Honey Bock
Yesterday I bottled the honey bock that has been brewing over the last week. This one was made with the following ingredients:
- A Black Rock Bock beer kit.
- 1kg of honey
- 500g of Dextrose
- Caster sugar for carbonation
The only difference from the standard procedure was replacing part of the brewing sugar with honey. Before being added, the honey needs to be pasteurised, which involves heating it up to 80°C and keeping it at that temperature for half an hour or so. This kills off any any wild yeasts or other undesirables that might spoil the brew.
I've used honey in a few other brews over the years but had not tried it with a dark beer, so it will be interesting to see how it turns out. The previous beers had a stronger honey flavour than commercial beers like Beez Neez, which is probably a good thing for a dark beer. I guess I'll find out after it matures for about a month.
Comments:
Shane -
Interesting, I haven't had a honey-flavored beer. I'll have to keep an eye out for Beez Neez.
James Henstridge -
Shane: you might have trouble finding the beer outside of Australia -- while Matilda Bay is owned by one of the major brewers (Fosters Group) it isn't their most well known beer, so you'd be more likely to find Redback.
Wolfger -
Ubuntu brewers unite! :-)
Shane -
Are they generally a lighter colored beer? I now recall having Leinenkugal's Honey Weiss, but was not much of a fan.
James Henstridge -
If anything, the honey beers I've made have been darker than the plain beer kits since I'm replacing sugar (which doesn't add any colour) with honey (which does).
If you're asking about Beez Neez, the colour in the picture on the Matilda Bay Brewery website looks about right. I don't know whether you consider that lighter coloured or not.
Shane -
Ahh so Beez Neez is a honey wheat like the Leinenkugal. Leinenkugal's brews are usually too weak for me so I'd be interested to try another honey wheat to get a better opinion.