Tapping Into Maple Beers
Some flavor pairings are so obviously complementary; it’s perhaps inevitable that they become trends. The perfect maple beer has long been a dream of many a brewer, and it’s clear that brewers and drinkers alike enjoy finding their maple paired with some form of dark beer, usually a big stout. Yet as self-evident as this pairing may be, it is not always the easiest to achieve. Many of the compounds responsible for maple syrup’s unique, earthy flavor are quite volatile and thus easily scrubbed away during the fermentation process, leaving only faint evidence of the brewer’s intent. That’s hardly what you’d want under any circumstances — and especially not when an ingredient comes with as hefty a price tag as maple syrup.
Some of this conundrum may stem from the fact that the styles of beer which maple syrup would intuitively seem to pair best with — dark beers — are perhaps the most resistant to showcasing subtler nuances. Indeed, the flavors we associate with maple syrup are largely the result of Maillard reactions created through the application of heat, much as with coffee or even the roasted malts that give stouts their roast. But while a big, dark, roasty stout might allow coffee and chocolate to punch through, the character of maple is just a bit too volatile to claim the same staying power. With maple syrup, our idealized combination of flavors may just result in a paradox of practicality, and a lesson in managing expectations. Does one simply accept that the combination of flavors a drinker most desires might not hit the intensity level that they’re looking for, or does one try to meet those expectations through a clever manipulation of the fermentation process?
As I see it, there are several possible approaches to consider when planning out a maple brew. One can lean into expectations and simply load up a stout with as much maple syrup as possible. Or, one might change up the base style, searching for a showcase that won’t drown out the maple with competing characteristics — doesn’t a maple cream ale have a nice-sounding ring to it? You could, of course, simply take a less direct path toward finding your maple beer nirvana, and enhance the perception of maple flavor with something that simply tastes like it, like fenugreek or candy cap mushrooms. Or, finally, you could decide to circumvent the issue altogether, and simply prevent the maple syrup from fermenting at all by adding it into a beer that no longer contains active, viable yeast.
In its Rawest Form
Those lucky enough to live in maple country might understandably feel the urge to go as maple-forward with their brew as possible, and in this case, why limit yourself to just one source of flavor? Brewers in the appropriate regions might consider a beer that combines not only syrup, but maple sap as well, and perhaps even bark. All varieties of maples, including black, red, and silver can be tapped for syrup, though naturally the highest concentration of sugar will be found in the sap of the sugar maple. Regardless, maple sap contains nowhere near the sweetness of its condensed syrup, and is so close to raw water that it can be used to replace your brewing water entirely.
It’s important to note that the properties of your sap are set in wood, not stone, and thus may not only vary from year-to-year, but from day-by-day and tree-to-tree. Maple sap generally has a gravity around 1.005 to 1.007, but it may sometimes come in as low as 1.003. Typically, you can expect a pH between 6.5 to 7, but in some cases, it may range as widely as 3.9 to 7.9, depending on the season and conditions. Brewers may consider adding around 0.2 g calcium chloride per gallon (4 L) of sap to ensure adequate calcium is present, especially when brewing a maple stout.
If you are not tapping the sap firsthand, it’s worth noting that some producers may offer reverse osmosis (RO) sap — sap that has been filtered and concentrated via reverse osmosis. While still much more liquid than syrup, RO sap can have a much higher concentration of sugars than sap straight from the tree, and this concentration can vary widely. In fact, if you live in a region known for maple syrup production, some producers will create a sap of whatever gravity you ask. It’s much easier for someone with proper equipment to do this versus trying to hit the correct gravity at home. Using concentrated sap is the technique Sean Lawson uses to create Lawson’s Finest Liquids’ Maple Tripple Ale. This may not be an option for most readers, but if you are able to get sap with a known sugar content, this can help take away some of the unpredictability that comes with brewing with a natural foraged ingredient. Timing is worth considering too: Sap harvested later in the season may have lower concentrations of sugar and differ in taste compared to early-season sap.
Regardless of where and when you get your sap, keep in mind that nature is just as eager to get on with the fermenting as you are. Natural fermentation will take off on its own in a couple of days, so the sap should be kept cold in the interim, and frozen for longer periods if you are unable to brew with it immediately. Using fresh or properly stored sap is critical as off-flavors (fecal-like) show up pretty quickly if stored improperly.
One’s first instinct when it comes to replacing all of the brewing water with pure sap may be to wonder if the flavor will become overwhelming, but generally, you’ll find the opposite to be true. Because there is so little to maple sap beyond water and dilute minerals, and the sugar content is so low, little maple flavor will make it through the fermentation process. Indeed, it is the long, long boiling process that sap undergoes in order to become syrup that is responsible for most of the flavor of maple as we know it — as the water evaporates, the sugars are transformed through caramelization and Maillard reactions. However, the sap itself will add a mild mineral and ester character to the beer, which holds up well to the profile of something like a stout or porter.
For a fully mapleized stout, let’s not only double down, but triple down on the maple. If you live in the Northeast of the U.S., Southeast of Canada, or one of the less popular maple sugaring regions with access to sap, you no doubt have access to bark as well. Try peeling a few ounces of bark from a tree and toasting it in the oven before adding to the boil, enhancing the toasty, earth notes in the beer.
Maple Brewing Techniques
Boiling is already an integral part of the syrup making process, so maple syrup certainly doesn’t require any more of it. In fact, adding your syrup during the boil will only diminish your chances of saving as much of the precious, delicate flavor as possible. Whether brewing an all-in stout with sap and syrup alike, or a toned-down variation with just syrup, set the syrup aside until after fermentation has completed. While I don’t always recommend racking to a secondary vessel, I find it’s absolutely warranted in cases like this when you want to introduce the maple with as little turbulence as possible. Dumping a bunch of maple syrup onto a thick, hungry yeast cake is only going to stir up a vigorous secondary fermentation, and just as with adding the syrup to the boil, this risks blowing off many of the maple’s volatile molecules. After transferring to a secondary, there will still be plenty of yeast left behind to ensure the maple is fermented out, but the process will be a slower, gentler integration. For similar reasons, I recommend building your beer around a slow, steady yeast variety, preferably one comfortable with fermenting steadily at lower temperatures, without pumping out a lot of esters.
Just how much maple syrup should you add? Frankly, I’ve found it’s next to impossible to go overboard in this regard. I have brewed beers with as much as 1 part maple syrup to 4 parts beer. After taking this approach for a maple imperial stout using an entire gallon (4 L) of maple syrup in a 5-gallon (19-L) batch, I still found that the beer could have been, well, a bit more maple-y. So much of maple’s essence relies upon its richness, and once fermented out completely, it’s just not that overwhelming of a flavor. But the main consideration here, in the end, will likely come down to cost. Maple syrup certainly isn’t cheap, and dumping a gallon (4 L) or more of the stuff into a batch is not going to be economical for most brewers. For most recipes, I would recommend at least 32 fl. oz. (950 mL) of syrup per 5-gallon (19-L) batch, though lighter beers may still shine with less than this.
Until recently, maple was sold in three grades, corresponding to its color. Led by the state of Vermont, the USDA recently changed from the letter grade system to a self-descriptive system. When brewing with maple syrup, you’ll want to seek out what was formerly Grade C syrup, now known as “Very Dark and Strong Flavor.” If you can’t find this darkest of dark maple syrups in your area, simply search for the next shade down, or what would have previously been labeled Grade B. While the average consumer tends to stick to the lightest shades for their pancakes and waffles, you’ll want the most robust of maple syrup to hold up to your beer.
Another glaring caveat that until now has been left unaddressed: What if you do want your beer to be sweet?
Beyond dosing your beer with syrup in the glass, the simplest method is to fall back on crystal malt. Or, to reach for the brewer’s latest darling ingredient: Lactose sugar. These ingredients can quickly become overbearing, but depending on your goals, they’re certainly able to deliver the perception of sticky sweetness that many expect from a maple beer. Used more discreetly, a moderate dose of lactose — half a pound up to a pound in a 5-gallon batch (0.23–0.45 kg/19 L) — supplies a clean, smooth mouthfeel and drags the beer just into the spectrum of sweet. This approach can be especially effective if brewing a dark beer on the less-than-imperial side, such as a porter or a more modest stout.
What if adding a perception of sweetness back into your maple-
infused, thoroughly-fermented beer isn’t quite enough? Perhaps you’re over this whole fermentation thing, ready to embrace maple flavor wholly undisturbed and undiminished. In other words, you want to combine finished, stable beer with maple syrup, but dodge the flavor-scrubbing fermentation of that syrup.
This tactic is relatively easy to achieve for those with the ability to keg their beer, but for practicality and stability reasons, should probably be avoided by those who bottle condition. If one wishes to avoid fermenting their maple syrup, they’ll have to neutralize their yeast after fermentation has completed. The easiest way to accomplish this is using two common winemaking ingredients, potassium metabisulfite (Campden tablets) and potassium sorbate. After fermentation, cold crash the beer if you’re able, then transfer the liquid to a secondary vessel to free the beer from as much yeast sediment as possible. Add about 2 grams per gallon (4 L) of potassium sorbate plus two whole Campden tablets. Let the beer sit for at least a day to ensure even dissolution within the liquid. After this, add your desired volume of maple syrup — though keep in mind you will not need nearly as much by volume as with other techniques, and a large volume of maple syrup will make your beer incredibly sweet. Allow the beer to age for an additional week or two after this. Some slight refermentation may still occur, since Campden and potassium sorbate do not actually kill yeast, but rather inhibit it from multiplying.
Base Beer Style Selection
Though many brewers will want to go big with a maple beer, it may be wise to stick to the lighter side of dark and the smoother side of roasty. A porter or brown ale can serve to contrast the woodsy maple essence just as well as a big stout, but if one does choose to go in the stout direction, avoid leaning too hard into bitter, roasted malts. The rich, potent base of a Russian imperial stout is only going to make it all the harder for the maple to peek through. Consider blackening your beer instead with less intense malts like Carafa III® and Blackprinz®, which still impart notes of coffee, chocolate, and roast, without becoming overly acrid or overbearing.
Thus far, I’ve made the assumption that you’ll be wanting to stick to a dark beer base, and load it up with as much maple as possible to make sure the flavor sticks around. However, I’ve found that maple works across a surprising variety of styles and grain bills, and you should feel little hesitation for exploring in this regard. Using a healthy percentage of oats or wheat in the grain bill can add to the perception of a full, silky mouthfeel, and a small percentage of a light smoked malt like oat-smoked wheat can help to enhance some of the earthiness of the maple. Style-wise, maple pairs quite well with nearly every shade of beer, and will shine especially well in ambers and red ales, which also offer the bonus of a touch of residual sweetness. Regardless of the style, a small percentage of crystal malt will help to balance out the dryness that the maple will impart, which many drinkers might find paradoxical. For a beer that’s smooth and rich, but shies away from sweetness, Munich or Vienna malt may be the perfect thing, granting just enough fullness to the mouthfeel.
Of course, given that this gentle sugar benefits from a slow, steady fermentation at lower temperatures, why not embrace the slowest and lowest of all fermentations? A lager with a light grain bill provides little to hide behind. I suspect this combination sounds like it might clash — a notoriously delicate category of beer combined with a notoriously gratuitous breakfast topping. Fortunately, we don’t have to worry about such marketing paradoxes when brewing at home. In truth, the end result of fermentation will likely leave maple syrup as the perfect, mineral-y, earthy, just-slightly-sweet partner for a light, neutral lager base. Think somewhere along the lines of a Vienna or helles lager — already perfect drinks for the transition seasons, paired with the Northeast’s finest spring bounty.
With the tactics described in this article you should be able to craft a maple brew that lands anywhere from dark to light and sweet to dry. With so many variations to try, your greatest challenge may be getting your hands on enough syrup.
Maple Imperial Stout
(5 gallons/19 L, all-grain)
OG = 1.076* FG = 1.021
IBUs = ~35 SRM = 45 ABV = 9.6%
* Prior to maple syrup addition
Ingredients
10.5 lbs. (4.8 kg) 2-row pale malt
2 lbs. (0.9 kg) Munich malt
1 lb. (0.45 kg) flaked oats
1 lb. (0.45 kg) Carafa® III malt
0.5 lb. (0.23 kg) crystal malt (20 °L)
4 oz. (113 g) chocolate wheat malt
8.5 AAU Northern Brewer hops (60 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 8.5% alpha acids)
8.5 AAU Northern Brewer hops (5 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 8.5% alpha acids)
32 fl. oz. (950 mL) very dark maple syrup (secondary)
Wyeast 1318 (London Ale III), White Labs WLP066 (London Fog), or
LalBrew Verdant IPA yeast
3⁄4 cup corn sugar (if priming)
Step by Step
Brewers with access to maple sap may replace all brewing water with sap for this recipe. Those without access to sap can add 0.5 lb. (0.23 kg) corn sugar as substitute. The gravity of maple sap for this recipe is assumed to be ~1.005, though this will vary — take a gravity reading of the sap before brewing to adjust accordingly.
Mash grains in sap at 154 °F (68 °C) for 60 minutes. Sparge as normal and boil for 60 minutes adding hops according to ingredients list. Cool the wort to fermentation temperature and aerate the wort if using a liquid strain.
Ferment at 69–72 °F (21–22 °C).When primary fermentation is complete, rack beer to secondary vessel, then add 32 fl. oz. (950 mL or 2.8 lbs./1.3 kg) very dark (previously called Grade C) maple syrup. Allow two to three weeks for additional fermentation before packaging as normal.
Maple Imperial Stout
(5 gallons/19 L, extract with grains)
OG = 1.076* FG = 1.021
IBUs = ~35 SRM = 45 ABV = 9.6%
* Prior to maple syrup addition
Ingredients
6 lbs. (2.7 kg) extra light dried malt extract
1 lb. (0.45 kg) Munich dried malt extract
0.5 lb. (0.23 kg) Carapils® malt
1 lb. (0.45 kg) Carafa® III malt
0.5 lb. (0.23 kg) crystal malt (20 °L)
4 oz. (113 g) chocolate wheat malt
8.5 AAU Northern Brewer hops (60 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 8.5% alpha acids)
8.5 AAU Northern Brewer hops (5 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 8.5% alpha acids)
32 fl. oz. (950 mL) very dark maple syrup (secondary)
Wyeast 1318 (London Ale III), White Labs WLP066 (London Fog), or
LalBrew Verdant IPA yeast
3⁄4 cup corn sugar (if priming)
Step by Step
If available, replace all brewing water with sap. If not, add 0.5 lb. (0.23 kg) corn sugar as a substitute.
Place all the crushed grains in a large muslin bag. Begin heating 4 gallons (15 L) of water and submerge the grains in the water. When the water reaches 170 °F (77 °C) remove the grain bag and allow it to drip back into the kettle. Turn off heat and add the malt extract. Stir until all the extract is dissolved then bring wort to a boil. Add the first hop addition at the start of the boil and second addition with five minutes left in the boil. Cool the wort to fermentation temperature, top up to 5 gallons (19 L) and aerate the wort if using a liquid strain.
Ferment at 69–72 °F (21–22 °C).When primary fermentation is complete, rack beer to secondary vessel, then add 32 fl. oz. (950 mL or 2.8 lbs./1.3 kg) very dark (previously called Grade C) maple syrup. Allow two to three weeks for additional fermentation before packaging as normal.
Maple Amber Lager
(5 gallons/19 L, all-grain)
OG = 1.044* FG = 1.008
IBU = 23 SRM = 17 ABV = 5.8%
* Prior to maple syrup addition
Ingredients
6 lbs. (2.7 kg) Pilsner malt
1.5 lbs. (0.68 kg) Munich malt
0.5 lb. (0.23 kg) melanoidin malt
4 oz. (113 g) crystal malt (60 °L)
4 oz. (113 g) chocolate wheat malt
4 AAU Tettnanger hops (60 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 4% alpha acids)
4 AAU Tettnanger hops (10 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 4% alpha acids)
4 AAU Tettnanger hops (5 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 4% alpha acids)
24 fl. oz. (700 mL) very dark maple syrup (secondary)
Wyeast 2124 (Bohemian Lager), White Labs WLP830 (German Lager), or
SafLager W-34/70 yeast
3⁄4 cup corn sugar (if priming)
Step by Step
Mash grains at 152 °F (67 °C) for 60 minutes. Sparge as normal and boil for 60 minutes adding hops according to ingredients list. Cool the wort to fermentation temperature and aerate the wort if using a liquid strain.
Ferment at lager temperatures, 50–54 °F (10–12 °C). When fermentation is complete, rack to a secondary vessel and add 24 fl. oz. (700 mL or 2.1 lbs./1 kg) maple syrup. After beer has completed secondary fermentation of maple syrup, lager for additional three weeks before packaging.
Extract with Grains recipe:
To brew this recipe using extract with grains, replace the Pilsner, Munich,
and melanoidin malts from the all-grain recipe with 3 lbs. (1.4 kg) Pilsen dried malt extract, 1 lb. (0.45 kg) Munich dried malt extract, and 4 oz. (113 g) Carapils® malt.
Place all the crushed grains in a large muslin bag and add to 4 gallons (15 L) of water. Turn on the heat and when the water reaches 170 °F (77 °C) remove the grains and allow them to drip back into the kettle. Turn off heat and add the malt extract. Stir until all the extract is dissolved then bring wort to a boil. Boil 60 minutes, adding hops as indicated. Cool the wort to fermentation temperature, top up to 5 gallons (19 L) and aerate the wort if using a liquid strain.
Follow the remainder of the instructions in the all-grain recipe.
