Black barley in Bock

I put together a recipe for a PM Bock (5.5 gal):

8 lbs Munich LME (split between early and late)
2 lbs light Munich malt
1.5 lbs Caramel 20L
4 oz Melanoidin
25 IBU of Hallertauer Mittelfrüh

I just noticed that this comes out to a color of about 11 SRM, too light for the BJCP Traditional Bock guidelines. Normally I'd be fine with the minor style violation, but I'm doing a Doppelbock now and will do a Maibock after the Bock, so I'd like to keep the color progression intact.

I have some black roasted barley lying around from a previous batch, and 1-1.5 oz of this should put the color around 14 SRM, around the low end for bocks. According to the BJCP guidelines, some dark roasted malt for color adjustment is allowed, but no non-malt adjuncts should be used.

How big a "violation" would it be to go ahead with the tiny color adjustment? I know that roasted barley and barley malt are different, but with < 1.5 oz, is it going to be noticeable? I'd prefer to use a malt addition to hit the color, but it's not worth placing an order for a few oz of malt. There's no nearby LHBS, but I'll be near one next weekend, so I could pick it up then, but that'd mean delaying this brew by at least two weeks.

So I guess I wonder whether you'd (a) break style and use an ounce of black barley; (b) wait an extra couple weeks to get some dark malt; or (c) just run with the out-of-style color.

Violation???????

Are you serious?????

It is YOUR beer. If YOU will be drinking it, do what you want, I personally would jump on that variation.

If a bunch of Franciscan MONKS will recieve your beer and put you to death if it is out of style, then you are SCREWED.

Free your mind my friend. Free your mind. Make a new style.

Oh, I should have said, I absolutely agree with you. I have not made many beers strictly to style---my bitter was dry hopped, my stout had centennial hops (before I knew that American Stout was a recognized style), my Kölsch was seriously bitter, etc.

In this case, though, I'd like to stay close to the style on the first try. That's why I'm curious---if (as I suspect) it's going to be a minor flavor change, then I'm going to go ahead. If it's going to make it into something that would somehow jump out as "not a Bock" then I'll reconsider. I don't have a sense for how much acrid flavor would be carried by an ounce of black barley that might not be in, e.g., a dark crystal malt.

It wouldn't be a BIG flavor change.....Probably not at all. Just for color eh?

Hope so. I think I'm probably going to go with it. Beats food coloring.

Or de-bittered black malt.

Reading Gordon Strong's "Brewing Better Beer" gave me an idea. He suggests cold steeping as an alternative to mashing dark grains to avoid extracting too much roastiness. So I'm going to cold steep 1.5 oz of black roasted barley in about 400 mL of water. Tomorrow, shortly before pitching yeast, I'm going to boil it for a few minutes and "pitch" the extract.

Your attention to detail is good!

When they say not to use non-malt adjuncts for color adjustment, I'm pretty sure they mean don't use artificial food coloring - Sinamar is malt-derived agent used solely to add color to beer and is considered perfectly acceptable (because Sinamar is malt derived, it is in compliance with the German Beer Purity Law)

Right, but roast barley is not a malt, so (at least according to Wikipedia), it's no longer compliant with the German Beer Purity Law (though it was ok for the original Reinheitsgebot).

I'm not really concerned about that, though, I'm just trying to avoid roasty / acrid flavors. I'm fairly sure that I'd have been fine mashing it, but I was curious to try the cold steep as well.

Just had SA winter lager, a wheat bock. Very Nice.

That's one of my all-time favorite beers, and easily my favorite in the Sam Adams stable. Not exactly sure why, but I always get excited when it hits the shelves. Just realized last week that they call it a bock.

But your point about the wheat is well taken

Get some Sinamar. Perfect for color without flavor.

zeg said:

Right, but roast barley is not a malt, so (at least according to Wikipedia), it's no longer compliant with the German Beer Purity Law (though it was ok for the original Reinheitsgebot).

I'm not really concerned about that, though, I'm just trying to avoid roasty / acrid flavors. I'm fairly sure that I'd have been fine mashing it, but I was curious to try the cold steep as well.

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Well, you could always just steep a dehusked black/chocolate malt like Carafa Special which have little of the roasty/astringent flavors of typical deeply kilned malts/barley due to the dehusking process.

I would just get some Sinamar Extract myself though. Sinamar is derived from Carafa Special malts, has no flavor to speak of and its only purpose is to provide relatively flavorless coloring adjustment in beer. The actual amount of Sinamar you'd need to get those extra three degrees SRM is pretty inconsequental, plus you can 'fine tune' the color to get exactly where want by using Sinamar since you don't have to rely on calculations that its going to be a specific color - just add it slowly until you reach the color you want.

Thanks for the suggestions. However, the reason for using the black barley is simply that I had it available and don't have a homebrew shop closer than about a 100-mile round trip. Ordinarily, I simply tune my grain / extract bill to hit the right color range. This time, I was switching between brewing software and converted the recipe over assuming I'd already fine-tuned it.

The cold steep seems to have worked. The barley extract didn't taste like something I'd want to drink a lot of, but it was mostly just barley flavor with a "dark" (maybe coffee-like) overtone. It didn't taste astringent or roasty, even pure, so I'm sure it's going to fit within the flavor profile if it has any effect at all.

in my last big winter bock i wanted a bit of dark fruit flavor, which i got from special b, and a little darker color to go along with it, for that i used (dehusked) carafa special II; 100 g in 20 L, added just before mashout. the beer is chestnut brown, came out great. well, still lagering but already tastes great. not really any roast, certainly no burnt flavors. my &#8364;0.02 anyways

Awesome, sounds like a similar approach to what I did. Glad to hear it worked! I'm looking forward to seeing the color---since I added the black extract to the fermenter just before pitching yeast, I didn't get to see its effect in my OG sample.

zeg said:

Awesome, sounds like a similar approach to what I did. Glad to hear it worked! I'm looking forward to seeing the color---since I added the black extract to the fermenter just before pitching yeast, I didn't get to see its effect in my OG sample.

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You didn't boil it?

I cold-steeped it for 24 hours, then strained and boiled it for 5 minutes to sanitize.

zeg said:

I cold-steeped it for 24 hours, then strained and boiled it for 5 minutes to sanitize.

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Cool...thanks!

i like the shock followed by relief! we're just looking out for each other!

Indeed.

It's also good to be clear for future readers. I certainly don't want someone searching for advice to stumble upon my post and conclude that pouring cold steeped black barley liquor right into the fermentor is a good practice!

Update: took a hydro sample today and started raising the temperature for a diacetyl rest. There is not even the slightest hint of roastiness, and the color is great.

Right now there's some definite diacetyl, though! I've not encountered this before, but there's no question about it. It's not unpleasant, but it currently overwhelms the maltiness on the finish.