Using tea in beer

[octoscott]

Anyone got any experience of this?

I fancy trying an earl grey or jasmine tea IPA, but have no idea when or how much tea to add.

[lord.president]

I fancy an earl grey one too,I'm sure I seen one on here somewhere,though earl grey is bergamot,not sure if you can just buy that.

[Rookie]

A couple of years ago I used some lapsong smokey tea to make a smoked porter.
I made a very strong two cup batch of the tea and added it in a bit at a time in the bottling bucket until it was how I wanted it.

[Sadfield]

Have one bottle conditioning at the moment. I went off the theory that I didn't want the tea being in your face so used half the amount you'd use to make a cuppa. For me it worked out about 3g/L and I put it in at flame out as if I was making a cup of tea, letting it brew as I cooled the Wort. Tasting at bottling, the black tea was there in a subtle way, and the bergamot gave the beer a fragrant, sweet citrus flavour. If anything I'd possibly say I was a little conservative.

I have a bottle of marble/emelisse Earl Grey IPA waiting to judge my beer against, so will be able to give more of an idea in a week or so. Reading the tasting notes on the bottle they made several additions in the fermenter. It seems that tea can be treated as hops.

RECIPE: Earl Grey Pale Ale. (10L)

1Kg Pilsner malt
1.2Kg Maris Otter
100g Light Crystal Malt

60 minute mash @ 67C. 60 minute boil.

10g goldings First Wort Hops
10g cascade @ 60'
10g cascade @ 20'
5g cascade & goldings @ 10'
5g cascade & goldings @ 0'
30g Earl Grey Tea @ 0'

Safale S 04

Pretty new to brewing, so there may be more refined recipes out there.

[simpleton]

Never made one but this is quality stuff:

http://www.marblebeers.com/our-beers/earl-grey-ipa/

I would think it'd be nice in a experimental saison too.

[DaveyT]

While revisiting this website to see a Vienna malt recipe I knew of (for another thread), I found this recipe that might be of interest:
http://www.themadfermentationist.com/20 ... sting.html

[Sadfield]

Finally got around to tasting my Earl Grey beer along side the fantastic Marble Earl Grey IPA. Not a direct comparison as mine is a 5.5% English Pale Ale and Marbles is a 6.8% IPA, also I used the tea at flame out (30g in 10L batch) as opposed to their dry hopping.

As a measure of the level of Earl Grey I'd say they were similar, although the tea comes through a little clearer in mine as it hasn't the massive hop hit of the Marble IPA. The tea flavour is there but doesn't become too dry and astringent.

Hope this helps.