Coffee Stout

[Brewer_010]

I am planning on brewing a coffee stout and I'm not sure of when to add my freshly brewed espresso (thinking ~300mL to 20L). Some questions I have are:

Do I boil it for 5 mins to kill any bugs?

Should it be added to secondary or primary (what about infections)?

Is there a specialty grain that I can add that will 'enhance' the flavour, like carafa?

Would appreciate anyone's experiences with this, cheers.

 

[Jye]

Ive not brewed one but have try a few and heard of varying methods of adding the coffee, anything from adding beans to the mash to adding it straight to the keg. I think its going to have to come down to personal preference.

Adding it to the keg would be the best way to control the amount of coffee and it can be very easy to over do. 300 ml will be way to much and you might want to start with 50 ml and add more if needed.

Checkout Meantime Coffee Stout if you can find it.

 

[winkle]

I brew a expresso stout (using expresso coffee surprisingly) one full scoop into the machines' filter and collect around 300ml. I allow it to cool then dump it into the fermentor (primary) along with the wort. Plenty of flavour. I'm sure there are heaps of other ways though.

Edit: oops 23litre batch.

 

[newguy]

I know of 4 ways. They are:

1. Bowl of water with the crushed beans in the fridge for a few days. Strain out beans, boil water to sanitise, then add to fermenter.
2. Crushed coffee beans in the mash. Although I drink a buttload of coffee, I'm not a coffee geek so I'm not sure of the reason why but apparently you're not supposed to boil coffee grounds. Putting the grounds in the mash apparently comes close to the ideal coffee brewing temperature.
3. Adding a pot of coffee (or partial pot of strong stuff) to the boil.
4. Dry hopping with coffee beans. Strong risk of infection unless you personally just finished roasting the beans.

Method 1 worked the best for the coffee beers I've tried. I didn't personally try it but I've tried methods 2, 3 and 4. 1 was definitely the best taste-wise.

Putting beans in the mash is probably the easiest, but getting the amount right is tough. Coffee goes great in porters or stouts.

 

[Sammus]

If you want to do it with real espresso (or even better, like 20ml from 20g ) then I've read that only a couple shots of needed in a whole batch before its overdone.

I think straight to the keg would be the go. Then you could add shot by shot so you dont over do it.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

If using esspreso, drop the milk and sugar... B)

 

[Swinging Beef]

1 Ristretto per gallon added as if they were aroma hops.
So.. 5 in the last few minutes of the boil.
Remember... much like brewing beer... get the coffee brew right.
No second runnings, please.

 

[brendanos]

Add the coffee as late as possible, at flameout, or even in the fermenter before bottling. Brewing the coffee is done with near boiling water/steam so that should be pretty safe. If you boil the coffee you risk adding a harsh/astringent/generally unpleasant flavour to your beer.

 

[Quintrex]

My advice would be add, the coffee in secondary, as heaps of the coffee flavour compounds are volatile and are thus lost in the CO2 resulting from fermentation.
For my last one I used around 7 double shot espresso's for a single 20L batch, otherwise the next best option is to get the ground coffee, between 100-150g coffee for 20L batch and do a cold extraction with water overnight, then add to your brew. The cold extraction limits the harsh flavours extracted, but gets the flavour.

Can post the details for coffee cold extraction out of randy moshers radical brewing if you want!

Q

 

[Sammus]

If using esspreso, drop the milk and sugar... B)

I didn't know espresso has milk OR sugar in it :lol:

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

I didn't know espresso has milk OR sugar in it :lol:

Point noted..


Bit like asking "Where is the milk" when served Green Tea.....

 

[Sammus]

Lol yeah, sorry bout being pedantic, I think its in my blood

I was even more thinking that espresso is the liquid obtained from the machine, ie ~30ml of thick dark intense coffee. Then one would add milk or sugar as they please. I guess adding sugar only you could still call it espresso, once it has milk in it it can acquire one of many other names though

 

[Muggus]

I know of 4 ways. They are:

1. Bowl of water with the crushed beans in the fridge for a few days. Strain out beans, boil water to sanitise, then add to fermenter.
2. Crushed coffee beans in the mash. Although I drink a buttload of coffee, I'm not a coffee geek so I'm not sure of the reason why but apparently you're not supposed to boil coffee grounds. Putting the grounds in the mash apparently comes close to the ideal coffee brewing temperature.
3. Adding a pot of coffee (or partial pot of strong stuff) to the boil.
4. Dry hopping with coffee beans. Strong risk of infection unless you personally just finished roasting the beans.

Method 1 worked the best for the coffee beers I've tried. I didn't personally try it but I've tried methods 2, 3 and 4. 1 was definitely the best taste-wise.

Putting beans in the mash is probably the easiest, but getting the amount right is tough. Coffee goes great in porters or stouts.

I've tried method 3 and it didn't turn out nearly as good as I would have wanted. Could barely smell or taste it in the brew, but the sharpness of it does cut through at warmer sampling temps.

Next time I attempt one I was actually thinking of doing something along the lines of method 1 or 4 you mentioned. Possibly adding sterilsed beans to a secondary and letting the beer age on them for a bit.

 

[boingk]

All this talk of coffee and espressos...might have to go and fire up my ultra-deluxe got-it-with-some-coffee plunger. Seriously, best little ripper of a 1-cupper ever and it was $5 with a 50g pack of coffee. Best I've got, anyway haha

I've heard adding instant coffee to the fermenter or the bottles themselves gives quite a good result, although amounts vary from a 6g measure-full per longneck to only a few teaspons per brew.

Cheers - boingk

 

[SJW]

GMK is the master of pantry brewing, pm him.

 

[peas_and_corn]

I made a heap of coffee with a drip peculator- with a bit over 200g of grounds. I condensed it down using the nasa and added it to the stout- it was a big stout so it needed a lot of coffee. Needless to say, it was crazy caffeinated (23L after all!)

 

[Sammus]

My original plan was to pull 10 doubles into a 21L batch, so about every 3 beers you would be having a single shot of espresso. It'd have to keep you up for a while lol.

Are there any paler beers that would suit these heavy coffee infusions? I think in small quantities it would be good for a party brew, and stout isn't something I can drink a lot of in one sitting

 

[Aaron]

I find Joe White Chocolate malt is a good way to get espresso flavours into a beer. Much easier than playing around with the real thing too. I find around 200gm in anything round 20l is normally a good amount. If you add a little black malt it will give that burnt flavour of a dark roast.