Honey Lemon Ginger Recipie

[RitsiGators]

I was thinking about making a Honey Lemon Ginger beer,

I was going to use about 0.5 lbs honey malt to add some honey flavor, 1.4 oz lemon zest @ 7 min, and then 6 oz grated ginger @ 30 min, 2 oz grated ginger @ 10 min, and 2.5 oz grated ginger in the secondary for 7 days.

I have never used ginger or honey malt in a beer though so do you guys think it would come out?

 

[smagee]

Honey malt will do really well with a ginger beer; I'll have to keep that in mind for the next time I brew one. I'd suggest pushing the 6oz grated ginger to later in the boil, maybe 15 minutes left or so. Cooking the ginger will mellow its flavor out quite a bit, but with that small an amount, 30 minutes of boiling is a bit long.

I'd chuck the lemon zest in closer to flameout too; otherwise most of its oils will just boil off.

 

[RitsiGators]

Ok, I will move the lemon zest and first ginger addition closer to flameout, do you think i should add more ginger as well or do you think that will overwhelm the lemon and honey flavors?

 

[smagee]

Honey malt is pretty potent, so I don't think there's much risk of it getting overwhelmed. The lemon will be fairly light; you could compensate a bit by using citrusy hops though (centennial or amarillo would be my choice, although I think ahtanum would do as well).

My last ginger beer actually had 6 *pounds* of ginger in it, but a lot of it was added early in the boil. I'd shoot for using 1-2 pounds total; the trick is to balance it out with the timing of its addition. I think a good balance would come from something like:
8oz @15 minutes left
8oz @ flameout
8oz in secondary

Drop the lemon in somewhere between 5 minutes and flameout (zest from 2 lemons, for ease of measurement) and you're all set. It might also help to add a pound or so of honey in the secondary to dry it out a bit, but that'll depend on the rest of your recipe.

 

[RitsiGators]

I was leaning towards centennial so im glad we were thinking similarly, I was wondering how do you sanitize your ginger before you put it into the secondary?

so far the recipe is looking like this... I think its almost ready

Estimated SG: 1.046
Estimated IBU's: 17.5

Grains:
6 lbs pale malt........ 61.5%
3 lbs white wheat.... 30.7%
8 oz honey malt...... 5.1%
2 oz carapils........... 2.7%

Hops:
0.6 centennial (9.6AA) @ 30 min
0.6 oz centennial (9.6AA) @ 1 min

Yeast:
Safale US-05

Adjuncts:
8oz grated ginger @ 15 min
1.4 oz lemon zest @ 2 min
8oz grated ginger @ 1 min
8oz grated ginger in the secondary

 

[chapa]

I get some lemon flavors from citra also, might be one to consider...centennial sounds great though.

 

[smagee]

Why so much white wheat? With all that wheat, I don't know that the carapils really adds much, since you'll have plenty of body/head retention from the wheat malt. I prefer a lighter clean beer to help the ginger really stand out, but your version will probably be tasty regardless. That honey malt will be awesome.

As for sanitizing the ginger, I honestly didn't worry about it too much. For my last batch, I boiled it in enough water to cover it for about five minutes, then added the ginger and water both to the secondary. You could also soak it in vodka or something if you'd prefer to add some quick ABV.

Citra would also work, but in my experience, it provides more tropical flavors than anything else, and it doesn't work as well for bittering additions due to its tendency towards cat urine (never experienced that myself, but I've steered away from it for anything earlier than 15 minutes left for that reason). Those flavors will still be nice, but not as citrusy as I'd prefer in these types of brews.

 

[JoeBuch]

Sorachi Ace is also very good for lemon flavor. When dry hopped it seems to be very musty, bust as a late addition it taste like limoncello

 

[EarthBound]

How many gallons do you plan to yield?

 

[RitsiGators]

Hmm, I think I will use the same method to sanitize the ginger. I was going to add the wheat just to add a little more malt backbone, but I think i am going to cut back on the wheat a bit to 2 lbs and up the 2-row to reach the same gravity.... I will also probably stick with centennial as i have a bunch of it in my freezer

Earthbound, the recipe was for a 5 gallon batch, i see that you have a blueberry cider in your signature, my wife is getting into making apple wine and cider could you pm me the recipe?

 

[Homebrewtastic]

I was thinking about making a Honey Lemon Ginger beer,

I was going to use about 0.5 lbs honey malt to add some honey flavor, 1.4 oz lemon zest @ 7 min, and then 6 oz grated ginger @ 30 min, 2 oz grated ginger @ 10 min, and 2.5 oz grated ginger in the secondary for 7 days.

I have never used ginger or honey malt in a beer though so do you guys think it would come out?

I have a strawberry Ginger kolsch in bottles right now. I added 6.5 oz. of Ginger at flameout and the taste is pretty darn assertive. So you're schedule for it will probably be a bit overboard. I would just
do 3 oz. at flameout and then the secondary addition.

 

[Medevac_Chief]

has anyone thought about adding any actual honey to the boil instead of using the honey malt?

 

[Damoxemus]

I've used Cascade and Sorachi Ace in the two ginger beers I have done. Both turned out well, but I found dry hopping with Cascade and 8oz of ginger really made a big difference (compared to the Sorachi Ace, no dry hop version I did).

And yes, the first batch I did had honey in it too:

I highly recommend this recipe as a starting out point:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=141080