Had a brain fart here:
Has anyone tried brewing with various nuts?
Curious mostly.
This has been discussed before but IIRC the oils affecting head retention was of great concern. I can’t remember if anyone has actually tried it. I did try almond flavoring once that the lovely & talented Ms. Tubercle had left over from making almeretto in my 7% lawnmower beer. Not too good.
There are a few breweries around that do various nut flavoured beer. never had one myself. The only one that comes to mind was one of those collabrative series between I think stone, Maui Brewery and maybe Cambridge Brewing company. It was a macadamia nut. Although I hate to encourage anyone to go there there was an extensive discussion on Tastybrew at one point and a briefer one here as well. I think what I was generally decided upon is to toast the nuts slowly and repeatedly, resting on paper to remove as much of the oil as possible. Or use flavouring.
Rogue uses hazelnut extract in their Hazelnut Brown. I haven’t tasted it…not a big fan of the hazelnut.
When I was in Australia last year, I remember trying a macadamia nut porter at a brewpub outside Melbourne. It was pretty good, IIRC. I’ll have to dig out my notes.
Lazy Magnolia in MS makes a pecan beer called Southern Pecan. It’s decent but not exciting. The oils didn’t seem to affect the head adversely.
I remember listening to a “Can You Brew It” as they discussed the Macadamia Porter in Australia and the brewer there said he got his adding nuts info from Lazy Magnolia. I also spoke to Lazy Magnolia about using nuts. I followed his advice and made a Dunkel Weisen with Black Walnuts, it tasted just like liquid banana nut bread. It was great for a holiday beer. What I did was to finely chop about a pound of nuts and roast them @ 350 on a cookie sheet until it started to brown, then I added them to the mash. This was early in my brewing life so I don’t know how well if at all they converted, but the flavor was definitely there.
I would recommend emailing Lazy Magnolia, they were very helpful.
I’ve had a peanut butter beer and a couple of hazelnut flavor/extract-added beers; all them were drinkable, but none of them were exactly triumphs of the brewer’s art. Probably the best I’ve had is the Rogue Hazelnut Brown.
If you’re brewing with actual nuts - peanuts or tree nuts - it’s a royal pain to get the oils out.
If you’re adding extracts, it’s tough to get the balance right so that the beer isn’t overwhelmed by the flavor. Also, many nut flavors are very artificial tasting, so you’ve got to keep it subtle.
In all cases, nut flavors work best with malt-focused brown or dark beers.
Corsica is “known” for chestnut beer. I’ve also heard of a brewer here who runs the beer post-boil pre-chiller through a hop back loaded with chestnuts. Never tried it though.
I’ve had success with the hazelnut extract Whole Foods carries.