Orange peel

[bert7cosby]

Hi have a Christmas beer in its 2nd day of fermentation and I would like to add some orange flavour. What would be the best process for this ? I have plenty of oranges and thought I would chuck in some peel.
Thanks

[6470zzy]

I generally will zest a few oranges and then add the zest to the pot at flameout but I see that you are already into fermentation. Why not zest a some oranges , boil up a small amount of spray-malt add the zest to it and then cool and pitch the lot into the FV as your initial fermentation begins to die down?

Cheers

[IPA]

Hi have a Christmas beer in its 2nd day of fermentation and I would like to add some orange flavour. What would be the best process for this ? I have plenty of oranges and thought I would chuck in some peel.
Thanks

Crush 25gr of this and bung it in.
http://www.themaltmiller.co.uk/index.ph ... ductId=346

[bert7cosby]

Worried about infecting the beer, what do you think ? Steep orange peel in some vodka for 10 mins first or stick it in the oven and dry it out and hopefully kill any nasties at the same time?

[threehub]

....don't cook it ! Any orangey flavouring and aroma will all be lost from your peel if you put it in the oven, as the majority of them come from the natural oils in the fruit. Cooking them on their own will just evaporate most of what you're trying to capture. Mind you, the kitchen will smell great !

If you're worried about risk of infection, then either steep orange peel / zest in vodka (the essential oils will likely pass into the alcohol), and use the orange vodka as what you add to the brew - or, as someone else said, heat with malt to allow the flavours to transfer to the resulting liquid.

[raiderman]

Normal oranges aren't that distinct I read somewhere that american brewers user bitter oranges ie sevilles or marmalade oranges. I've found adding some grapefruit peel - no pith sharens the flavour up. In terms of infection, my first attempt I forgot to add the peel just at the end of the boil so it went in with the steeping hops at around 80c, no ill effects. Normally though I add just before the end. In your case why not take out a small amount of the unfinished beer, boil and add the peel, cool and add back to the fermeneter?

[IPA]

Worried about infecting the beer, what do you think ? Steep orange peel in some vodka for 10 mins first or stick it in the oven and dry it out and hopefully kill any nasties at the same time?

Good idea. I use the same method to make saffron beer. I then dump the whole lot including the vodka in the secondary fermenter.

[Francois]

I normally just whack such addendum things (zest, spices etc) in a big mug, pour over boiling water to cover, leave to cool for a bit then bash them into fv. If the ferm's not too far along there's plenty of time for flavours to be leeched out decently