How does this stout sound?

Greetings all,

I originally was going to do a porter but have gone to the darker side and decided to do a stout. Yeah, thats right, i like rich dark beers in the summer. anyways, onto the recipe..

5 gallon batch, 3 gallon boil, mini mash.

4.50# Light LME
2.25# 2-row
.75# Roasted Barley
.50# Chocolate Malt
.25# Flaked Oats
.25# Flaked Wheat

2oz Williamete @ 60
10oz cocoa powder @ 1
Wyeast American Ale I yeast
1# frozen raspberries for 7 days

Mash in 1.25 gallons of water for 60min at 152-154.
Sparge in 2.25 gallons for 10-15 minutes @ 170ish.
Primary for 2 weeks @ 68 degree water bath, probably 70 degree ambient temp.
Secondary for 1 week (on 1# raspberries) @ 70.
Bottle for 2-3 @ 70.

I'm going for a chocolate-raspberry flavor with chocolate being the primary flavor with more than a hint of raspberry but not overpowering the chocolate. I chose the american ale yeast because i dont *want* any other fruit flavor other than the raspberry, also the reason for the Williamete hops. Correct me if im wrong.

Thoughts? Concerns?

Much appreciated! :rockin:

I think you'll play hell trying to get raspberries to fight through the big roastiness of a stout. I'd also skip the wheat and make it a full lb of oats, but that's just me.

I agree with the full LB of oats and skip the wheat.

@El_Exorcisto you'd be surprised how good the rasberries work. Just finished a chocolate rasberri stout and the rasberris were very noticable. We did use 2# of rasberries in our 5 gallon however and also only used 8oz of chocholate in 10 gallons. It was split for the Rasberri and a diffenerent beer.

When done again, we'll use more chocolate and less rasberri. Still turned out good though.

Instead of chocolate malt, I would recommend Pale Chocolate, gives you more flavor. my .02.......

Chocolate Rye Malt also imparts a very good/strong chocolate flavor compared to traditional chocolate malt if you want to give it a try. I did it was amazing. Plus, you can be a little heavy handed with it

awesome, thanks for the suggestions! I was toning the oats down because i've heard/read that they can be oily if you use too much and the wheat was more for head retention. As for the choclate substitues, i'll have to see what the LHBS has on their shelves.

non-recipe question, sorta.. With a beer as 'heavy' as a stout, do you use more priming sugar or does the normal amount carbonate well regardless of what kind of beer you're making?

thanks again!