Rogue Chocolate Stout Clone (Attempt)

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

physast

Well-Known Member
Joined
Aug 6, 2007
Messages
199
Reaction score
1
I just finished brewing a Rogue Chocolate Stout clone recipe that I found here on homebrewtalk.com. See recipe below.

The final color is more of a medium brown for which I expected an ebony color. Any ideas what went wrong?

I have also been getting a very low efficiency with my all grain attempts.

My All Grain process is basically this.
1. Mash all grains using 1.3qrts/1lbs grain @ 150 - 155 F for 60 min
a. Stir once at the beginning of the mash to make sure no dry clumps exists.
2. Sparge with enough water @ 175 to make about 6 gallons of wort.
a. stir again after adding sparge water
3. recirculate a few times to catch loose debris in the grain bed
4. empty wort into two pots that I use for boiling (stove top boil)
a. Take gravity reading
5. Add all hops using hop schedule
6. cool to about 80 F and add to fermenter
7. pitch yeast
8. drink a beer and wonder why my efficiency is so bad.

Any ideas how to get my efficiency up? I am guessing that the color turned out medium brown because my efficiency was so low. Is this right?

Thanks for the input.

A ProMash Brewing Session Report
--------------------------------

Brewing Date: Sunday January 09, 2011
Recipe: Chocolate Stout (AG)

Recipe Specifics
----------------

Batch Size (Gal): 5.00 Wort Size (Gal): 6.00
Total Grain (Lbs): 12.63
Anticipated OG: 1.059 Plato: 14.51
Anticipated SRM: 25.4
Anticipated IBU: 38.8
Brewhouse Efficiency: 66 %
Wort Boil Time: 70 Minutes

Actual OG: 1.048 Plato: 11.91

Actual Mash System Efficiency: 56 %

Grain/Extract/Sugar

% Amount Name Origin Potential SRM
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
4.0 0.50 lbs. Crystal 120L Great Britain 1.033 120
87.1 11.00 lbs. Pale Malt(2-row) America 1.036 2
4.0 0.50 lbs. Chocolate Malt America 1.029 350
4.0 0.50 lbs. Flaked Oats America 1.033 2
1.0 0.13 lbs. Roasted Barley America 1.028 450

Hops

Amount Name Form Alpha IBU Boil Time
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
1.00 oz. Cascade Pellet 5.75 29.3 70 min.
1.00 oz. Cascade Pellet 5.75 9.5 20 min.
1.00 oz. Cascade Pellet 5.75 0.0 0 min.


Extras

Amount Name Type Time
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
1.50 Oz Cocoa Powder Other 0 Min.(boil)


Yeast
-----

WYeast 1056 Amercan Ale/Chico
 
Just realized I used a light roasted barley with a lovibond of ~300 instead of the darker ~500 lovibond roasted barley:eek:. This might explain some of the the color problem but not all. Also what about the efficiency?
 
IIRC, isn't Rogue Chocolate Stout just Shakespeare Stout with some chocolate added??
If so, I think you should be using more like 1.25# chocolate and the same amount for the 120L crystal.
 
IIRC, isn't Rogue Chocolate Stout just Shakespeare Stout with some chocolate added??
If so, I think you should be using more like 1.25# chocolate and the same amount for the 120L crystal.


That might help. I noticed that the promash gave my expected color at 24.5 or so. But this is nowhere near that. I will post a picture before putting into secondary.
 
Not enough chocolate malt, not enough crystal, wrong kind of roasted barley (and not enough) and the OG was way low so there were some extraction issues.

Also per John Maier you should add Neilsen-Massey chocolate extract at 2 oz per 5 gallons.

For the base shakespeare stout recipe, listen to the appropriate Can You Brew It show.
 
Not enough chocolate malt, not enough crystal, wrong kind of roasted barley (and not enough) and the OG was way low so there were some extraction issues.

Also per John Maier you should add Neilsen-Massey chocolate extract at 2 oz per 5 gallons.

For the base shakespeare stout recipe, listen to the appropriate Can You Brew It show.

I have been meaning to start watching/listening to some podcast/shows.

Why would pro mash give the srm at 25.4 for those grains? If I was just following promash calculations it should have been correct. I will re-check to make sure all the grain lovibonds are correct in promash.
 
Now I am thinking I might just save the chocolate extract and keep this beer a brown ale....
 
I have been meaning to start watching/listening to some podcast/shows.

Why would pro mash give the srm at 25.4 for those grains? If I was just following promash calculations it should have been correct. I will re-check to make sure all the grain lovibonds are correct in promash.

i recommend listening to the show, but (for quick reference) the recipe is posted on hbt, here: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/can-you-brew-recipe-rogue-shakespeare-stout-178121/

note that although it's indicated as "not cloned", i have brewed it 3 times and find it nearly indistinguishable from the real thing except for lack of Cascade aroma (a common isssue for me and many homebrewers with flameout hops, methinks).

it's a great recipe.....as to saving the chocolate and going with what you have as a different product, probably not a bad idea, depending on what the chocolate set you back, its availability, etc.

Good luck with it.
 
i recommend listening to the show, but (for quick reference) the recipe is posted on hbt, here: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/can-you-brew-recipe-rogue-shakespeare-stout-178121/

note that although it's indicated as "not cloned", i have brewed it 3 times and find it nearly indistinguishable from the real thing except for lack of Cascade aroma (a common isssue for me and many homebrewers with flameout hops, methinks).

it's a great recipe.....as to saving the chocolate and going with what you have as a different product, probably not a bad idea, depending on what the chocolate set you back, its availability, etc.

Good luck with it.

Try letting them stand in hot wort for 20-30 minutes like the breweries do in the whirlpool.

There is some info on this on this forum, more on the Northern Brewer and Brewing Network forums, and also in the PDF from Ray Daniels and Randy Mosher's NHC presentation from a couple of years back.
 
I have been meaning to start watching/listening to some podcast/shows.

Why would pro mash give the srm at 25.4 for those grains? If I was just following promash calculations it should have been correct. I will re-check to make sure all the grain lovibonds are correct in promash.

Models for predicting beer color aren't perfect. But if pro-mash gave 25.4 SRM (which is dark brown or so) and your extraction was poor, as it was, I would probably expect something around 20.
 
Try letting them stand in hot wort for 20-30 minutes like the breweries do in the whirlpool.

There is some info on this on this forum, more on the Northern Brewer and Brewing Network forums, and also in the PDF from Ray Daniels and Randy Mosher's NHC presentation from a couple of years back.

thanks. i've got a pale i'll be kegging in 2 weeks that i did this on (though only for 15 min) and am looking forward to seeing if it helped. i use an immersion chiller and what i did was run it for 2-3 minutes, turned it off, dropped in hops and let them sit for 15.
 
*Bump* I too would love more info on flameout additions.
 
Hope it's still okay to comment on efficiency. Mine was about 60% at best. It improved when I got a Barley Crusher but it really improved when I took more time on the sparge. Slow sparge makes for 70% or better. For me a slow sparge takes an hour or more. Good luck.
 
Back
Top