The Honey-Lavender Kolsch: Part 1

For a spring brew I decided to pick up the Honey Kolsch kit from Northern Brewer.  I thought it might be even more interesting to add some lavender – that is an ingredient that they feature on their site, after all – and I had a small sachet that our friend Lilly gave us last year.  The question was how to use it as an ingredient in the kit beer.

I did some research on the topic, and one suggested way was to create a tincture – infuse the little herbal flowers with a 40% alcohol solution.  I combined two shot glasses full of the flowers with three shot glasses full of Absolut Vodka (80 proof!), and voila – I had my tincture!

(If you're interested in the process, Wikipedia is a good place to start.)

Here are a couple of photos of the final steps in the process, filtering out the flowers, and the final product. 

I bottled the kolsch on Sunday, adding the tincture and the priming sugar to the big bottling tub.  I’ll have a post on that tomorrow.