Spice, Herb, or Vegetable Beer McAustin's Mocha Stout (w/cold-brewed coffee)

Had a very similar recipe for my last brew, gonna send off to a beer comp soon
No cold pressed coffee added but..
I added a handful of coffee beans, hops and oak chips in the primary (didn't transfer to secondary, so it was in there 4 weeks) and added .25 lb black patent and choc malt and reduced roasted barley to .25 and used 8.5 lbs light lme instead of 6lbs dark

Its a great beer it just doesn't fit any category well, I call it an extra stout farmhouse porter

My apologies for the noob question, but in the instructions when it lists:
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 13 (~66 deg)
Additional Fermentation: ~2 weeks aging in keg
Secondary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 14 (~66 deg)
Does that imply that the brew to glass time is just less then 6 weeks? 2 weeks primary, 2 weeks secondary, and 2 weeks keg?
Am I understanding this correctly?

I don't really subscribe to set time frames for beer to be ready to drink. I'd call those minimums really, but if it's ready before that, drink up.

I think beersmith had default values for the times that were defaulted to something real low (like a couple of days each or something) so I just changed it to ~2 weeks each. Give it more time to mellow if you add a lot of coffee.

Let me know how it turns out!

Austin

As the last few drops are coming out of my keg now I want to say how impressed I was with this recipe. It is a wonderful brew, thanks to the OP.
Next time I would cut down on the coffee and maybe increase the amount of cocoa nibs I used, but after some ageing in the keg the coffee is spot on so maybe not. I'm going to miss this one when its gone.

Cheers,

I brewed a recipe very similar to this. It was originally a chocolate milk stout that ended up a little too sweet, so I added a french press pitcher of coffee to secondary, along with some 60 min ekg hop tea.

Fantastic. This recipe is almost the same as mine. I made mine for my friend's mom's birthday this sat. I can tell this beer is going to be a real crowd pleaser.

this will be my first stout and next beer to brew. i will follow the recipe as is (extract)

can the cocoa be hershey's cocoa powder?

Man, I made this beer a little while ago... It was SUPER strong with the coffee and was kind of too bitter for me. A little too much going on.

I kinda left it alone for a few months and popped one open just now - it's tasty! To echo what a few others have said, this beer gets smoother with age. Other than me accidentally over-carbing it, I'd say this beer is a success! I'm gonna throw a bunch in the fridge right now

It's probably in some other threads on coffee+beer but surprised no one mentioned this here. Avoid the sludge with Toddy's method of cold brewing. It's soooo good... http://www.toddycafe.com/shop/product.php?productId=67

Basically is just a big plastic pitcher that you let the coffee sit in with water, a filter is in the bottom that you drain through when it's ready.

their step by step instructions http://www.toddycafe.com/customerservice/instructions.php

Brewing this one again today. I can't wait.

Okay, so I've got a minor problem here.

I walked out of the brew shop with 5lbs of Light DME, not 6lbs of Dark DME.

Given that the steeping grains are accurate, how would the change to 5lbs Light DME affect the beer?

Also, I've got a malt starter packet and some table sugar (ick!) that I can make up the missing lb of difference with. Is that worth it?

Roasty, save the Light DME for another style - using it would not result in a stout if I'm not mistaken.

I'm thinking of making this recipe with some minor variations. I do have questions though - what do you guys think of adding an additional 1 lb. of dark LME? Is 8 oz. of lactose enough to qualify this as a milk/sweet stout recipe? What is the advantage to use cocoa nibs over cocoa powder (if any)?

What effect will taking the lactose out have on the beer?

arnies said:

What effect will taking the lactose out have on the beer?

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it just wouldn't have the same creaminess to it or the mouthfeel that comes with that. it won't be ... well as "milky" i guess you would call the flavor/mouthfeel

cold brew coffee question,

how much water did you add to 1lb of coffee? Others have posted that the coffee absorbed the water leaving them with sludge.

I used 24 oz. of water to 0.5 lbs ground coffee. I filtered about half as much water out of the grounds so it did absorb a good bit. Maybe a courser grind would be better, but the coffee I did extract was perfect for my purposes.

From what I read, cold brewing coffee should be more of a syrup when the filter process is complete. This syrup is used in the format of shots for ice coffee. The syrup can be stored up to 2 weeks in the fridge. Hope this helps someone, I was lost on the whole "cold coffee" thing till I read it and it said in the form of syrup when filtered.

Hi mcaustin: would you be able to post an updated version of your extract recipe for the mocha stout? If I understand correctly you would now:

_ use cacao nibs instead of the cacao powder, if so, how much? Also, do I assume they would be steeped along with the grains, or are they part of the boil? If you stick with cacao powder, when is that incorporated?

_ possibly use less cold press coffee? How much less? I'm looking for a balance of chocolate and coffee flavors.

_ different hop schedule?

Thanks,
Andy,
Tucson, AZ

Cacao nibs are soaked in vodka for 24 hours then put in the secondary / end of primary for 5-7 days. They are put in a hop bag just as you would when you "dry hop". If you boil cacao nibs you get a bitter taste. I'm thinking 6-8oz of coffee cold brewed looks more like it. This is my thinking. I'm hoping to brew this recipe soon, waiting out my grain to come in.

shadows69 said:

Cacao nibs are soaked in vodka for 24 hours then put in the secondary / end of primary for 5-7 days. They are put in a hop bag just as you would when you "dry hop". If you boil cacao nibs you get a bitter taste. I'm thinking 6-8oz of coffee cold brewed looks more like it. This is my thinking. I'm hoping to brew this recipe soon, waiting out my grain to come in.

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Great, thanks! I made the mistake of only buying one bottle of New Belgium's Imperial Chocolate Coffee Stout when it came out, so I'm going to try my hand at cloning it. I'm still a partial extract brewer so I'm curious if I can even come close.

Any other advice would be greatly appreciated!

Just got done brewing this beer followed to a tee except added 1 lb. rice hulls. This is going to be a pretty big beer got a OG of 1.067. Now to figure out what coffee I want to use might let my wife decide that since I brewed it on her request.

Brewed this tonight with a few changes. Only had fuggles on hand so I used that instead. Also, I plan on steeping nibs in vodka to add the chocolate at bottling. Didn't have any lactose either so I am hoping I can boil it in a few cups of water and add to the primary. Any input on that?

I would take some of the already fermenting wort and boil that with lactose. I'm not sure how your going to add the nibs att bottling time? They are added at the last 5 days or so to the already fermenting wort in a straining bag to pull the flavor from the nibs.

shadows69 said:

I would take some of the already fermenting wort and boil that with lactose. I'm not sure how your going to add the nibs att bottling time? They are added at the last 5 days or so to the already fermenting wort in a straining bag to pull the flavor from the nibs.

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Yeah, I was going to soak the nibs in vodka for a few days to extract the flavor and then add the chocolate flavored vodka to taste.

I made a Stout based of this recipe, but with a few substitutions (list below if you care). The most noticeable was using Hazelnut flavoured coffee - I used about 6 oz, cold steeped in water for about a week. This produced 350ml of liquid coffee which I added at bottling. It smelled AWESOME going in. It's been in bottle for almost two weeks and I tried some the other day. A little to strong on the coffee, but I think that will drop away with some age.

Thanks for posting this base recipe!



0.5 lb Lactose (Milk Sugar) 41 1 5.7%
6.6 lb Liquid Malt Extract - Dark 35 30 75.4%
7.1 lb Total
Steeping Grains
Amount Fermentable PPG °L Bill %
0.55 lb American - Caramel / Crystal 60L 34 60 6.3%
0.55 lb American - Chocolate 29 350 6.3%
0.55 lb United Kingdom - Roasted Barley 29 550 6.3%
Hops
Amount Variety Type AA Use Time IBU
1 oz East Kent Goldings Pellet 5 Boil 60 min 13.3
1 oz Cascade Pellet 7 Boil 40 min 16.34
1 oz Cascade Pellet 7 Boil 15 min 9.24

8oz Pure Cocoa (5 min)
2 oz Vanilla Extract - Trader Joes (Secondary for a 7-10 days)

I know this is an older thread but can anyone tell me what vol of co2 I should be aiming for with this beer? Thanks.

Quick question - how would I back down the bitterness on this recipe? My wife wants a chocolate-coffee stout, and this looks like just the thing, but she doesn't want it too bitter. She's not a big beer drinker, and definitely not a hop head, but she tried a brew something like this at a brewery in Asheville, NC, and loved it. Since I started brewing this year, she's been after me to brew something like the on she had in Asheville.

You could use less bittering hops ( though that's probably not the bitter you mean), use less chocolate/roasted barley or you could use lactose and/or vanilla beans to sweeten it.

I went with the third option. Turned out well.

Wargoul said:

I know this is an older thread but can anyone tell me what vol of co2 I should be aiming for with this beer? Thanks.

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I think I aimed for 2.1 or so. Try using DME for priming, works great IMO.