spiced beer questions

weldedsord

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https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/1054245/cinnamon-spice
hi I have wanted to do a spiced beer for fall but i'm trying to figure how many allspice berries to use. I've talked to a few people and got vastly different answers everything from 5 berries to two onces. I know it's not the same unit of measurement. also should I crack the berries or leave them whole when adding.

thank you for you're time and advice
 
Never done allspice, so take my advice with a grain of salt.

Having said that...some folks say you could make a tincture and add a little at a time during bottling until you hit your desired flavor amount. That might be the best way for your first go at it.

Otherwise, i would recommend being restrained as you don't want to overpower the beer. How much would that be, tough to say. Here are a couple articles about adding spices. hope this helps.

https://byo.com/article/master-the-spice-options-and-approaches-to-additions/

https://www.brewcabin.com/adding-spices-to-beer/
 
I would just like to add that it's easy to overwhelm the beer with spices. A couple of years ago, I made a spiced holiday ale based off of a British Brown Ale recipe. I used cinnamon, allspice, and a couple of other spices. I was easy to add way too much. A very undrinkable beer.
 
I have done a bunch of experimenting with spices and peels and I've dumped many of these experiments during my learning process. It is very very very easy to over do the spices. And crushed (super potent so use very little) is different than uncrushed (can use a little more). Dry hop addition different than 15 minutes in the boil. S-05 vs Belle Saison yeast completely change the intensity of spices. And just this past season I learned that bottle carbed vs force carbed in a keg makes a huge difference in the potency of spices in the final flavor. 2-row vs 6-row malts.......and on and on.

It also all depends on your palate threshold. I'm very INsensitive to hop bitterness; DIIPA - no problem...but dark toasted malts are practically undrinkable; most stouts and porters taste acrid and harshly bitter like burnt toast to me. I'm very sensitive to sweet; any kind of beer made with maple syrup at any point - tastes like a vomit inducing mouth full of moldy table sugar to me; but honey or vanilla - love it.

The dry hop way to learn is the easiest. You can add a little, then taste after a few days, then add a little more, then taste, etc. until you get what you want. Crushes or not crushed is a little more difficult but you can fill 2 one gallon carboys (or something) then dry hop each differently to see what crushed vs whole does. Etc. Or do it even more small scale and pour a few pints and add a tiny amount of each spice to get an idea of what the final product would be in a larger batch.

Spices are a crazy rabbit hole...FWIW: I have learned keep it simple - one spice per batch until I learn what I like - kind of simple. And to start with a little (E.G In a 5-6 gallon batch: 3 g spice corns LIGHTLY crushed - basically just break the corns to expose the insides, at 15 minute in the boil, or 4 g dried fruit peel as a dry hop) and go from there.
 

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