Sublime8365
Well-Known Member
I'm looking to make a Gingerbread Stout as sort of a Christmas in July type thing.
My inspiration for the beer is Buffalo Bayou's Gingerbread Stout. Being as most people outside the Houston area probably haven't had it, here's their description for it:
"Sweet, creamy, slightly roasty stout with big nutmeg, cinnamon and cloves on the nose. Surprisingly easy-going mouthfeel."
It's an imperial stout at 10% ABV but I'm shooting for more the 7-7.5% range for time considerations. I'm also looking to do a partial mash to cut down on some effort/time because I'm only planning to make a half batch (3 gal).
I'm going into a lot of new/fairly new areas: I don't brew stout's very often, I've never really worked with spices (other than coriander in wheat beers), never worked with lactose, and I've never done a partial mash (primarily all grain).
So, let's get started!
Obviously with this beer I'm spending most of my recipe formulation research on the grain bill/additives.
Here's what I have so far for my grain bill (for now I left it at quantities for a 5.5 gal batch since that's what people probably read the most, I'll scale it down later):
6.5 lbs extra light LME (52%)
3 lbs 2-row (24 %)
1.5 lbs roasted barley (12%)
1 lbs crystal (8%) - not sure what L to use, somewhere between 60-120 any suggestions?
0.5 lbs flaked barley (4%)
I'm a little lost on the spices/lactose. Randy Mosher had outlined a gingerbread beer in Radical Brewing using a soft brown ale as a base. Since this stout will have bolder flavors to balance out the spice would you up them or keep them?:
1 tsp (4g) Cinnamon
0.5 tsp (2g) Ground ginger
0.25 tsp (1 g) All spice (thinking of replacing with nutmeg and upping the cinnamon and cloves if necessary)
0.25 tsp 91g) Cloves
For the lactose, I was thinking somewhere between 0.5 and 1 pounds. Just looking for some of that creamy mouthfeel and some sweetness.
I'm not worried about hops right now, I'll figure that out later.
Lastly, the yeast. I don't want to have a super full bodied beer. I'd like to have it pretty drinkable so I was thinking a higher attenuating yeast to help dry out the body and let the lactose do the heavy lifting on rounding out the body of the beer. Was thinking either WLP002 (english) or WLP007 (dry english).
Thoughts? Any help is much appreciated!
My inspiration for the beer is Buffalo Bayou's Gingerbread Stout. Being as most people outside the Houston area probably haven't had it, here's their description for it:
"Sweet, creamy, slightly roasty stout with big nutmeg, cinnamon and cloves on the nose. Surprisingly easy-going mouthfeel."
It's an imperial stout at 10% ABV but I'm shooting for more the 7-7.5% range for time considerations. I'm also looking to do a partial mash to cut down on some effort/time because I'm only planning to make a half batch (3 gal).
I'm going into a lot of new/fairly new areas: I don't brew stout's very often, I've never really worked with spices (other than coriander in wheat beers), never worked with lactose, and I've never done a partial mash (primarily all grain).
So, let's get started!
Obviously with this beer I'm spending most of my recipe formulation research on the grain bill/additives.
Here's what I have so far for my grain bill (for now I left it at quantities for a 5.5 gal batch since that's what people probably read the most, I'll scale it down later):
6.5 lbs extra light LME (52%)
3 lbs 2-row (24 %)
1.5 lbs roasted barley (12%)
1 lbs crystal (8%) - not sure what L to use, somewhere between 60-120 any suggestions?
0.5 lbs flaked barley (4%)
I'm a little lost on the spices/lactose. Randy Mosher had outlined a gingerbread beer in Radical Brewing using a soft brown ale as a base. Since this stout will have bolder flavors to balance out the spice would you up them or keep them?:
1 tsp (4g) Cinnamon
0.5 tsp (2g) Ground ginger
0.25 tsp (1 g) All spice (thinking of replacing with nutmeg and upping the cinnamon and cloves if necessary)
0.25 tsp 91g) Cloves
For the lactose, I was thinking somewhere between 0.5 and 1 pounds. Just looking for some of that creamy mouthfeel and some sweetness.
I'm not worried about hops right now, I'll figure that out later.
Lastly, the yeast. I don't want to have a super full bodied beer. I'd like to have it pretty drinkable so I was thinking a higher attenuating yeast to help dry out the body and let the lactose do the heavy lifting on rounding out the body of the beer. Was thinking either WLP002 (english) or WLP007 (dry english).
Thoughts? Any help is much appreciated!
