Picked up an Irish Sweet Stout kit....

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
goodbyebluesky82

goodbyebluesky82

Well-Known Member
Joined
Sep 18, 2008
Messages
236
Reaction score
0
Location
Charlotte, NC
My brewstore packages up their own kits w/breiss dme, specialty grains and pellet hops. They are always cheaper than buying the ingredients "a la carte" and their "Irish Sweet Stout" was one of their rotating "15% off" specials this month and looked interesting to me. I've never been a fan of dry stout but if I could brew a sweeter/maltier version a little lower in bitterness I might become a stout convert. Its says its in the style of Mackeson's Stout.

Heres what I'm looking at:
6 lb. Dark DME
2 cups Choc Malt
2 cups Crystal Malt 120L
2 cups Roasted Barley
2 cups Flaked Barley
1 oz. Centennial @ 60 min
Dry Nottingham yeast

The target SG is 1.064+, and the FG 1.012-1.019
IBUs: 27

Unfortunately for me, they list their grains in "cups" and not by weight. For the sake of comparison I'm assuming that 2 cups= at least .5 lb or more, except for the lighter flaked barley. Altogether this big ol' bag of sealed grain weighs at least around 3-4 pounds.

Anybody have any opinions or criticisms? It appears it will be a very rick dark stout and moderate in bitterness being under 30 IBUs, am I correct?
 
Reverend JC said:
Is there any lactos? I think you might need some of that to make it a sweet stout.
Click to expand...

JC is right.

It is hard to really say what changes should be made to the recipe without knowing any of the weights of the grains. not to mention, it is all crushed and in a bag anyway.

So, adding a little lactose will sweeten it up
 
I'm having a hard time getting that OG from plugging ingredients into BeerSmith. With 6 lbs of Dark DME and 1 lb each of the other ingredients, I'm getting an OG Estimate of 1.056 for a extract w/ steeping grains.

That's sorta a lot of crystal 120L. Maybe the plan is to use the dark caramel sweet flavor from the crystal for the residual sweetness for the sweet stout.

This looks more like a combination of a Dry Stout and a RIS than a sweet stout. Looks interesting, but I wouldn't think it is a clone of Mackeson's XXX Stout. Lots of residual sweetness from the crystal malt along with raisin/plum flavors. Good amount of roast from the roasted barley and the chocolate malts. With 10% AA Centennial @ 60 minutes = 33 IBUs.

Let us know how it turns out.
 
mmb said:
This looks more like a combination of a Dry Stout and a RIS than a sweet stout. Looks interesting, but I wouldn't think it is a clone of Mackeson's XXX Stout. Lots of residual sweetness from the crystal malt along with raisin/plum flavors. Good amount of roast from the roasted barley and the chocolate malts. With 10% AA Centennial @ 60 minutes = 33 IBUs.

Let us know how it turns out.
Click to expand...

These Centennials are 8.6%, so thats what probably why yo9ur software calculated the IBUs at 33 and not the 27 the kit states.

I've never tried Mackeson's (or even seen it available) so I won't be disapointed if this differs. What you just described sounds quite nice to me. From experience sometimes my LHBS's commercial examples they cite are a bit off, but its more of a comparison than claiming to be a clone.

For those that suggested it, lactose would make this technically a cream stout, correct? My impression is this is supposed to be irish in style with plenty of big roasty flavors and body, but with some residual sweetness and maltier finish and not "dry" like dry stout (i.e. guinness, beamish), which I don't particularly care for. And the IBUs are lower as well.
 
goodbyebluesky82 said:
For those that suggested it, lactose would make this technically a cream stout, correct? My impression is this is supposed to be irish in style with plenty of big roasty flavors and body, but with some residual sweetness and maltier finish and not "dry" like dry stout (i.e. guinness, beamish), which I don't particularly care for. And the IBUs are lower as well.
Click to expand...

The style would be "sweet stout." They are also called milk stout or cream stouts historically because of the milk sugar, or lactose, added to make the finish sweet. Lactose is a non-fermentable sugar and stays sweet to the finish.

It doesn't HAVE to have lactose to be a sweet stout but it does need something to provide that sweet finish to be a sweet stout.

Of course, it doesn't really matter what the style is if you don't plan on entering competitions with it.
 
Hey again guys, I brewed this up and its almost reached its FG in well under a week.

The hydrometer sample I tasted today had a very strong roasted grain taste to it, very deep roasted. And I detected very little residual sweetness, not even the maltiness I was expecting. I'm not a real roasty bitter dry stout kind of guy. Some are, I'm just not.

So I am considering backsweeting this with lactose at bottling even though the kits recipe never called for it, what is an acceptable amount for a slight sweetness to hep bring out the malt? 4 oz.? 1/2 pound? I can just mix it with the priming sugar at bottling right?
 
Yes, you can do it at bottling and i would say somewhere between 2 to 4 oz depending on how sweet you want it.
 
Also keep in mind that flavor can and usually will change during conditioning. I've had beers go from thin and disappointing to full bodied and tasty in a week or two.
 
goodbyebluesky82 said:
My brewstore packages up their own kits w/breiss dme, specialty grains and pellet hops. They are always cheaper than buying the ingredients "a la carte" and their "Irish Sweet Stout" was one of their rotating "15% off" specials this month and looked interesting to me. I've never been a fan of dry stout but if I could brew a sweeter/maltier version a little lower in bitterness I might become a stout convert. Its says its in the style of Mackeson's Stout.

Heres what I'm looking at:
6 lb. Dark DME
2 cups Choc Malt
2 cups Crystal Malt 120L
2 cups Roasted Barley
2 cups Flaked Barley
1 oz. Centennial @ 60 min
Dry Nottingham yeast

The target SG is 1.064+, and the FG 1.012-1.019
IBUs: 27

Unfortunately for me, they list their grains in "cups" and not by weight. For the sake of comparison I'm assuming that 2 cups= at least .5 lb or more, except for the lighter flaked barley. Altogether this big ol' bag of sealed grain weighs at least around 3-4 pounds.

Anybody have any opinions or criticisms? It appears it will be a very rick dark stout and moderate in bitterness being under 30 IBUs, am I correct?
Click to expand...

This recipe went pretty well. I ended up using 1 pound of lactose at bottling, and tried the first one last night. Only 3 weeks in the bottle and its pretty dang good. Black and velvety, moderate roasted bitterness, minimal hop bitterness, slightly sweet flavor and malty finish, and no obvious off-flavors. Sweet success!
 

Similar threads

12PACFan
Irish stout feedback
Replies
16
Views
1K
youngdh
Y
mashdar
Chocowheat Dry Session Stout
Replies
0
Views
473
mashdar
mashdar
G
First Custom Grain Bill- Thoughts?
Replies
11
Views
1K
BrewnWKopperKat
BrewnWKopperKat
orgenomescii
Brewing like a Barbarian: Ancient Irish Descriptions of Malting & Brewing
Replies
2
Views
1K
McMullan
McMullan
P
Critique of oatmeal stout recipe
Replies
9
Views
1K
RyPA
RyPA
SSBrew 300

Latest posts

Back
Top