Brewing with Molasses

Hello everyone. I am looking to formulate a few recipes that utilizes molasses. One of my favourite imperial stouts, Howe Sound Brewing's Pot-Hole Filler, makes use of blackstrap molasses in their recipe.

So, my question is on what kind of recommendations are there for how much to use, what effect I can expect that it has on gravity/body, and when to add to the boil.

Thank very much.
Alex

A little molasses goes a long way. I used to use a pound of it in my imperial stout(10 gallons) but even that was too much for me. As a percentage of fermentables it was very small so the effect on gravity and body are minimal but the flavor is strong.
I would stick the jar into the mash after sparging to heat it up and make it pour better, and I added it late in the boil, stirring constantly so it didn't settle to the bottom and scorch.

Thanks.

I think I'll trial no more than 1/2lb in my 6gal recipe. Perhaps as low as a 1/4lb.

I haven't brewed with just molasses, but I did use dark brown sugar which contains a good amount of molasses in a RIS with good results, I used around it for about 9% of the grain bill.

ThisMeansWort said:

Thanks.

I think I'll trial no more than 1/2lb in my 6gal recipe. Perhaps as low as a 1/4lb.

Click to expand...

I vote for 4 oz. I've used 8 oz in a barley wine and it took a year to mellow.

david_42 said:

I vote for 4 oz. I've used 8 oz in a barley wine and it took a year to mellow.

Click to expand...

Right. This stout is not yet up to imperial proportions with significantly less ABV than a barleywine. I look forward to brewing this; I just need to put a dent in the current batch of stout that's taking up its share of the bottle stock. Thanks for the input.