Amount of coffee for an RIS

Hi all,

My father-in-law and I are planning on starting an RIS this weekend. We did the same recipe last year (sort of a Yeti clone), and it was amazing! This year, we want to do it again, adding coffee, but aren't certain about amounts. It seems that most people add it at secondary, but with amounts varying widely. BYO posted a recipe online with 15 oz, while a recipe here on HBT called for only 4 oz.

Anyway, here's the base recipe. Any suggestions about how to get a good coffee aroma matched to the strength of this?

17 lbs 2-row pale.
1.5 lbs flaked wheat
0.75 lbs chocolate malt
0.75 lbs black patent.
0.62 lbs roasted barley
0.20 lbs molasses

Mash at 154degF for 60 min. Boil down to 5 gal., adding 1.5 oz Chinook at 60 min, another 1.5 oz at 15 min, and 1 oz. at flameout. Split batch into two carboys, giving each one packet of American Ale yeast. When the krauesen begins to die down, rack off the sediment into a single carboy. (I'm assuming this would be the time to add the coffee.)

For coffee beans, we're thinking of using Starbuck's Komodo Dragon roast.

Thanks for any advice!

-- Matt

Very interested in the answer to this.

I don't know that I'd add just the coffee beans, would think some of the oils and bitterness might lead to unwelcome results. A lot of people rave about doing a cold steep of their coffee in the fridge for 24 hours before pouring the liquid into the secondary/keg. Sadly I've not been able to get around to brewing one of my own, but might give you something else to think about.

Edit: Rereading, doesn't sound like you are planning on adding the beans, my bad . But yeah, the cold steeping thing.

Erik, thanks. What about amounts? Any recommendations there?

I've heard adding the coffee at bottling gets the best results. I've added a Lb of grinded coffee to the mash and was also pretty good. So its really your preference

I recently did a 1.060 Sweet Stout (it doesn't really compare to your recipe but here is what I did) and added coffee to it by taking 1L of distilled water, boiling for 15 min, cooled, added 4 oz (by weight) of ground coffee in a sanitized container, stirred, covered, and put in fridge for 24 hours. After this I ran the mixture thru a coffee filter (actually twice) and it yielded 2 cups of cold steeped coffee. I added this to 2.5 gallons at bottling and it scored a 39 at the Minnesota State Fair comp. Turned out great. Hopefully you can use this and kind of scale it accordingly for what you think will work for your recipe. Good Luck, Cheers!

I added very strong brewed coffee to a sweet stout at knock out - I think it was about 1 liter for a 5 gallon batch. The coffee flavor came through pretty well.

I am interested in this as well, I have a mocha stout in primary right now. I want to have the coffee flavor come out a bit and was thinking about 12oz of cold press would be good for my five gallon batch, but what others are suggesting here makes that sound like too little coffee.

Also, when I was doing research on this the one thing that seemed important was cold steeping. If you brew a batch in your coffee maker you will bring along more of the acidity and such which can leave off flavors. I did this with mine and was very happy but I know others have hot steeped too and they came out fine. Just my 0.02.

I was trying to do an Alesmith Speedway Stout clone. I talked to Alesmith and they use the equivalent of 22oz. in a 5 gal. batch. They added it right before bottling since it is easier to control. I tried it and it worked great!

ericnem said:

Also, when I was doing research on this the one thing that seemed important was cold steeping. If you brew a batch in your coffee maker you will bring along more of the acidity and such which can leave off flavors. I did this with mine and was very happy but I know others have hot steeped too and they came out fine. Just my 0.02.

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When you say cold steeping, do you mean just adding room temperature water to the coffee grounds? I have not tried this but I see what you mean about leaving behind the acidity.

Yeah cold-brewing. You use more coffee grounds and just leave it soaking overnight. It's really good for iced coffee in the mornings too .

Patirck said:

When you say cold steeping, do you mean just adding room temperature water to the coffee grounds? I have not tried this but I see what you mean about leaving behind the acidity.

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Yes, after boiling / cooling the water (to about room temp) I added the coffee grounds and then put in the refrigerator overnight.

I have found that 4oz of cold steeped coffee will give you a pronounced coffee flavor that most find overpowering. I have been brewing a malty, robust coffee porter that is strong on all counts, 8%. I use 2oz of cold steeped coffee at bottling and the coffee flavor is more balanced and not overpowering. IMHO the beer should be beer first, with coffee undertones, not just alcoholic coffee with beer undertones.

Mmm... alcoholic coffee

ksbrain said:

Mmm... alcoholic coffee

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Breakfast of Champions!

Certainly cure a hangover.

Calder said:

Breakfast of Champions!

Certainly cure a hangover.

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Sort of like 4 loco but doesn't taste like a$$!

Question: since cold steeping is essentially soaking ground coffee in cool -- cold/non-warm -- water for a period of time -- why not simply grind the beans and add to primary at the end of the fermentation?

In other words, why go through the hassle of steeping in cold water when you could steep the beans in the nearly-finished, cool beer still in the fermenter?

(I'm asking because I'm curious. I'm not seeing the difference between the two methods. Isn't the outcome is the same? Plus, it'd save the hassle of boiling water, steeping in the fridge, filtering, etc etc. Filtering out at bottling is easy enough.)

Essentially, you're dry-hopping with ground coffee.

You could do that, but I feel that it is easier to filter a pint of cold steeped coffee over filtering 5+ gallons of beer. But go ahead and try it and report back on your results.

I've had good luck with adding 4oz of Whole Beans to the Secondary in my Robust Porter. This is the only method I have ever used so I don't have anything to compare it to. I think 3-4 days is the optimum time to leave them in there, anything longer and it can become harsh and will take time to mellow. The coffee in my Porter is very forward, So I think 4oz would work well in a big beer as well, it would be more of an undertone than in your face.

2-4 oz cold brewed! Sounds great, thanks!

So Yankee, you just threw the beans in intact, that would explain why you did not get stronger coffee flavor. I believe that cold steeping ground beans gives off a lot more flavor, hence I caution everyone to start with less and work your way up to more. It also depends on what type of coffee bean you use. I found that a medium roast was better then a dark roast for keeping the coffee flavor in balance.

Snowhere said:

So Yankee, you just threw the beans in intact, that would explain why you did not get stronger coffee flavor. I believe that cold steeping ground beans gives off a lot more flavor, hence I caution everyone to start with less and work your way up to more. It also depends on what type of coffee bean you use. I found that a medium roast was better then a dark roast for keeping the coffee flavor in balance.

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Yeah I throw them in whole, but I do get a strong Coffee flavor.

Snowhere said:

I have found that 4oz of cold steeped coffee will give you a pronounced coffee flavor that most find overpowering. I have been brewing a malty, robust coffee porter that is strong on all counts, 8%. I use 2oz of cold steeped coffee at bottling and the coffee flavor is more balanced and not overpowering. IMHO the beer should be beer first, with coffee undertones, not just alcoholic coffee with beer undertones.

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I did something similar in a robust porter and agree with you. I used 2.5 OZ of a light roast coarsely crushed beans and it was about perfect for a coffee stout. In a beer that I just wanted coffee undertones I would use less 1.5-2oz nothing more.

I just placed the crushed beans in the secondary in a weighted down hop bag for a week, then bottled.

Oceanslider said:

I was trying to do an Alesmith Speedway Stout clone. I talked to Alesmith and they use the equivalent of 22oz. in a 5 gal. batch. They added it right before bottling since it is easier to control. I tried it and it worked great!

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so you added 22oz of hot brewed coffee from your coffee maker at bottling? please let me know, i'm trying to do an alesmith clone .. do u have a recipe?

thanks!

I just picked upon this thread.

I have a Brett Brown/Porter brewing right now that I am planning on adding vanilla and Cocoa to. After reading this thread, I'm wondering what a touch of coffee would do to it too.

If I just tossed a couple of ounces of fresh ground beans in, would that give me some coffee notes, and would the grounds eventually sink to the bottom. The beer will be in secondary for about 8 weeks.

It is a 7 gallon batch.

Calder said:

I just picked upon this thread.

I have a Brett Brown/Porter brewing right now that I am planning on adding vanilla and Cocoa to. After reading this thread, I'm wondering what a touch of coffee would do to it too.

If I just tossed a couple of ounces of fresh ground beans in, would that give me some coffee notes, and would the grounds eventually sink to the bottom. The beer will be in secondary for about 8 weeks.

It is a 7 gallon batch.

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I don't know that grounds would sink, I'm kind of doubting that they would. I would go with either putting them in whole or slightly crushed/cracked. You could also cold steep some coffee overnight. A lot of people report good success with that method. If you go with the whole method, I would suggest putting them in there for 3-5 days depending on how much coffee flavor you want, maybe even less if you just want a slight flavor.

They will sink I make a breakfast stout clone and just dumped a ton of coffee in the secondary.. After a month or two they all sunk to the bottom

Regulation said:

They will sink I make a breakfast stout clone and just dumped a ton of coffee in the secondary.. After a month or two they all sunk to the bottom

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Out of curiosity, how strong is the Coffee Flavor?

For a breakfast stout I add in about 6oz of cold pressed coffee at flameout, and then another 6oz of cold pressed coffee at bottling (5 gallon batch). The coffee flavor comes across beautifully.

I think the best method is to add small amounts of cold brew to your bottling bucket until it tastes right to you. No guess work that way. I added 12 oz to 2.5 gallons at which point I could detect a faint coffee flavor. The other half I left alone so I had 2 different porters!