adding coffee to a stout

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.

DodginBUIs

Well-Known Member
Joined
Aug 9, 2010
Messages
62
Reaction score
2
Location
Florida
Ok i know there are plenty of threads on here to read though for advice on adding coffee, the only problem is that they all have different measurements or are lacking some sort of crucial information (for the most part) I want to dumb it down and ask again because I want to add coffee to the oatmeal stout I have in the primary right now. So:

-I have a 5 gal batch of beer. How much water (in ounces) should I use to cold brew the coffee? (less is more, i dont want to water down the beer)
-How much (in ounces) ground coffee beans should I add to the water?
Im assuming once im done cold brewing I have created a coffee concentrate.
-Do I then add the concentrate I just created to the secondary (or keg as in my case) and rack on top, or do I use the coffee concentrate to make a pot coffee and add that? (i want the smallest amount of liquid added to avoid diluting the beer so im thinking of using the concentrate)
-How much of the concentrate (in ounces) should I add to a 5gal batch (dont want to overpower it, dont want to barely detect it either so Id certainly appreciate the benefit of your trial and error)

Thanks in advance for the input. I will add my process and results for future rookies like myself.
 
For my Imperial Stout (5 gallons) I did 4 ounces of course ground coffee in 8 ounces of water for the cold press.
I then added the cold press to the kettle at flame out.
I primaried for 4 weeks and secondaried for 3 weeks.
The coffee flavor/aroma is perfect IMHO. Definitely not a full on Coffee Stout, but you can smell it ever so slightly and taste is just enough to know it is there.

Coffee variety will also have a big impact on all of this.
I used a Peruvian coffee.
 
thanks, i think im going to try the 4oz grounds to 8oz water you did, leave it overnight and add it when I keg.
 
Haha, reviving an old thread, but when you make the concentrate, do you literally just put 4 oz of grounds and mix it with 8 oz of water in a bowl (or something), and then strain the concentrate?
 
Use a french press.
You can get a smaller one for between $10 - $20 and it works perfectly.
You can use it for your morning coffee too, if you want to be weird :D
 
Try "dry hopping" whole beans in the keg I usually use 8-10 oz of super light roast and put them in a grain bag in the keg for about a week. That's the best results I've got so far...
 
I'm in the same dilemma. I have my stout in the primary right now and need to put into the secondary tomorrow for 2-3 weeks. Can I use whole coffee beans in the secondary? Or is the concentrate best? I have a french press!

Thanks.
 
The best results I have had is with whole beans, put them in a grain bag and hang them in your secondary for a few days. try 6-10 oz of light roast. I tried dark roast once and it was wayyyyy too much roastieness.
 
In my Espresso Stout, I added 16 oz. of brewed espresso to the bottling bucket. It was goooood ! !

NRS
 
I recently made a stout with a cold coffee extraction added at secondary. Here are the directions that I followed:

Add 1/2 pound of ground coffee to 24 ounces of tap water in a sanitized sealable container. Keep coffee mixture sealed in fridge for 24 hours. Strain coffee mixture with a sanitized kitchen strainer or cheesecloth and add to secondary fermenter and then rack beer from primary into the secondary fermenter.

This was for a 5 gallon recipe. It turned out great!
 
I recently made a stout with a cold coffee extraction added at secondary. Here are the directions that I followed:

Add 1/2 pound of ground coffee to 24 ounces of tap water in a sanitized sealable container. Keep coffee mixture sealed in fridge for 24 hours. Strain coffee mixture with a sanitized kitchen strainer or cheesecloth and add to secondary fermenter and then rack beer from primary into the secondary fermenter.

This was for a 5 gallon recipe. It turned out great!

24 oz. seems like a lot of water. Would there be less coffee extraction if I used, say, 16 oz. water to 1/2 pound of beans?

Then again, compared to 5 gal maybe it's not that much...
 
Kind of a funny side story....
When I brewed my first coffee stout, we added ground French Roast directly to the boiling wort, like a hop addition. <=Stupid.
When I ran the wort through my plate chiller, a bean got sucked in and clogged the chiller. Man that was a b!tch.
I'm also pretty sure it added a significant amount of caffine to the beer.
It was very very good though.
 
dpeanut7 said:
Haha, reviving an old thread, but when you make the concentrate, do you literally just put 4 oz of grounds and mix it with 8 oz of water in a bowl (or something), and then strain the concentrate?

This is exactly what I did and it was amazing. Just an FYI ! I'm sure all methods work!
 
I've added it at bottling time. Maybe that's cheating but it allows you to mix a small amount of beer + coffee extract and see what the right ratio is for your tastes. My coffee extract was 16 oz freshly ground coffee + 48 ounces H20, left at room temp overnight and strained through coffee filter. I used all of it in a 5 gal batch. I dissolved the bottling sugar in the coffee extract to keep the total volume down. The coffee flavor is obvious and might be too much for some folks but I like it a lot. I'm thinking it will mellow a lot after a month or 2 in the bottles.
 
Kind of a funny side story....
When I brewed my first coffee stout, we added ground French Roast directly to the boiling wort, like a hop addition. <=Stupid.
When I ran the wort through my plate chiller, a bean got sucked in and clogged the chiller. Man that was a b!tch.
I'm also pretty sure it added a significant amount of caffine to the beer.
It was very very good though.

I added directly to the boil also. I believe at flame out.
No plat chiller so so problems.

I used a dark roast in a hoppy beer. It came out very bitter.
In a few months it was great though.
 
Back
Top