Wild beer experiment, comments please

[jimny14]

Ok then, so I've been thinking about doing a nettle and gorse flavoured beer along the sort of lines of :- about 2/3s medium dme to 1/3 bke, then boiling the nettles for about 45 minutes as the bittering and then chucking in the gorse flowers for another 15 mins. The only thing i'm pondering is quantities, I was thinking maybe a good 2 carrier bags of nettles maybe 2 and a half, and 1 and a half to 2 bags of gorse flowers for a 40 pint brew. Does this sound too little for flavour? I'm probably gonna aim for around the 4-4.5% mark so thinking I should be putting in about 1.75 kg dme and 750g bke. I'd be using an ale yeast for this too, not decided which yet but probably a standard like nottingham or safale s04.

Any comments greatly received, hopefully the weather will be good tomorrow n I can go out collecting. Should be good use of an unexpected day off. Cheers James

 

[prolix]

I have read a few nettle beer thread in the past but can remember non

Good luck anyhow and don't get too stung.

 

[jimny14]

Hi everyone, right I've just put this on. I ended up with this recipe :-

2x carrier bags of nettle tops
1x carrier bag of gorse flowers
1kg medium dme
1kg light dme
500g bke

I boiled the nettles for about an hour then, 10 minutes before the end of the boil chucked in the gorse flowers. Turned off the gas then let it all steep for about 10 minutes. Stuck all the liquid in the fv. Got 6 litres out. Added all the dme and bke and stirred it all in and made up to 23l. Added S-04 yeast at 24C. Now stuck in spare room to do its thing. I'll see what it does and maybe do some late flavouring depending on how its turning out.

 

[bigsteve2007]

Hi everyone, right I've just put this on. I ended up with this recipe :-

2x carrier bags of nettle tops
1x carrier bag of gorse flowers
1kg medium dme
1kg light dme
500g bke

I boiled the nettles for about an hour then, 10 minutes before the end of the boil chucked in the gorse flowers. Turned off the gas then let it all steep for about 10 minutes. Stuck all the liquid in the fv. Got 6 litres out. Added all the dme and bke and stirred it all in and made up to 23l. Added S-04 yeast at 24C. Now stuck in spare room to do its thing. I'll see what it does and maybe do some late flavouring depending on how its turning out.

Well keep us posted on what the beer looks and tastes like, good luck pal! :thumb:

 

[jonewer]

Gorse flowers? What do they taste like?

 

[jimny14]

Hi, don't know how the gorse is gonna come through in the beer, i've only used them in a gorse and elderflower wine before. They smell really coconutty when raw and some of this came through in the wine i did, will have to wait and see what happens with the beer, I do love a good experiment.

 

[jonewer]

Hi, don't know how the gorse is gonna come through in the beer, i've only used them in a gorse and elderflower wine before. They smell really coconutty when raw and some of this came through in the wine i did, will have to wait and see what happens with the beer, I do love a good experiment.

Good luck! :thumb: