Saison- Sugar or Honey?

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Jeff W
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Saison- Sugar or Honey?

The saison recipe I'm about to use calls for 1.5 lbs of either honey or cane sugar.  Any suggestions on which one would be better?  

JamesLewis
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Sugar will give you a drier

Sugar will give you a drier finish, which is what I prefer. Honey, can get to that level, it is more difficult. Honey also gives a honey flavor which adds a degree of funk (technical term otherwise know as honey flavor :)  )In a small amount it may contribute complexity to the saison, but I have had many that over do it. Either way, add the sugar or honey in fermentor (boil in water to sanitize and put into solution) add it after fermentation has peaked. Like 5 days, when the airlock slows. With that quantity you could add it twice, once on day 5 then again on day six. The goal is to keep the fermentation consistent and to give the yeast the easy sugar as desert after they have done the work on the maltose. The sugar/honey can/maybe should be up to 15% of the sugar in the beer. Remember to take this into consideration when making a starter as you will have a lower OG therefore a smaller starter.

Jeff W
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Thanks James.  For the yeast

Thanks James.  For the yeast starter, like half of what I would normally use?

JamesLewis
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Figure out the OG of the beer

Figure out the OG of the beer without using the honey/sugar and plug that into to Mr Malty pitching rate caculator.

http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html

Jeff W
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Thanks!

Thanks!

Jeff W
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Added half the sugar tonight

Added half the sugar tonight and the yeast just loved it.  I started getting blow off within five minutes!