adjunct in a question is likely to net the better answer than reading all possible options and picking out of the dark.
In theory, I think biotransformation is possible. In practice, I think it’s a bunch of hype that doesn’t actually do much of what they say. But maybe that’s just me, always the skeptic until someone hands me a blind triangle experiment, which never ever happens.
If anything, your conclusion of “undesirable” has been my tentative conclusion as well. I’ve been turned off by many of the new and supposedly exciting Bretts and sours and American wilds. I think the Belgians of old know more what the heck they’re doing. But, opinions (from me, anyway) don’t mean a whole helluva lot either.
Would a book about variations on adding different adjuncts, spices, fruits at various points for reasons x, y, z and pros and cons as to why different methods are used and which methods to avoid be a good resource? It is a subject matter that fascinates me and that sometimes even how you would boil/ heat one ingredient from a very similar one differs greatly. I’m in planning stages of writing a book about sanitary ways of adding ingredients to beer but was wondering if there is interest and how needed this information is. With that thought in mind, would you guys say this is something that would be a great resource or too broad of a topic? (Because I definitely don’t mind slowly writing a new encyclopedic source in this regard)
For coffee I do a cold brew and add at packaging. My dosage is 2.5 oz of freshly ground coffee steeped in 16oz cold water for 24 hours. For me the results are perfect. The essence of whatever coffee I use comes through without the burnt acidic flavors that would clash with the flavors of the stout. I just tapped a coffee oatmeal stout with this method and it’s aroma is like sticking your nose in a bag of fresh coffee beans. I got the idea for the cold brew method from a zymurgy article
I’m sure it’s as good as most others. It is more concentrated at a 1:2 ratio versus 1:1 that most cold brews recommend. It’s about the same volume of coffee I would shoot for from a half pound of coffee. Big bang with little volume.
I haven’t, but that sounds tasty to me… I’m sure you’d need to use at least a whole jug or two of it, plus it has a lot of sugar so you’d need to account for that in your recipe.
Yeah…I’m thinking Autocrat in a milk stout…maybe find a nice British milk stout that calls for sugar adjucts, use the sugar in the Autocrat to that end…
Keep in mind, the sugars are fermentable. Need to be added before fermentation is complete, and of course in a milk stout, need to use lactose to bring up the sweetness since that is unfermentable.