Recently I made a cream ale and I love it. Came out fantastic. It is now gardening season and my hot peppers are doing well. So I thought, wouldn’t it be cool to add a hot pepper in each bottle? If i do that do I need to prepare the peppers so that I don’t get any bad results. Like do i need to sterilize the outer surface like maybe by soaking in vodka for a short period?
I would chop the peppers and add to vodka after soaking for a few days or few weeks then add the vodka to the bottles.
I have had good results without sanitizing things that are added to finished beer - the low pH and alcohol are good protection; peaches, mandarins, cocoa nibs, vanilla beans - none of these has caused an infection. But one nice thing about making a tincture with vodka and the ingredient is you can adjust the amount of character by controlling the tincture dosage, so with something as variable as heat from peppers the tincture might be the safer way to go.
Cave Creek Chili Beer has a whole chili in each bottle.
http://www.chilibeer.com/chilibeer/Home.htmlMost people in the bottle shop I frequent, have one just to say they’ve had one. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone go for two. Chili becomes the first and only taste/sensation; the beer itself becomes irrelevant.
If I were to do this, I might wash them in watered-down vodka, just for a little sterilization and to clean-off any gardening residues.
Yeah, I understand the idea of the tincture for control purposes, but I like the aesthetic aspect of having the whole pepper sitting in the bottle.
I get this but chances are you are using brown bottles which make aesthetics negligible and making clean up more difficult. In addition you could come out with extreme heat or none at all this way.
