Chocolate experiment worked!

So my recent experiment with "first wort chocolating" ended up being a success. I had tried to make a chocolate stout that actually ended up with a real chocolate taste. I ended up coming up with the idea of putting in a half pound of bakers chocolate in the brewing kettle for the first runnings to mix with. The idea stems from first wort hopping. It actually locked in the chocolate taste VERY nicely.

SO, if youre looking for a new and effective way of getting chocolate into your brew, try this technique. It works very well!

You have my attention. I've eaten bakers chocolate before. It's not for eating. Describe the chocolate taste and overall taste of your beer. Extract or all grain?

Thanks.

When I did my chocolate mole porter I added the majority of my Mexican chocolate (along with my homemade chili powder) in the mash tun...that's what the brewers on australian Craftbrewer radio do...they recommend doing it there to keep the oils from the chocolate in the mash tun and not in the wort...I then added more in the boil, at the bginiing and some more at flame out with the cayenne pepper.

Revvy said:

When I did my chocolate mole porter I added the majority of my Mexican chocolate (along with my homemade chili powder) in the mash tun...that's what the brewers on australian Craftbrewer radio do...they recommend doing it there to keep the oils from the chocolate in the mash tun and not in the wort...I then added more in the boil, at the bginiing and some more at flame out with the cayenne pepper.

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So ... Instead of lautering and sparging in the normal way, you must have to essentially separate by not removing all of your wort from your MLT. The oils (being less dense) will be on top of the wort, so if you removed all the wort you'd get the oils into your boil kettle as well. You could accomplish the same thing by siphoning your beer from your boil kettle to your primary, or your primary to your secondary, or your secondary to your bottling bucket. Or for that matter, it should only affect the last bottle because the oils will rise to the surface of the bottling bucket and will the be the last to be removed.

I've never brewed all-grain but I wouldn't be surprised if any free (undissolved) oils end up adsorbing onto the grain bed as you drain down the MLT.

Oils or fat in the beer can do all kinds of potentially strange or bad things to the beer, but considering people have made beer with Hershey bars and chocolate syrup, beer must be relatively forgiving. If I was inclined to make a chocolate stout, I wouldn't be afraid to throw it in the mash.

Jack said:

So ... Instead of lautering and sparging in the normal way, you must have to essentially separate by not removing all of your wort from your MLT. The oils (being less dense) will be on top of the wort, so if you removed all the wort you'd get the oils into your boil kettle as well. You could accomplish the same thing by siphoning your beer from your boil kettle to your primary, or your primary to your secondary, or your secondary to your bottling bucket. Or for that matter, it should only affect the last bottle because the oils will rise to the surface of the bottling bucket and will the be the last to be removed.

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Considering the aussies who host the show have 60 years of brewing experience combined and can brew a beer with over 50% regular wheat flour, if they suggest doing something, I tend to be willing to try something...Maybe THEY know something more than you...or me...

I did nothing else different, just mashed and sparged as normal. That's what the aussise suggested. You stick it in the tun, and let er rip...Maybe the grain bed itself absorbed the oils since the grain is sucking up water and expanding as it's being converted (kinda like when you sop up some gravy on your plate with a piece of bread, or more like if you are making french toast and the bread pores are infused with the with the egg/milk)...I'm figuring with all the grain, with the rice hulls that I normally us and with my braid there was a heck of a lot of filtering and absorbtion going on before ithe runnings came out...

All I know is that my runnings were crystal clear as normal (except really dark) and tasted like chocolate and chili powder and smelled amazing....I've brewed with chocolate normally and there were oil slicks in the wort....doing it this way they were greatly reduced (the only bit I noticed came from the two addtiions I added in the boil. And they were smaller than normal, becasuse so less was added in the boil...I probably could have those additions but I had an extra half disk of mexican chocolate already opened and didn't want to waste it.

Scotty_g said:

I've never brewed all-grain but I wouldn't be surprised if any free (undissolved) oils end up adsorbing onto the grain bed as you drain down the MLT.

Oils or fat in the beer can do all kinds of potentially strange or bad things to the beer, but considering people have made beer with Hershey bars and chocolate syrup, beer must be relatively forgiving. If I was inclined to make a chocolate stout, I wouldn't be afraid to throw it in the mash.

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+1 Scotty...that's what I'm thinking...it's also why many of us add pumpkin in the mashtun when we make our pumpkin beers rather that the boil....the mess stays in the tun and the filter bed and fine mesh braid keeps it from coming through., and all that comes out is infused with the flavor.

You people are gonna make me do some kind of partial grain thing. Darn you all to heck.

I mean, aside from steeping grain. That's a given

Thanks for posting this. I'm planning on brewing a Chocolate Imperial Stout as soon as I'm over this cold that won't seem to go away.

The recipe that I'm looking at calls for chocolate to be added with 10 min left in the boil.

If I put the choc. in the MLT, do I use the same amount as the original recipe? Or should I add more?

Thanks.

kornbread said:

If I put the choc. in the MLT, do I use the same amount as the original recipe? Or should I add more?

Thanks.

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I dunno...since I was making up my own recipe.

I would just add what you were planning to add...but have more on hand to further FWC (first wort chocolate) or Add to Boil if it didn't seem like enough...