first time brewing a stout; concerned about fermenting time and final gravity

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rnbwdrgn

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I am new to home brewing and wanted to try making a stout. I also changed the recipe. I used a kit for the basic stout. The kit only required adding boiling water to the malt extract and finishing with cold water before adding the yeast. In my recipe I added about a gallon of coffee and a 8oz can of hershey's special dark cocoa.

My concerns are that today seems to be the 14th day of fermenting. The original directions said that fermenting should be complete after 7-8 days. The directions also said that the final gravity should be below 1.014. I have checked the gravity M-W-and today and the gravity remains around 1.020.

Would adding the cocoa and coffee change the fermenting time and the final gravity?
 
I am new to home brewing and wanted to try making a stout. I also changed the recipe. I used a kit for the basic stout. The kit only required adding boiling water to the malt extract and finishing with cold water before adding the yeast. In my recipe I added about a gallon of coffee and a 8oz can of hershey's special dark cocoa.

My concerns are that today seems to be the 14th day of fermenting. The original directions said that fermenting should be complete after 7-8 days. The directions also said that the final gravity should be below 1.014. I have checked the gravity M-W-and today and the gravity remains around 1.020.

Would adding the cocoa and coffee change the fermenting time and the final gravity?

The gravity may or may not keep going. Don't worry about it if it stays put. 1.020 is only .006 away from 1.014, and it's not a uncommon place for extract brews to stop. I have an oatmeal stout recipe that never goes below 1.020, and it's a really good beer!

I don't know about the 8 ounces of cocoa, that seems like an awful lot but I'm no expert on that. I don't like chocolate, so I haven't used coccoa in my beer!
 
You can allow it to ferment for 2 to 4 weeks anyway, which will really improve your beer. You can pretty much disregard the kit instructions.

Welcome to the brewing world and all the best.

B
 
Thanks for the quick replies. One other thing I wanted to mention is that up until Tuesday or Wednesday of the past week there seemed to be enough gas pressure to move air out of the airlock. The last I time I timed the bubbling. There was about 1 bubble every minute. Now there's little to no air movement or water displacement/activity present in the airlock.
 
Thanks for the quick replies. One other thing I wanted to mention is that up until Tuesday or Wednesday of the past week there seemed to be enough gas pressure to move air out of the airlock. The last I time I timed the bubbling. There was about 1 bubble every minute. Now there's little to no air movement or water displacement/activity present in the airlock.

The airlock movement or the lack thereof means very little. Trust your hydrometer, and nothing else, to tell you when your beer is done.
 
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