Chili Pepper Beer
TroubleShooting
Nicolò Binda - Varese, Italy asks,
I would like to brew a chili beer with some very hot peppers I have. I just tried a chili imperial stout and I loved it! I would like to replicate it but I don’t know how to use the peppers. I think that I can use them in the boil or in the dry hop. What is the best method? And how many grams of peppers do I need to use in order to have only a spicy aftertaste?
Nicolò, I first must say grazie! I think this is the first question I have answered from an Italian homebrewer and am excited to know that you are reading BYO in Varese. Without knowing what beer you sampled I cannot help you replicate the flavor, but I will let you know my thoughts about your question.
When I am considering adding non-traditional ingredients to beer I think about the other flavor compounds present in my idea. As I type this I am drinking an imperial stout and the flavors that jump out of the Tsarry Night in my glass are raisin, fig, cocoa, toffee and a nice punch of alcohol. If I wanted pepper in this beer I would want to avoid veggie aromas associated with fresh peppers and would be drawn to dried peppers or smoked peppers. Since I have brewed stouts with a blend of smoked and dried peppers with great success, I would offer these methods of preservation for you to consider.
The chipotle pepper, popular in Mexico, is a smoked Jalapeño pepper. There are several types of chipotle peppers and I have brewed some nice beers flavored with a pepper known as the meco chipotle chili. I like the combination of smoke and hot present in these peppers. I also like the raisin-like flavors present in dried peppers. The combination of smoke, heat, and raisin marry well with a style like imperial stout.
You are asking me a question about preference, so here is my opinion: Add your peppers to your hot wort at the end of the boil like you would with aroma hops. You will extract the heat, the smoke and the dark fruit flavors from the flesh of the dried pepper. These flavors will not fade during fermentation or aging. When it comes to determining the dosing rate, I have a little more difficulty in offering rules of thumb. The intensity of your peppers play greatly into your recipe and you really must do some trial blends to determine a good dosing rate. If you end up with a beer that is too extreme you can always blend it down by adding some beer that was not exposed to peppers. A good starting point is three grams of peppers per liter of wort (0.1 oz. of peppers per quart of wort). Good luck with your pepper homebrew!
