Date Beer

I should quickly say..... dates don't have a ton of flavor, especially not in beer. If you want to be able to taste them, you really need to use a metric buttload. And plan on mashing fast and high, or adding a lot of lactose or maltodextrin since the date sugars will be almost 100% fermentable.

 

Legend has it, that badly made arrack was one of the reasons for the importation of IPAs into India.

 

I made a date quad, using only date sugar, and also use date sugar to make my own dark candi syrup. Slice them in half, remove seed, place on a baking pan in the oven at 350 until they turn dark brown and get crispy. Then grind and use however you'd like.

 

Try 1-2# of date sugar the next time you get a hankerin for a batch of "Sumerian Date wine beer" and stop insulting dates based on your botched "Sumerian date wine beer". If one pound of date sugar makes good flavor and aroma for me, two pounds should be good enough for you.

 

My "botched" Sumerian date beer scored a 40 and a gold medal at the Drunk Monk. Not sure where you get the idea that it was botched. I was actually amazed at how decent it turned out since I actually pitched no yeast but got all the yeast from the dates themselves. If I were to brew the recipe again, I would do it the same way but with regular malt instead of smoked malt, that was my primary commentary on it. How much like dates it tasted, I must confess I'm not exactly sure since the smoked malt covered up most everything else. Suffice it to say that it was mildly flavored other than the smoke.

 

A "sour fruity bacon beer" (as described by you) which allegedly scored a 40 and won a gold medal in Wisconsin isn't a great testament to the caliber of beers judged at your local homebrew contest. Did you bribe the judges with Cheddarwurst or something?

They were like...mmmm...yeah...this beer tastes like bacon...there must be meat in this beer....boom...40! Your gold medal had nothing to do with the dates that you couldn't taste in your malty smoked bacon beer that was coincidentally brewed with dates and your misguided disrespect for brewing with dates is currently the subject of my outrage!

 

Date ice cream is pretty good, but date beer is just unAmerican...as is dishing on Wisconsin : )

 

Not sure how it works in Nevada, but it's a regional obligation to diss adjacent states in the Midwest. I meant no harm to @dmtaylor. I'm having a difficult day because Greeks can't pay their bills.

 

Must be over-invested in Euros : )

Another great debate: can you make Feta (beer) with Wisconsin cheese?

Cheers/Opa!

 

The Urban Knaves of Grain hold the Drunk Monk every year in Illinois, not Wisconsin. When my Sumerian beer won gold in 2008, there were 427 total entries, with 19 entries in the Specialty category that it won in.

http://knaves.org/DMC/victor/VICTORS2008.htm

Personally I didn't really like the beer to be honest. But somebody else did. Competitions are always a crapshoot -- the beers you think are awesome get humbled, while the beers that are wacky or off occasionally win. It's really a crapshoot. Enter more competitions and results will be all over the board for most beers. When you can consistently win medals more than 50% of the time, that's when you know you're good. I'm not there yet.

 

The judges must have originally been Wisconsinites. Illinoisans would not rate a bacon beer highly in a Belgian beer contest. We have high standards here.

 

Name one Belgian beer that tastes like bacon @dmtaylor .

There aren't any. How is it possible to win a Belgian style homebrew contest with a bacon beer?

Because Wisconsin!

 

I was going to say something very kind about the neighboring Illinnoyances, but on second thought... I've got nothing.

 

Once again you are wrong on two counts, my flatland-loving friend(?). The contest is not specific to Belgian entries, and there is no bacon in this recipe. Although I'll admit: bacon is quite tasty, and so are Belgian beers. The two ingredients together, though? Not so much. I can agree with you on that.

 

I'm aware and somewhat disappointed you didn't use real bacon. A beer contest called the Drunk Monk accepts non-Belgian entries? This further diminishes the credibility of the contest.

I'll say something nice about Wisconsin in the meantime. Your cheese curds are phenomenal. The rest of the country has no idea what they are missing.

 

Okay, okay, you guys have got Goose Island and the best deep dish pizza and hot dogs in the universe. There. I said it.

 

I'm willing to permanently swap Goose Island, deep dish pizza and hot dogs for New Glarus, butter burgers and all you can eat fried fish practically everywhere on Friday.

 

Get a room, you two.

 

Don't have much experience with beer Dates but I can tell you banana dates shack is awesome, dates Rey bread can Get a room you two.

 

... as might a quad date