My stout isnt black!

I made a sweet stout that is cooling down and about ready to pitch. I had about 3.5 gal of wort and it was a very very dark brown, almost black, but not quite black. i imagine once i add water it will be even less dark. will it get darker with time or is there something i can do to darken it up? here is the recipe

steep grains at about 160 for 50 mins
1/4 lb roasted barley
1/2 lbs 60L crystal malt
3/4 lb chocolate malt
1/4 lb black patent(changed to something else i dont remember. the man at the lhbs suggested it as a substitute bc it was less bitter)

9 lbs light lme
1 oz kent golding bittering
1 oz kent goldings flavor

I want an opaque black.

grrtt78 said:

9 lbs light lme

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Why light? Why not Amber?

All those grains should give you a dark hue. What color is it?

i origionally planned amber but the guy at the brew store said light im not sure y. its dark its just not black.

How did you cook the grains? Did you sparge them?

i just heated them in about a half gallon of water for fifty minutes at 150 degrees. i poured the water in the brewpot and squeezed out the rest from the grain bag. i have another post right now asking how to properly sparge grains. lol

My stouts have a pound of roasted barley and a pound of chocolate in them and are quite black. How black?


None more black.

will it get darker than it was in the brewpot? if not can i make it darker somehow?

grrtt78 said:

will it get darker than it was in the brewpot?

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No.

grrtt78 said:

if not can i make it darker somehow?

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I wouldn't bother with it. Let this one go as is, and do better next time. If you REALLY feel the need to darken your brew, steep another 1/2-3/4 lb of roasted barley in 1/2 gallon of water. Use that same water to rinse (sparge). Rinse it 3 or 4 times with that water. Add that to the fermenter.

Taste it before adding anything - roasted barley is real easy to overdo (as are all dark grains).

the_bird said:

Taste it before adding anything - roasted barley is real easy to overdo (as are all dark grains).

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And take that advice.

yea i will probably leave this one as is i was just wondering why it didnt get to be black. i thought i added more than enough dark grains to make it black. also anyone know why i was told to use light extract instead of amber?

could it be lighter bc i steeped in a small amount of water and added taht to a large amount of water?

Generally, you buy light extract because it is more versatile - if you have some left over (or if you buy in bulk), you can use it in anything.

As to the color, it seems that you should have been pretty close. A little more roasted barley or chocolate (like, another quarter pound) might have gotten you there. The real question, though, is what was subbed for the black patent. BP os VERY dark, small amounts give a lot of color, so subbing that ought might have made a big difference. I like a little BP in my stouts, FWIW.

grrtt78 said:

could it be lighter bc i steeped in a small amount of water and added taht to a large amount of water?

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Doubtful, unless you steeped in a very small amount of water and didn't sparge. How small is small?

about a gallon

Make sure your grain bag is big enough to allow the grains to separate a bit so they can steep well.

If they get too packed together, then you won't extract as much from them.

dark DME makes dark beers. Light DME makes lighter beers.

Yes, when I made my stout, I used dark LME, which helped a lot with the color. Of course, I somehow got away with using 1/2lb of Black Patent, which really darkened it up a lot. Luckily, the beer is quite tasty despite that. Not having BP in a stout means you need a lot of other dark malts to make up the difference.

Adrian Abascal said:

dark DME makes dark beers. Light DME makes lighter beers.

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Light extract makes ALL beers, it's the grains that give most of the color.

The low volume might have hurt how much you extracted from the grains. No reason, when steeping, to not steep with the full amount that you'll be boiling. If you do a 2.5 gallon boil, you can steep in 2.5 gallons, you don't have to worry about whether you are "too thin" like you do if you're doing a mash. That, and it doesn't sound like you rinse the grains, might be the reason for generally poor extraction (of both color and flavor, likely).

Making sure your grain bag is sufficiently large is another good suggestion.

the_bird said:

Making sure your grain bag is sufficiently large is another good suggestion.

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Rice hulls help. They're cheap, and they really allow for great drainage.

i use an electric stove so it takes me a while to get me 3.5 or so gallons to boil. can i steep in the 3.5 gallons at about 150 or so and then when they are done turn up the heat? it would take probably twenty minutes to get up to a boil. would that be bad?

Looks like a lot more dark grain than I use and my stouts are coal black.
you did have those grains crushed, didn't you?

Oh and how are you measuring the colour? If you are eyeballing it in a small container
it may not be as dark as it will be in a glass or bottle, etc.

Also check the Lovibond rating of your roasted barley. I (and BOSTON) recently made stouts that turned out brown-porter-ish due to the fact that our LHBS sells roasted barley of 350L instead of 500-600L.

You did have the grains cracked... Right?

yea they cracked them for me at my lhbs

boo boo said:

Looks like a lot more dark grain than I use and my stouts are coal black.
you did have those grains crushed, didn't you?

Oh and how are you measuring the colour? If you are eyeballing it in a small container
it may not be as dark as it will be in a glass or bottle, etc.

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Yeah I was actually thinking around these same lines. This should be pretty darn dark.