So, last sunday I´ve brewed my first honey beer.It was a pale beer using just Pale Ale malt to get an OG before adding the honey of 1045.I pitched a blend of cultured Coopers-Windsor dry yeast 36 hours later(at high krausen) I have added 2.22 lb of unpasteurized honey , streight to fermentor.Beer Smith program says this addition gives me an OG of 1058,thus the sugars added are 22% of the total fermentables,is it too much for such a low gravity beer?.Is this beer going to be too dry?
honey typically fully ferments. it might take a long while (though wort nutrient helps to move the yeast along) but you can expect 100% attenuation of honey. yeah, you'll probably have a dry finished beer and 22% fermentable from honey is alot. i don't suspect that it will be screwy or unrecognizable as beer however. not much you can do anyway. Cheers.
It's definitely going to be dry, but I wouldn't stress it too much. Dry is not a bad thing in a session beer. I think the real key is how high were your IBUs? Also, out of curiosity, what does BeerSmith predict your gravity is with just the pale malt?
It's going to be dry compared to a typical 1.058 beer, but whether it's too dry will depend on your taste. If it does seem too dry, but you like the flavor contribution from the honey, you could add body back the next time with some carapils or maltodextrin.
In the past I have brewed Dubbels of OG = 1.060 using 2 lbs. of honey. I used Wyeast 3787 and I ended up with FG = 1.014. My beers tasted just fine and they were not dry. Cheers!
I'm glad your beer tasted good. That's fairly anemic attenuation for that combination of yeast, gravity, and simple sugar contribution, which of course would explain why it wasn't dry.
Maybe JackHorzempa and I have mashed a bit high,155 F in my case,that could help these beers to keep some body.
I took a sample today, even there´s a lot of diacetyl yet remaining I can feel it very dry,maybe time could diminish this matter,hope so.
