A buddy of mine asked me for a recipe to showcase a bunch of honey a farmer customer of his is giving him. I've used honey a number of times, but never to be the center of attention. To complicate things more, he wants a beer not a mead. He's an extract with specialty grains brewer. So far what I have come up with for a 5 gallon batch is: 5 lbs Golden DME 4 lbs of what ever honey he gets 1 lb of vienna so he can tell theres malt in there .5 lb honey malt .25 lb of briess extra special (the burnt sugar and woody notes made me think this would add a touch of complexity ) even though my This is wrong, radar is going off. 1 oz of Citra at 15 min Wyeast 3787 I dunno. I'm not an extract brewer. He really threw me a curve ball with this one. Thoughts?
Definitions vary, but I'd call this a braggot rather than a beer. I've never used that big a portion of honey, so I can't offer much help. But there is a mead forum at the homebrewtalk site that does seem to have braggot discussions fairly often. Edit: another thought...if you want this to be beer-like rather than mead/braggot-like, you could build some body back in with carapils or maltodextrin.
Yeah I feel like a contestant on masterchef, being asked to help with something I have no idea about. Good call with the carapils.
To overstate the obvious, your friend doesn't know what he wants. At worst, this will be an educational experience for him. Having personally never done anything like this, I'd follow the offered advice and load up on flavorful, heavy bodied malts to balance the honey. I'd be tempted to use a saison yeast but that might blow his mind.
Bottled this about two weeks ago, so it's still pretty green: http://hopville.com/recipe/1382012/blonde-ale-recipes/honeymoon Honey malt plus a mid-range british crystal made for a nice sweet and complex maltiness (the golden promise as base didn't hurt). Hop schedule made to build up the floral qualities of honey. Lower attenuating, fruity yeast to leave the sweetness and give some esters to build up the honey flavors. This beer tastes like honey.
