Adding honey

[Brewed_Force]

I'm thinking of adding honey to an English bitter extract recipe.
A couple of questions:
Do I add the honey at the start of the boil or just put it straight in the FV with the extract/wort?
What type of honey ? There are numerous types in the supermarket.
Any suggestions?

 

[MyQul]

I add golden syrup to my bitters at 15 mins to go in the boil.

I think its a matter of which every one takes your fancy as I think they would all have the same or similar specific gravities so all add the same/similar amount of gravity ponts to the OG

 

[BeerCat]

One from David Heath which he adds it after fermentation. [ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-W9Y5kH-TJg&t=353s[/ame]

 

[LarryF]

I added 55g of honey to a Coopers English Bitter today. As the honey is pure sugar the yeast strips most of it out and leave only a hint. Add a hop tea and a dry hop and it's very subtle.

 

[Zephyr259]

I'd add honey at the end of the boil or later as that way you'll preserve more of the aromatics and flavour. It's easier to mix into the wort when hot and the heat will sanitise the honey if you're worried about that. Most mead makers avoid heat these days so would combine in the fermenter, you could go as far as adding it once primary fermentation is slowing down, I am considering doing something like this to step feed a braggot up to a very high abv, adding all the honey at the start would make the wort to high gravity for the yeast to do a good job.

As for the type of honey, orange blossom is a lovely honey to use in a lot of things, and I don't think it would clash in a bitter. Folks on here have made good meads from cheap aldi honey but i've had better success from more expensive varietal honey like tesco finest orange blossom, it just has more flavour. How much were you thinking of adding and do you have your grain bill yet?

 

[Brewed_Force]

I'd add honey at the end of the boil or later as that way you'll preserve more of the aromatics and flavour. It's easier to mix into the wort when hot and the heat will sanitise the honey if you're worried about that. Most mead makers avoid heat these days so would combine in the fermenter, you could go as far as adding it once primary fermentation is slowing down, I am considering doing something like this to step feed a braggot up to a very high abv, adding all the honey at the start would make the wort to high gravity for the yeast to do a good job.

As for the type of honey, orange blossom is a lovely honey to use in a lot of things, and I don't think it would clash in a bitter. Folks on here have made good meads from cheap aldi honey but i've had better success from more expensive varietal honey like tesco finest orange blossom, it just has more flavour. How much were you thinking of adding and do you have your grain bill yet?

1kg Light DME
90g Crystal 90L
90g Crystal 50L
30g Chocolate malt
300g Honey

(11 Litres)

 

[Brewed_Force]

I add golden syrup to my bitters at 15 mins to go in the boil.

I think its a matter of which every one takes your fancy as I think they would all have the same or similar specific gravities so all add the same/similar amount of gravity ponts to the OG

What do you reckon the golden syrup adds to the final brew?

 

[MyQul]

What do you reckon the golden syrup adds to the final brew?

It adds a delicate toffee note

 

[Crystal_Ball]

I used just shy of 1kg of blossom honey recently. I put it in the FV with some of the wort after the boil had finished to dissolve it. Then chilled the rest of the wort and added that to the dissolved honey mixture. Taste wise there was a definite honey blossom flavour but it did disappear after a month I think. Still a good beer to drink after though.

 

[Brewed_Force]

It adds a delicate toffee note

That sounds what I'm looking for, hence the extra crystal malt in the recipe.
I think I'll give the golden syrup a try...in the words of Dr. Pepper "what's the worst that can happen?":lol:

 

[MyQul]

That sounds what I'm looking for, hence the extra crystal malt in the recipe.
I think I'll give the golden syrup a try...in the words of Dr. Pepper "what's the worst that can happen?":lol:

It definately adds its own flavour

 

[Zephyr259]

That sounds what I'm looking for, hence the extra crystal malt in the recipe.
I think I'll give the golden syrup a try...in the words of Dr. Pepper "what's the worst that can happen?":lol:

Golden Syrup sounds more what you're wanting. I'm going to try adding caramelised honey to a brew at some point as well as making a mead (bochet) from it. That's likely to give a huge caramel flavour.

 

[Cwrw666]

I've been making the Greg Hughes honey ale recipe recently using Tescos finest orange blossom honey - it adds a definite citrusy note to it. I believe you're meant to add it 5 minutes from the end of the boil to sterilise it as honey can contain a lot of wild yeasts and bacteria, but not too soon in the boil as you don't want to boil off the aromas.
Note of caution with the recipe - it uses absolutely tiny amounts of hops, definitely not enough to filter out the hot break gunk, so the tap blocks up in seconds. I've made it twice and both times had to tip the wort out of the boiler into the FV...

 

[BeerCat]

Golden Syrup sounds more what you're wanting. I'm going to try adding caramelised honey to a brew at some point as well as making a mead (bochet) from it. That's likely to give a huge caramel flavour.

Good idea about caramalised honey. I have some in the cupboard. I am doing an Adnams broadside clone which uses sugar so i may swap that out instead.