Strange ingredients/additives

[KMalt]

What are the strangest ingredients/additives you've used in some of your homebrews?

A lot of things sound strange to the new brewer such as pumpkin, fruit, honey, etc. But I'm sure there's some additives that even sound strange to long-time brewers. For instance, has anyone tried yogurt in their wort? Anything else wierd?

[bigmf]

I haven't tried anything too daring in my beers. I was going to try maple syrup once but the price for the amount I needed was insane.

I think yogurt would cause a massive lactobacillus infection if I recall the chemistry correctly.

Oh and for something really different maybe Toney can tell you about "scrumpy".

[toneyc]

Scrumpy... shudder... I haven't actually made it, I don't think I'm brave enough. It has meat in it.

:o
Toney.

[chris1kanobi]

Meat and beer, hughhh, heugherr! A few of the guys in my brewclub (and myself) really enjoy fine cigars. We were particularly fond of Acid Blondies. They have a herbal, fruity, floral, musky scent and flavor, that goes well with homebrews. The box of cigars is lined with some of the remaining tobacco leaves and rather than waste them we decided to "dry hop" several beers with them. Adding only 1 ounce. of leaves to 5 gallons of wheat beer, for 3 days, created a beer that had awesome aroma. However, the tobacco leaves leached out a bitter flavor (like chewing tobacco). We called it Kung-Fu Brew, because it smelled and tasted like High Karate after shave. We got a 26 in the National Competition, I would hate to have been judged after that beer. Plans are in the works for a less potent addition, like a gram.

[Fast_Eddy]

Originally posted by chris1kanobi
it smelled and tasted like High Karate after shave. ...

That stuffs not for drinking, you know?

The most noticeable ingredient I've ever used is peated malt in a scotch ale. One half pound makes a very noticeable very smokey flavor in a five gallon batch. Definitely one of those beers that gets a binary reaction.

[ehixon]

I was talking to a guy last weekend who's friend used spruce clippings (I've also seen that in a brewing recipie book)- he said it was quite good.

The book (the title of which I have NO recollection of) also had recipies for beer with coffee, juniper berries, and- get this- garlic. I cna't imagine that garlic beer would be even remotely drinkable.

[wortchillergoal]

I know of someone who used A-! steak sauce.

[chazwicke]

Although I have not actually brewed in about 8 years, I am considering making a small batch soon using cilantro. I mean, after all, coriander is cilantro seed I think. I love the flavor of cilantro and think if it was added to say a pilsner style it might turn out good and be a nice accompanyment to Mexican foods. I did use Liquid Smoke in a batch years ago in an attempt to clone a rauchbier like Schlenkerla.

[sweetwater]

I always have some of my own Stout on hand, I call it Shore Lunch, it has Wild rice and Maple Syrup in it......... excellent!

[Beerconnoisseur]

You will want to be careful, adding things like tobacco leaves to your beer. Potentially, you could leech out fatal amounts of nicotine, and since ethyl alcohol is a pretty good solvent, you wouldn't want to poison any imbibers, no?

"Arsenic and Old Ale" might make for a good stage production, but a questionable beer... ;)

[S.F.B.]

It's not all that unusual but I have a brown ale that I use buck wheat honey as 1 of the ingredients. Pretty darn good. It is still on the young side but getting better all the time.

[evilredlight]

next spring i am going to tap and sap some birch trees and use it as a primer. and I may try to use it as a topping sugar, to get the OG up to canadian standards!!! ;)

[GunNut76]

Originally posted by sweetwater
I always have some of my own Stout on hand, I call it Shore Lunch, it has Wild rice and Maple Syrup in it......... excellent!


Do you put the rice in the secondary or mash it? Just got a 2 lb bag of it yesterday.