Suggestions on using maple syrup-Grade A very dark/ strong taste

I have some input for you based on what I've learned by reading and brewing. Firstly, pecans are going to hurt your head retention because they have fat in them. One thing you can do is crush them and then after roasting them let the fat soak into/onto a paper bag or towel, and you would want to repeat this a few or several times. This is to get the fat out.

Secondly, maple syrup, which actually has a very high percentage of fermentable sugar, won't give you any maple flavor because it's fermented away. Lastly, I would advise against using corn sugar if you can add more malted barley instead of the simple sugar.

Anyhow it looks fantastic.

 

You don’t want A.. you want the lowest grade Maple Syrup you can find. The darkest stuff. Unfortunately you need to know someone that sugars to get the best. Ideally you need to reduce it even further until it’s as thick as possible. Then you might actually get some maple flavor out if it, maybe.

 

I brewed my first maple beer and tried adding a dark grade to the keg. First day you could taste the maple, and about a day later you couldn’t. I used a high grade extract and everyone who tried it said it was great with no comments about tasting fake.

Good luck.

 

@GormBrewhouse has experience with maple syrup and probably has some insights to share

 

How did you mix the syrup with the beer?

 

I have found that using sugar maple wood gives the best maple flavor.

Using cooking grade syrup in the secondary after your yeast is used up and the abv tolerance for the yeast is mostly met works.

I'd advise not using more that a pint of syrup per 5 gallons unless you are looking for a super sweet syrupy brew.

I'd also ad is finding a sugar house that makes maple syrup the old way. That's to say, no ROed sap. It does shorten the boiling time but you get much less of the Carmel notes and it's just nothing like a traditional syrup. There are less of us who boil the old way but there still are some.

Have fun.

 

I have some recent experience that might be helpful. In January I brewed a 8.5% stout. I used White Labs English Ale yeast since it’s a heavy flocc’er. After it was done in primary I then cold crashed it for a couple days before transferring to secondary. In all it spent about 2.5 weeks in primary.

As far as the syrup was concerned, I used grade A dark robust. Nowadays you want grade A, which is higher quality. The old rating system is no longer used so previous advice about lower grade is no longer pertinent. The darkness and flavor is now part of the name, i.e. “dark robust”. I would think that’s what most people would want to get the maple flavor into the beer. As far as the question of volume of syrup, I had read that some breweries use 10% of the beer volume to get a pronounced flavor, so that’s what I went with, .5 gal maple syrup to 5 gal of beer into secondary. I let it sit for 1 week before kegging. There was little to no yeast activity in the secondary.

There’s still some of this beer left after 6 months. It still has a great maple presence. I expected it to fall off but it hasn’t. Hope that helps.

 

I boiled the syrup to reduce it then added some water and put in the keg. Then put the keg on its side and periodically rolled it.

 

I believe the old cooking grade, or grade C, is now called dark strong flavor.

Dark robust I believe is the old grade B

 

The reason I asked is that I wondered if the syrup had sunk to the bottom and been mostly picked up in the early pours. But it sounds like you kept it well mixed.

 

That was the goal. First few pours didn’t taste overly syrupy or anything so it seemed mixed. Also, I said first day but I let it sit in the keg over night before trying. First day I tapped it vs first day I put the syrup in.

 

Are you talking about reverse osmosis. That's what this place by me does but i think it's with the water.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=id%3D1674532872605107%3Btype%3Dvideo%3Buser%3Dcrownmaple

 

Yes it removes the some of the water and shortens the boiling time.

Good for the sugar maker, but yeild a very different maple syrup due to the shortened boil time. Guys near me start with the usual 2.5% sap, RO it so its 20% and sometimes higher then boil.

This method will make legal syrup as determined by a hydrometer
And a color grading chart, but the taste is very different.

I maybe old school but if you find a sugar maker that don't use a RO or the chemical defoamer I bet you will see a difference as wel

 

Dried and seasoned?
Do you apply any heat to it, like in an oven? If yes, how hot and how do you gauge when to pull it?

 

It was actually less sweet than using real maple. Prior to using it I did a side by side with a commercial beer similar to the stout I brewed. There was a difference and could tell them apart but I went back and forth between which one I preferred. There is even a review on their website from another homebrewer that got good results. I would try 2.5 ozs and then add more if needed. I brewed a 9% coffee stout and used like 3.5ozs. The maple was very present. If I rebrewed it I would have used less.

I took it to homebrew club and got really positive feedback.

https://www.beanilla.com/maple-flavor?gclid=EAIaIQobChMI65iys8eU5AIVNP_jBx2VJAEDEAQYASABEgLHHfD_BwE

 

I’ve also heard of people using dry maple powder. You could add that to secondary. Never used so I can’t comment. Not sure if this would just ferment out as well.

https://www.amazon.com/Frontier-Map...+syrup+powder&qid=1566411237&s=gateway&sr=8-3

 

Ripper,

Somewhere back a few years someone. Posted a vid of me showing how I prepare wood.

In short, cut down a tree, split it like you would firewood and store Ina shed for a few months. Then split againto the thickness of a half inch. Then put in the oven bring it up to 300 or so till the outside faces of the wood start to tan/ brown up. Pull it out, let it cool and store in freeze bags. That's for maple.

White oak is similar but I will go up to 350 or soon some of it to get a bit of charring, other oak at 300. There are charts online that tell what flavors can b expected at certain temps.

Make sure you ventilate or the lady of the house might get fussy