Winter Stout-ish

[Dementedchook]

Well, at the moment the fermenter is empty. This being a somewhat unreasonable condition, I've been thinking about a stoutish beer for winter. Now I havn't really tried too many stouts (Guinness for a bottle, which I thought very...bland, coopers, which I thought was a little bit too roasty/burnt for my taste, and young's double chocolate, which was more or less dessert in a bottle), but I do have a rough idea where I want to head.
Currently, my brewing skills are more or less extract + steeping (haven't done it yet, but I'm sure it's nice and easy).
I'm thinking of basing it around a can of coopers stout, with DME, steeped grains, and use of the approx. 4/5 of a can of Morgans caramalt blend I've got sitting in the freezer, along with hops.
I'm aiming for a dessert type of feel, caramel, vanilla maybe, chocolate flavor, definitely quite "chewy", not very bitter. I'm also open to suggestions such as appropriate hops, seeing as I'm pretty new to the beer world. High alcohol content is something I can live with, but not really what I'm aiming for. Prefer a 23L batch size, which I'm sure will ensure it'll be venturing out the airlock.

 

[Nick JD]

1.5kg x 2 Coopers Light Malt Extract Cans
200g Carafa 3 steeped for 30 minutes @ hot tap temp in 3L water.
20g Pacific Jade boiled for 45 minutes in steep water (once 30 min is up) with 200g sugar.

Extras:
30ml vanilla essence
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 tbsp powdered ginger
10g coffee (ground beans)

Dissolve cans of goop with the steep boil (all the "extras" added in boil). Will be about 2L by the time the 45 minutes are up.

Top up to 23L and add yeast.

 

[bum]

Isn't there a well regarded Coopers stout toucan popularised by a modest little wallflower about these parts?

 

[Dementedchook]

1.5kg x 2 Coopers Light Malt Extract Cans
200g Carafa 3 steeped for 30 minutes @ hot tap temp in 3L water.
20g Pacific Jade boiled for 45 minutes in steep water (once 30 min is up) with 200g sugar.

Extras:
30ml vanilla essence
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 tbsp powdered ginger
10g coffee (ground beans)

Dissolve cans of goop with the steep boil (all the "extras" added in boil). Will be about 2L by the time the 45 minutes are up.

Top up to 23L and add yeast.

That looks good, what's it taste like? And why they 200g sugar? Is it to get a little more alcohol?

 

[manticle]

I'd recommend a milk stout - make it strong and thick using the can/s and dme (go pale), use a small amount of fuggles in a 10 minute boil, small amount of crystal and choc grains and 500g lactose. 2 coopers tins will give a high bitterness so you could replace 1 tin with a milder tin or even with your amber plus another tin of pale extract plus pale dme.

Split a couple of vanilla pods into the boil (scrape the seeds out - that's where the flavour lies). If you can buy pods in a store other than the supermarket, that's good. Vanilla pods are usually expensive but the price you pay for the weedy bits of twig you buy in Coles is ridiculous. Get some big fat juicy moist ones from a market - then the expense at least seems a bit worth it. Second bet get natural vanilla extract - don't be tempted to use essence.

You can make it sweeter using liquorice extract (haven't tried that myself). Cocoa and coffee both work in a stout although I find you get those flavours (and more integrated) by using choc malt and roast barley.

 

[Nick JD]

That looks good, what's it taste like? And why they 200g sugar? Is it to get a little more alcohol?

Tastes great!

For the hop boil the bitterness comes out better if the boil water is sugary. Opening a can and pouring out 200g of goo is fraught with gooey disaster (for me anyway - always get goo on everything). LDME would be just as easy instead of sugar.

Manticle - the vanilla escence I use is not vanillin, but an extract of the pods. I just call it escence. I like your idea of going fresh vanilla though - must try it.

 

[manticle]

Tastes great!

For the hop boil the bitterness comes out better if the boil water is sugary. Opening a can and pouring out 200g of goo is fraught with gooey disaster (for me anyway - always get goo on everything). LDME would be just as easy instead of sugar.

Manticle - the vanilla escence I use is not vanillin, but an extract of the pods. I just call it escence. I like your idea of going fresh vanilla though - must try it.

There's some extract pastes and so on that have a good flavour. It's the essence in a bottle stuff I don't like - possibly due to the overshadowing of a reasonably delicate flavour with strong alcohol. That might not show up in the stout though, I'm not sure.