Beer Forum

OK. I'd like to reach out to the BN Army with recommendations on a Belgian strong recipie with a little spice. I want to brew something special for the holidays. I'd like to:
1) shy away from real heavy, sweet base beer.
2) use very little flavor and aroma hops - I don't want to clash with the spices

This is what I have been tweaking via Beersmith:

17 lbs. Bel. 2 Row
20 ozs. Aromatic
20 ozs. Caramunich
8 ozs. Chocolate
5 lbs. Clear Candi sugar
2 ozs. Styrian Goldings (5.4% Alpha) @ 90 min
2 ozs. Saaz (4% Alpha) @ 15 min
WLP#575 - Belgian Ale Yeast Blend (~ 77% AA)

With 70% efficiency, mashing at 158:
Projected OG: 1.069 Projected FG: 1.015
IBU: 24.6 SRM: 16.5 ABV: 7.0

1) do you guys think this will be a good base beer recipie?
2) what about the spice(s)? I was thinking cardamum, orange peel, cinnamin, and a touch of ginger, maybe corriander. I definately don't want to overpower this with spices (and I don't want to use all of them, obviously). I just want a touch of spice to compliment the hops and high alchohol. BTW, I just bought Daniels "Designing Great Beers" and I am a little miffed that the Belgians were overlooked completely....

What amounts (if any, of the above spices) do you recommend for a 10 gallon batch?

Thanks, in advance for any suggestions.


Mylo

The only advice I can give you here is to be VERY careful when using the cardomon. I used this in a christmas ale two consecutive years. I never measure for a spiced ale, more just a pinch of this, two quick shakes of that.

One year turned out great and the next was bigtime overpowered with cardomon. Great spice, but use a very light hand when adding it.

I think the reason that there is little information about beer styles in Ray Daniel's book is because "style" and "belgian" are such loosely related terms. With belgian beers you just gotta go for it sometimes and see how it turns out.

I would get rid of that 15 nimute addition. Its not really appropriate for the style and is going to clash with any spices you add.

I would reccomend playing it safe. You can always add more spice but once you have too much.. theres no going back... kinda like listening to Lunchmeat.

Drop the 15 min addition. Most beers in this "style" have no late hop additions. The clear candy sugar isn't any better than table sugar.. so save money and use that... or use the dark candi syrup, which I highly reccomend (of course I get it at the grocery store here for under 2 euros a bottle... you'll pay more)

I've been doing a lot of thinking about spices lately and trying out some different things. One thing I discovered that works well is using coriander seed in the mash. In a 20 liter batch (a little more than 5 gal) I used 5 grams of coriander seed that went through the mill with the grains. Results were awesome! It gives you a light coriander aroma and a deep background spice without being aggressive.

I would combine that with a little sweet orange peel (not the bitter kind) in the boil. Then a week before bottling put some cinnamon in some vodka and some thyme (thyme is great in these beers but don't get carried away) in another thing of vodka and let them steep until you're ready to bottle. Add this, to taste, in your bottling bucket. Trying adding it to just a pint first and figure how much you may want to add to the entire batch... then add 2/3 of that to the bucket and tastes before adding the rest.

hmmm... I wish I had time to brew this up now. Unfortunately I have a new home that needs a lot of work. I won't be able to brew for a few months