Gin botanical saison

[stz]

Hello HBF.
Planning a gin botanical saison. No idea where to go with the herbs/spices in regards to when and how much to use. Previous 'spiced' beers have probably been on the overwhelming side? While it isn't always to my palette they are usually well received. Usually decide how much to use then use half of that at knock out and half as a 'dry hop' to cover my bases.

I've got some cassia/chinese cinnamon, juniper, angelica root, licorice root, grains of paradise, cardamom, star anise, coriander seed, orris root, orange peel, lemon peel.

Probably going to pick the ones I like, use 50g of the ones I really like, 25g of the ones I like less, roughly grind/smash as appropriate and do the half at knock out, half as 'dry hop' thing? It is going to be a lot and it might be horrible as it ages out a bit. Also considering a jar of half decent marmalade? A lot of the flavours would be complimentary.

It might be smarter to use 20g and 10g? or 15g and 5g? I could make a tincture and dose that, but generally dislike caution. No expectation that I'm going to nail this on my first rodeo. I did a beer with grains of paradise and 25g was quite noticeable.

Has anybody done this sort of beer before?

 

[strange-steve]

I've not made one so can't really help you out there, but I tasted a gin botanical beer recently by Tiny Rebel called Gin and Juice and it wasn't half bad, so the concept isn't a bad one. Their description doesn't offer much help either I'm afraid, "juniper berries, citrus peel and aromatic spices" is as specific as it gets.

 

[Ajhutch]

I’ve been thinking about this sort of thing too. There’s a cucumber and juniper Saison from Brew by Numbers which I’ve tried and enjoyed. I saw a tweet earlier that they’ve recently released version two. One maxim that I’ve heard plenty of people talk about when it comes to spice additions is that you can always add more but you can’t take it out, so if you’re adding juniper and stuff as a ‘dry hop’ then maybe start low level and build it up until it tastes how you want. Let us know how you get on though, sounds a lovely refreshing beer for summer.

 

[stz]

Yeah I think I'm going to err on the side of caution. I'd rather have a keg of saison with a hint of something more interesting going on than a keg of saison that tastes like it was infused with a urinal cake. Apart from the more familiar ones a lot of these herbs taste bitter, piney, earthy and with muted citrus and pith notes at best and like damp soil and toilet cleaner at worst.

 

[Dutto]

How about extracting the herb/spice flavours with vodka?

Last summer I threw a load of chillies into a half bottle of vodka (the chillies were looking very tired) and left it for about a fortnight before straining off the vodka into a second bottle.

The result was much too spicy as a "chilli vodka" (even when frozen and sipped from a tiny glass) but 5ml put into a litre of beer tasted great on cold windy nights last winter.

Here's a link to a site using vodka extracts to flavour beer:

http://barleypopmaker.info/2012/06/...-spices-and-as-an-alternative-to-dry-hopping/

It's not to my taste but if you Google "using vodka to extract a flavour" you get a load of hits.

Enjoy! :thumb:

 

[stz]

Yeah in the past I've made a lot of tinctures with spirits and then performed volumetric dosing before committing the whole batch to get it right first time. It has a lot of positives, it is certainly the smart way to do it, sanitary and it is often the optimal way to extract certain things, but I kind of want to bomb it all in towards the end of fermentation and be done with it. Vanilla is a good example. Because they are so expensive I go to the hassle of making tinctures for that.

 

[MickDundee]

How about extracting the herb/spice flavours with vodka?

Isn’t that how people “make” their own gin anyway?

 

[robbym123]

Stating the obvious I guess, but if you are going 50:50 boil/'dry hop', you could taste in the fermenter, and scrap the dry addition if it is already spiced enough.

Also, you could do a split batch, perhaps no chill method, one lightly spiced and one fully.

I am very interested in how this turns out. My second ever saison fermenting as we speak. First one was a half batch, made by putting a saison yeast into half a batch of kolsch, just to understand how much of the saison flavour comes from the yeast ( lots of it!). Second one is more of a 'proper' saison, with Vienna and Munich malt, plus lemon juice/zest and coriander seeds.

Would love to up the ante further to the kind of thing you have planned.

 

[Dutto]

Isn’t that how people “make” their own gin anyway?

Yes, but the OP was looking at making a beer and there's more than one way to skin a cat! :thumb:

Look at the list:

" .... cassia/chinese cinnamon, juniper, angelica root, licorice root, grains of paradise, cardamom, star anise, coriander seed, orris root, orange peel, lemon peel."

I'm still waiting for my Spiced Beer from last Christmas to mellow down the taste of cloves ...

... so I reckon a vodka extract would be much safer than chucking any of that lot straight into a beer.