Caramelizing Wort?

[BrewGuy]

I have a Scottish Wee Heavy recipe that I am trying tomorrow. It says right when you start the boil to remove 4 Oz and caramelize in a pan, then add back into boiling wort. Am I right in my assumption that by caramelize they mean simmer in a sauce pan until it reduces down to a caramel like syrup?

[beerking]

I would not go quite to the syrup stage, but I would boil (not simmer until reduced by one half.

This is being done to produce kettle carmelization, which creates melanoidins in the beer that are essential for the style. The traditional method of doing this is a boil of 120 minutes. This would be for a full wort boil.

[kilkil]

I would do a lot more than 4 ounce, I took about a gallon of the first runnings and boiled until it starting getting stringy (when pulling my stirring spatula out), I think down to about 1/3 volume. I did the boiling in my usual boil kettle.

[BrewGuy]

I ended up caramelizing about a cup of wort. I ended up with 1.080 OG. This is the biggest beer I have made so far. Its in the primary now, the spent grain dog biscuits are in the oven, and now I am going to spend the rest of the afternoon relaxing with a homebrew cherry stout and watching basketball.

Thanks for the tips guys. :)

[beerking]

1.080 sounds great for that style. What yeast are you using?

[BrewGuy]

Wyeast 1028 Scottish ale. I smacked it last night and by this morning it was nice and fat.

[beerking]

Sounds good. You should have a nice ferment going by AM.