Stout For Winter

[Joel Mcleod]

G'day
Just made my first all extract brew. I started with a stout recipe & would appreciate to hear some feed back as to what I could do differently next time:
- 1.5 kg Coppers Dark LME Hops: 14g Super Alpha Hops 60mins
- 1 kg Morgans Chocalate LME 14g Fuggles 45mins
- 250g roasted Barley (steeped for 60mins) 14g Fuggles 15mins
- 200g crystal malt (steeped for 60mins)
- 500g Dried Light Malt
- 250g Brown surgar

Boiled 4.5L water & added coppers & morgans LME (60mins)
Aded DME & brown surgar (45mins)
Added grains to another pot & brought to the boil (kept temp under 70 degrees or It was just too hot putting my finger in water)
Boiled hops in seperate pot
OG 1050
FG 1018
It's been 27 days & I still havent bottled it!!!
If the fermenter is air lock does this matter??

Any feed back would be great

Cheers.

 

[manticle]

I think it looks pretty good but the hops look a little light on. I've never used super alpha and the name suggests they're pretty full on so maybe they make up the balance? What's the aa%

Were the hops boiled in plain water or in a mix of malt and water because hop extraction can be influenced by gravity of boiling liquid.

Are you going for a milk, dry or imperial or a blend?

Roast Barley is a great addition to stout.

Leaving for a good wack of time shouldn't matter. Have a little taste and see where it's at. It might be a good time to crash chill or fine. Leave a couple more days then bottle.

 

[Phoney]

Looks a bit light all round for my liking.

Im about to put this on, tonight as soon as the better half has finished dinner.

0.34kg LME
3.00kg Coopers Light LME
0.34kg Caramel/Crystal Malt -120L
0.28kg Roasted Barley
0.17kg Chocolate Malt
45g Perle
14g Styrian Goldings
1.00 tsp Irish Moss
0.60 kg Brown Sugar, Dark

Steep the crystal, roasted barley & chocolate malt in 3.8L @ 67C for 20mins
Sparge with 2L, then toss the grain dregs
Bring water to boil, remove from heat and add Coopers Light LME, LDME, Dark brown sugar.
Add water until total volume = 9L
Boil for 45 mins then add Styrian Goldings and Irish Moss
Boil for 15 mins, remove from stove, cool for 15 mins.
pour into fermenter and add cold water up until 19L

Pitch Safale US-04

OG: 1.068
FG: 1.017
ABV: 6.6

 

[manticle]

Looks a bit light all round for my liking.

A single tin of black malt LME would fix that up. I wouldn't call 1050 light even though I like thick stouts starting above 1070.

 

[Joel Mcleod]

I think it looks pretty good but the hops look a little light on. I've never used super alpha and the name suggests they're pretty full on so maybe they make up the balance? What's the aa%

Were the hops boiled in plain water or in a mix of malt and water because hop extraction can be influenced by gravity of boiling liquid.

Are you going for a milk, dry or imperial or a blend?

Roast Barley is a great addition to stout.

Leaving for a good wack of time shouldn't matter. Have a little taste and see where it's at. It might be a good time to crash chill or fine. Leave a couple more days then bottle.

Super Alpha has aa 10.3%
Fuggles aa 4.8%

The only reason I used Super Alpha hops was because the local brew shop hasn't got a very good range of hop varieties. I knew I needed a high aa% hop so I went for the highest available. Alpha hops impart a crisp clean flavour and also has some nice resin character.



I boiled the hops in 500mL of water & 200g of DME. In what way are the hops influenced?



I guess I was going for a blend



I tried the brew last night & it definitely has a chocolate aroma to it. It has a good mouth feel & a strange earthy dry hop at the back end. Time will tell.

 

[Joel Mcleod]

Looks a bit light all round for my liking.

Im about to put this on, tonight as soon as the better half has finished dinner.

0.34kg LME
3.00kg Coopers Light LME
0.34kg Caramel/Crystal Malt -120L
0.28kg Roasted Barley
0.17kg Chocolate Malt
45g Perle
14g Styrian Goldings
1.00 tsp Irish Moss
0.60 kg Brown Sugar, Dark

Steep the crystal, roasted barley & chocolate malt in 3.8L @ 67C for 20mins
Sparge with 2L, then toss the grain dregs
Bring water to boil, remove from heat and add Coopers Light LME, LDME, Dark brown sugar.
Add water until total volume = 9L
Boil for 45 mins then add Styrian Goldings and Irish Moss
Boil for 15 mins, remove from stove, cool for 15 mins.
pour into fermenter and add cold water up until 19L

Pitch Safale US-04

OG: 1.068
FG: 1.017
ABV: 6.6

Whats the irish moss do for the stout?
Would u know of any other hops good for a stout?
Your recipe seems pretty precise. Have you got a programe or is that what you came up with?

 

[manticle]

Irish moss clarifies the wort. I'm not 100 % but I think it drops the proteins out or something. Even though it's a dark beer it can still be clear.

As for the hops and water question - I believe the best extraction happens when the boiling liquid has some kind of gravity. Water has a gravity of 0 theoretically so you need to add sugars to it to up the gravity. 100gDME in 1L water = 1040.
There's some really knowledgeable brewers here and some great advice and articles in the wiki section. I'm just learning so I'm really muddling through.

For developing recipes you can use beersmith or promash (both purchasable software but beersmith has a demo version) or beer recipator (www.beerrecipator.org) which is an easy to use, free online spreadsheet.

There are also recipe databases on here, beer recipator and http://beerrecipes.org

 

[bradsbrew]

Would u know of any other hops good for a stout?

Mate Ive been getting some good results using POR, Newport and EKG, Fuggles in recent stouts.

Cheers Brad

 

[Swinging Beef]

All hops taste good in a stout.
I once made a tasty extract stout with the same two cans you used, but also a bag of LDME.
I used Halertau hops because that is what i had.
Very delicious.

I reckon your recipe looks good, but think you prolly should have chucked the hops in to the full boil.
Stgill... live and learn, mate.

 

[daniel78]

Well I'm in the same boat! I brewed my first all-extract brew on the weekend. But I have serious doubts about how it's going to go. It's a combo of several recipes/suggestions. I'd love some thoughts as to how this might go. It went like this:

150g roast barley
150g chocolate malt
150g rolled oats
150g crystal malt
(Steeped the above, then strained/sparged and mixed with the following

1.5 kg liquid light malt
2 x 1kg bags dry amber malt extract
Started boil, with 30g East Kent hops @start of boil.

Added another 30g at 30 mins

Added another 15g at end of boil.

I then cooled it and threw it in the fermenter with a Country Brewer Ale Yeast (dry), and filled to 21L. The OG was 1075! which freaked me out because I was expecting lower! (It was about 1090 before I added more water...)

Two days into fermentation I added a double shot of espresso coffee.

Am I insane/have I wasted my time and money?....

 

[KingPython]

I think the oats (edit: fixed) needed to be mashed with some base malt and you should of held back on the amber extract. You'll get something, I wouldn't fuss too much though. It will be very sweet though.

 

[brettprevans]

Daniel78

re recipe
- looks fine although the oats need to be mashed rather than steeped. no harm though.
- maybe a little light on the bittering hops. but ok

OG, FG
- I only make an OG of ~1064 and a FG of 1019 with the 3.5kg of fermentables youve got and @21L. thats about 6.6%
- the temp of the wort might thave thrown the reading.
- what was your final volume?

re coffee
- you might find that a bit strong. theres a couple of threads on adding coffee/expresso to stouts on AHB. do a search.

if worst come to worst and its undrinkable straight away, you let it age for say 6 months and it should even out.

you should be ok.


edit:

I think those grains (except the crystal) needed to be mashed with some base malt and you should of held back on the amber extract. You'll get something, I wouldn't fuss too much though. It will be very sweet though.

your wrong KP. all are ok to be steeped except oats. roast barley, choc and crystal are completely fine for steeping.

 

[brendo]

Well I'm in the same boat! I brewed my first all-extract brew on the weekend. But I have serious doubts about how it's going to go. It's a combo of several recipes/suggestions. I'd love some thoughts as to how this might go. It went like this:

150g roast barley
150g chocolate malt
150g rolled oats
150g crystal malt
(Steeped the above, then strained/sparged and mixed with the following

1.5 kg liquid light malt
2 x 1kg bags dry amber malt extract
Started boil, with 30g East Kent hops @start of boil.

Added another 30g at 30 mins

Added another 15g at end of boil.

I then cooled it and threw it in the fermenter with a Country Brewer Ale Yeast (dry), and filled to 21L. The OG was 1075! which freaked me out because I was expecting lower! (It was about 1090 before I added more water...)

Two days into fermentation I added a double shot of espresso coffee.

Am I insane/have I wasted my time and money?....

Mostly looks good to me... the grains you used (with the exception of the oats) are all fine for steeping. The oats require a mash, so most likely they have only really contributed starch.

adding the coffee certainly suggests that you went all out with your first extract. i don't think you need to worry too much, I am sure it will turn out to be a somewhat interesting, but good beer.

Cheers,

Brendo

edit: what CM2 said... too quick for me at this time of day...

 

[manticle]

Even when I use specialty grains I use a mashing process since they're so alike anyway.

Roast Barley will give you a nice coffee like flavour. In fact it gives such a lovely coffee flavour you can probably do away with the espresso next time. Sweet stout is still nice and the coffee and roast barley flavours will help balance it.

With such a high OG you may want to think about pitching another yeast early on. Someone more experienced may tell me I'm wrong. If I am, please do.

That is - if your initial OG of 1075 is correct - 1061 may not be worth worrying.

 

[KingPython]

Yep I was wrong, wrong. The oats are the only thing that needed to be mashed.

 

[manticle]

Mashing them is good practice for later though.

 

[Phoney]

Whats the irish moss do for the stout?
Would u know of any other hops good for a stout?
Your recipe seems pretty precise. Have you got a programe or is that what you came up with?

Manticle answered the Q re: the Irish Moss...
Well the original recipe said to use 37g of Pride of Ringwood, but Perle is just as suitable so I went with that. BTW I forgot to add that I added the Perle hops in before for the 45min boil. :excl: The Dark Brown sugar was my variation too. It said to use cane sugar. It also said to use Wyeast 1084 or Wyeast 1098, but I thought id keep it simple for my first extract & go with a dry yeast (US-04)

No, I got the recipe out of a book. Not sure which one as all I have is a photocopied page that my LHBS gave me! It's a Coopers Best Extra Stout clone.

But I do have beersmith & I entered the recipe in there to get the gravity...

FG was actually 1070 and 5 days in it's now down to 1030 & tasting pretty damn good!

From the hydrometer sample vial it seemed to be very gritty though! I think it's the hops pellets and the irish moss, I ended up with "bits" in my mouth. I hope they dont end up in the final product..!

 

[daniel78]

Mostly looks good to me... the grains you used (with the exception of the oats) are all fine for steeping. The oats require a mash, so most likely they have only really contributed starch.

adding the coffee certainly suggests that you went all out with your first extract. i don't think you need to worry too much, I am sure it will turn out to be a somewhat interesting, but good beer.

Cheers,

Brendo

edit: what CM2 said... too quick for me at this time of day...

Thanks for that. Being new to anything other than kits, I'm still not sure what you mean by mashing the oats, but I can research that. I think it's to do with holding them at a specific temp for a set period of time? I didn't do that with my grains. I just put them in cold water and brought them to a near boil and then let them steep (off heat) for a little. The espresso was probably overkill (I tasted some from the hydrometer yesterday and felt like I needed a TimTam to go with it!...

As for pitching another yeast, someone let me know if that's wise. When you say the oats only contributed starch, is starch a bad thing?

 

[brettprevans]

mashing v steeping. it the differance between what you have to do to grains to get the sugar convertion.

mashing is what all grainers do (and partials etc). yes mashing is basicly holding the grains at a specific temp for at least 60 min. you get differant types of mashing with temp variations and rest periods etc but thats a long way from here.

look up steeping and mashing. read a few books like Palmer's how to brew and a few of the newbie guides on AHB and youll be right.

oh and re steeping. only bring your temp up to 70C or so. dont boil the grain. you can extract tannins from the grain which make the beer bitter and astringent.

edit:
re yeast. it depends on your original gravity. if its really high (which i dont think it was) then yes. but in your case i think your fine.

re oats: oats give a nice creamy oilyness to beers. increased mouthfeel etc etc. lovely in stouts. but you have to mash them. look at 'cereal mash' for info on mashing cereal type ingredients, oats, barley, corn, rice etc etc.

 

[Ronin]

re oats: oats give a nice creamy oilyness to beers. increased mouthfeel etc etc. lovely in stouts. but you have to mash them. look at 'cereal mash' for info on mashing cereal type ingredients, oats, barley, corn, rice etc etc.

I'm pretty sure I've read you can just chuck instant oats straight into the mash, no need for a seperate cereal mash. At least I'm planning on trying that in a few weeks, last time I did a cereal mash, and while it's not too time consuming I like the idea of ust chucking in some breakfast cereal

James