BREW BETTER BEER WITH HONEY The beer industry has changed. Brewers are pushing the boundaries of flavor and taste; consumers are committed to trying anything at least once. It’s the perfect situation for craft brewers to thrive. It’s also the perfect situation for brewing with honey. This all-natural ingredient changes the outcome of the final recipe and marketing strategy in many ways, including: Want your beer to have depth and a complex flavor profile? Add a dark varietal during the boil. Want a sweet finishing note on your holiday beer? Add honey at the last stages of the boil. Want to bottle condition your beers? Add honey. Want a unique market position and labeling that stops shoppers in the beer aisle? Use honey iconography on your cans and bottles. There are plenty of reasons to brew with honey. Flavor, function and marketing are just the start. Are Honey Beers Sweet? Let’s get this question out of the way. Honey beers can be sweet but not always. Honey’s carbohydrates are more than 95% fermentable and adding honey early in the brewing process will yield a product with no residual sweetness. The strength of the honey flavor in honey beer depends upon four major factors: the stage of the brewing process at which the honey is added; the type of beer; the quantity of honey used; and the type of honey used. Adding honey during... The Boil Since honey is 95% fermentable, most of the sweetness in honey will be lost unless added at later stages in the boil. If you want a subtle honey flavor, add honey between 10 to 30 minutes left in the boil. To best preserve the aromatics of honey and obtain a stronger honey flavor, pre-process honey at low temperatures and add it at the end of the kettle boil so it is exposed to high temperatures for a minimal amount of time. Cooling or Primary Fermentation The benefits of adding honey during these brewing stages include a stronger honey flavor and a boost in gravity. Honey also will help lighten the body of the brew and raise the ABV. High Krausen Honey added at this stage will provide a strong honey flavor and help soften any bitter notes in the beer. Packaging Honey will provide carbonation after bottling, and also impart a strong honey flavor. If using honey in this manner, it’s recommended to boil honey in a water solution, pour the solution into the bottom of the bottling bucket and rack beer on top. TECHNICAL PROFILE OF HONEY “Honey is the natural sweet substance produced by honey bees from the nectar of plants or from secretions of living parts of plants or excretions of plant sucking insects on the living parts of plants, which the bees collect, transform by combining with specific substances of their own, deposit, dehydrate, store and leave in the honey comb to ripen and mature.” —From Codex Alimentarius The natural process that produces honey has likely existed for 100 million years. But even for the European honey bee (Apis mellifera), the nectar the insect creates is extremely unique and has properties not found in other foods. Honey is classified as a sweetener, but it is so much more than that. Honey is the substance made when the nectar and sweet deposits from plants are gathered, modified and stored in the honeycomb by honey bees. The definition of honey stipulates a pure product that does not allow for the addition of any other substance. This includes, but is not limited to, water or other sweeteners. Composition AVERAGE RANGE Honey is comprised primarily of fructose (38.2%), glucose (31%) and water (17.1%). However, the Fructose/Glucose ratio 1.23 0.75 to 1.86 remaining 13.7% of honey provides brewers Fructose 38.37% 30.91% to 44.26% with some remarkable benefits. Among those Glucose 30.31% 22.89% to 40.75% components are a variety of other sugars, Minerals (ash) 0.169% 0.020% to 1.028% enzymes, amino acids, antioxidants, vitamins and minerals. It is this unique blend that gives honey Moisture 17.2% 12.4% to 22.9% its functional advantages. Reducing sugars 76.75% 61.39% to 83.72% Sucrose 1.31% 0.25% to 7.57% Honey, on average, has a pH of 3.9. This acidity can work to enhance flavors, and inhibit mold Total acidity meq/kg 29.12 8.68 to 59.49 and bacteria growth. The amino acids that give True protein mg/100g 168.6 57.7 to 567 honey its low pH also serve as precursors to honey’s antimicrobial capabilities. Sweetness Honey’s Moisture Content Given the sugars that comprise honey, it is The moisture content of honey varies considerably slightly sweeter than sucrose and can be used in throughout the year, by region and by floral smaller quantities than other similar ingredients. source. On average, honey’s moisture content The primary carbohydrates that comprise honey is about 17%. As long as the moisture content include fructose, glucose and maltose, with just remains below 17%, honey will not spoil. Honey’s a small amount of sucrose. The combination low pH and antibacterial properties prevents of these sugars produces an ingredient that is bacterial growth. naturally sweeter than sucrose. In fact, some honeys contain significantly more fructose than maltose, making them up to 25% sweeter than sucrose. Honey Color Designation PFUND SCALE OPTICAL COLOR NAME The colors of honey form a continuous range (MM) DENSITY* from water white to dark amber, and is related Water White < 8 0.0945 to its mineral content and is characteristic of Extra White 9-17 0.189 its floral source. Light colored honey typically has a mild flavor, while dark colored honey is White 18-34 0.378 usually stronger in flavor. The Pfund color grader Extra Light Amber 35-50 a 0.595 measures the color of honey. Light Amber 51-85 1.389 Amber 86-114 3.008 Dark Amber > 114 - * Optical density (absorbance = 100/percent transmittance), at 560 nm for 3.15 cm thickness for caramel-glycerin solutions measured versus equal cell containing glycerin. HONEY STORAGE GUIDELINES Honey’s moisture content (about 17%), low pH Best stored in a sealed container at room and antibacterial properties make it one of the temperature, between 64-75˚F (18-24˚C) only ingredients that will most likely not go bad. • Cooler temperatures, between 35-60˚F, hasten Regardless, it is still very important to store honey honey’s natural crystallization process properly to maintain its integrity. • Honey stored at temperatures above 85˚F for extended periods of time will darken in color and be subject to subtle flavor changes 300 VARIETALS OF HONEY. 300 Opportunities To Brew A Unique Beer. There are more than 300 unique kinds of honey in the United States, originating from such diverse floral sources as Clover, Eucalyptus and Orange Blossoms. This simple yet complex variety of flavors allows brewers to develop unique beers with complex flavor profiles. Alfalfa Clover Sage Alfalfa is a legume with blue Clovers are the most popular Sage honey can come from flowers. It blooms throughout the honey plants in the United States. different species of the plant. summer and is ranked as the White clover, alsike clover, and Sage shrubs usually grow along most important honey plant in the white and yellow sweet clover the California coast and in the Utah, Nevada, Idaho, Oregon and plants are the most important for Sierra Nevada mountains. Sage most of the western states. Alfalfa honey production. Depending on honey has a mild, delicate flavor. honey is white or extra light location and source, Clover honey It is generally white or water-white amber in color with a fine flavor. varies in color from water-white to in color. The honey also has good body, extra light amber and has a mild, which makes it a perfect table delicate flavor. honey. Sourwood Sourwood trees can be found in Eucalyptus the Appalachian Mountains from Avocado Eucalyptus is one of the larger Southern Pennsylvania to Northern Avocado honey is gathered from plant genera with over 500 Georgia. Sourwood honey has California avocado blossoms. distinct species and many hybrids. a sweet, spicy, anise aroma and Avocado honey is dark in color, Eucalyptus honey varies greatly in flavor with a pleasant, lingering with a rich, buttery taste. color and flavor, but in general, it aftertaste. tends to be a bold-flavored honey Basswood with a slightly medicinal aftertaste. Tulip Poplar This tree is distributed from The tulip poplar is a tall tree with Southern Canada, to Alabama, to Fireweed large greenish-yellow flowers. It Texas. Basswood honey is often Fireweed honey is light in color generally blooms in the month characterized by its distinctive and comes from a perennial of May. Tulip Poplar honey is biting flavor. The flowers are herb that affords wonderful produced from southern New cream-colored and they bloom in bee pasture in the Northern England to southern Michigan and late June and July. The honey is and Pacific states and Canada. south to the Gulf states east of water-white with a strong flavor. Fireweed grows in the open the Mississippi. The honey is dark woods, reaching a height of three amber in color, however, its flavor to five feet and spikes attractive is not as strong as one would Blueberry pinkish flowers. expect from a dark honey. Taken from the tiny white flowers of the blueberry bush, the nectar makes a honey, which is typically Orange Blossom Tupelo light amber in color and with a Orange Blossom honey is often Tupelo honey is produced in the full, well-rounded flavor.