Chicken Beer Recipe

[Pyssedas Heavy Industrial]

Greetings friends and brewers - I am planning to undertake the brewing of a chicken beer - prospect which fills many a heart with shock and/or awe. I plan to use a fairly basic strong ale for the beer - and presume that the chicken is to be added cooked - if anyone has experience with chicken or other meat beers your thoughts and knowledge would be greatly appreciated.

More reports as they come to hand.
DGr

[Oliver]

DGr,

All I can say is: Good luck.

Might I also be presumptuous and post your website address here (I've got it from an email you sent me some time ago)?

http://www.geocities.com/pyssedas/ Chaps, check it out for a good laugh.

Cheers,

Oliver

[Pyssedas Heavy Industrial]

Indeed you may post the webiste - we are in the process of building a new one at http://www.pyssedas.com which promises to be even sillier.

Kudos to you for the Wrist-thick stout recipe (which we called big black bertha) - we have been tempted into opening a couple so far which have been fantastic - there was so much hoppy goodness in the fermenter after we decanted and bottled it that we added a regular homebrew mix can on top and created Son of Bertha - there is very little variation in taste between the two. Next time we might even attempt a third incarnation from the original ingredients - moving ever toward a black & tan type mix.

On a different note - Pyssedas (a motley collection of heavy industrial miscreants) has its 17th meeting this sunday - one item for discussion from the Brewing Division is production of the Pyssedas 2005 Brewers Annual if anyone has any suggestions for what they would like to see in it - and or what would be useful to them in a brewers annual please let us know

love as always
DGr
(Ex big Kahoona - Pyssedas Heavy Industrial)

[gregb]

ooo dibs......tastes a bit like chicken...

[Oliver]

I've been thinking, why stop at chicken beer. Why not tuna beer, or kangaroo beer, or koala beer (that's kinda catchy), or beef beer ... ?

Oliver

[Pyssedas Heavy Industrial]

If you are particularly interested in following the progress of the chicken beer - i have created a web log in its honour - check it out at:
http://www.geocities.com/pyssedas/chicken.html

I have recipes for other fine meaty beers such as Mutton etc - but daren't try them. At least they are good for when vegetarians come to the house in search of beer. "Sorry mate - all my beers have meat in them."

On a kind of related note - there was once a "koala" beer brewed at the Rifle Brigade in Bendigo - but this was in the days before I drank [yes they existed] and as such I can't vouch for the koalacality of it.
DGr

[Harland Sanders]

I would suggest that you buy a chicken chassis (aka skeleton, frame, etc) from a chicken shop and boil it for an hour or two to make your stock. I wouldn't use wings because they are very fatty and don't have much flavor, and it's the bones that give the best flavor. Commercial stocks are too full of chemicals and rubbish to consider.

[thehipone]

I'm afraid. Very afraid.

Good luck.

Maybe some hot chilli would go nice to make a sort of "Buffalo-style chicken wing beer"?

[Pyssedas Heavy Industrial]

hmm not a bad idea that - might aim to add a small chilli portion to about 6 or so of the beers - as ever watch the blog for more info
thanks
DGr

[dawg wterer]

A chilli beer warning - I recently added a whole birds eye chilli to 6 longnecks of a coopers real ale. After a month it was pleasantly heating on the pallet with interesting capsicum-type aroma hint, after three months it was a red hot macho tour of a hot place deep underground (ie ouch!).

Interesting watching the tougher guinea pigs suffer through it and then eat the chilli itself though.

Would the adding of chilli to a chicken beer make it a "Zinger Brew"?

[Dogger Dan]

Ok,

I once saw a chicken beer recipe and put it down to a lark. It was associated with a recipe called "goat scrotem ale" so in my defense, I don't want to suck a mean goats bone, sounds like a bit of work. Just me though.

I have shoved a chicken arse first in a beer can and done it that way on the Q if that counts for much.

Let me know how this one makes out. I must admit, I am kind of partial to adding a few chillies to a wet or two and see how that makes out.

Out of curiosity, when do you drink a chiken beer or a hot pepper beer? By the way, do you need a dinner with that?

Loving it

Dogger

[sago]

Chicken beer my ringpiece!!!!Was highly skeptical until we had a little surf via the search engine.
The correct terminology to get the recipe is COCK ALE and it stems from a Scottish brew from the 1500's.
It does involve flaying your cock and putting it to 5 pounds of raisins of the sun-stoned.

Look it up as it is of historical significance and good for a giggle.

[Pyssedas Heavy Industrial]

Indeed it should be called cock ale - as you will see on the chicken beer update page [address above] we have toyed with the name repeatedly. And while yes the original seems to have been made with raisins etc [just can't face that one yet] there are other recipes out there for cock ales where water is run over the cock into the fermenter etc. My methodology [if it can be described as such] was to make a fairly weak chicken broth this time as an experiment - with the capacity to make stronger ones in future. Again more details on recipe etc on update page.
DGr

[dawg waterer]

While it is possible to type "Cock Ale" into a search engine and see a number of recipes, I shall post one here to aid interest and enthusiasm in the topic!

Take a cock of half a year old, kill and truss him well, and put into a cask twelve gallons of ale to which add four pounds of raisins of the sun well picked, stoned, washed and dryed; sliced dates half a pound; nutmeg and mace two ounces: Infuse the dates and spices in a quart of canary twenty-four hours, then boil the cock in a manner to a jelly, till a gallon of water is reduced to two quarts; then press the body of him extremely well and put the liquor into the cask where the ale is, with the spices and fruit adding a few blades of mace, then put to it a pint of new ale yeast, and let it work well for a day, and in two days you may broach it for use or in hot weather the second day, and if it proves too strong, you may add more plain ale to palliate this restorative drink which contributed much to the invigorating of nature.

The London and Country Brewer - 1774

[grabman]

mmmmmm not sure about cock beer, sounds more like a cock up

[Pyssedas Heavy Industrial]

Just a quick update on where we are at with the cock ale adventure - the gang came over last thursday night and assisted in the bottling process. [At least that is what they claimed - when packing them into the shed this morning I noticed that not all were capped properly and have already had to dump some.]

A quick taste revealed a beer that was ok - but by no means outstanding yet. The major faults with the beer [essentially a dusty taste] have more to do with the treatment of the grains than the feathered additions did.

As mentioned previously the chicken taste is not all that evident - i'm not disappointed by that but will soup up the stock next time [if there is a next time]

As ever more updates at the link posted earlier

DGr

[Pyssedas Heavy Industrial]

Well friends amongst much excitement in the pyssedas brewing division family tonight we tasted the first proper glass of the chicken beer. [Cock ale for the precise].

And huzzah - it was not only drinkable but was in fact nice [ in the brewers humble opinion anyways] while more details can be found on the blog essentially the chickeniness added extra roundness and fullness to the flavour - and the chicken was more evident than earlier tasting may have suggest leading me to think that massive changes may not be required to the recipe after all.

In short I am very happy with this as a first attempt.

If anyone knows of any competitions in the Melbourne area where this beer would be an acceptable entrant please post them as I am keen to get expert advice from people who may have tried this style before.

Chicken beer - it will flip your wig dude!