100% LME Chocolate Raspberry Imperial Stout

I'm looking to put together an all Briess LME recipe for a Chocolate Raspberry Imperial Stout. Would love to hear feedback from all y'all on the recipe and brew plan...

LME Bill
6.60lbs Special Dark LME
2.00lbs Traditional Dark LME
2.50lbs Golden Light LME
0.50lbs Amber Liquid Extract

These LMEs break down into the following percentages of grains/malts:
40.16% 4.659lbs Base Malt
18.74% 2.174lbs Caramel Malt 60L
14.22% 1.650lbs Wheat Malt
10.81% 1.254lbs Chocolate Malt
9.31% 1.080lbs Munich Malt 10L
4.31% 0.500lbs Malted Barley
1.71% 0.198lbs Roasted Barley
0.52% 0.060lbs Black Malt
0.22% 0.025lbs CaraPils

Boil - 45 min
45 min LME
40 min Phoenix (10.5%) 0.66 oz
30 min Pilgrim (11.0%) 0.66 oz
15 min Phoenix (10.5%) 0.50 oz
15 min Irish Moss 1.00 oz
10 min Cacao Nibs 4 oz
5 min Pilgrim (11.0%) 0.75 oz
5 min Falconer's Flight 7C's (9.5%) 0.75 oz
5 min Cacao Powder 8 oz
5 min Lactose 1.00 lbs
5 min Candi Syrup 1.00 lbs
WY1762 Wyeast Belgian Abbey II

3 week Primary
Add a 49oz can of raspberry purée to the primary after 1 week

2 week Secondary
Rack primary on top of 2 vanilla beans and 4oz cacao powder; both of which were soaked/mixed in vanilla vodka for 2 weeks prior. Place 4oz cacao nibs in a muslin bag and suspend.

Dry Hops
Pilgrim (11.0%)0.75 ozSecondaryfinal 4 days
Falconer's Flight 7C's (9.5%) 0.75 oz Secondary final 4 days

Anticipated Numbers:
5 gallons
O.G. 1.099
F.G. 1.025
ABV 9.40%
IBU 61.9
SRM 50.3°L

I don't really see the purpose of the Amber Liquid Extract. It's going to get lost in the mix. I would just roll that 1/2 pound into the Golden LME. Also, you've got a pretty complicated hopping schedule. If this were an IPA, I would think it would be good. However, the other flavors your working with are going to overwhelm the hops.

If it were me (and it's not, I understand that), I would really simplify the whole recipe. 1-2 types of LME, 1-3 hop additions, and then use the adjuncts that you are really featuring here (lactose, raspberry, vanilla, cocoa nibs).

Ok, best of luck!

Thanks for the feedback JR...

I already have the amber and light mixed together from a previous purchase (decided not to use in another brew) that needs to be used soon. Using it in this brew does 2 things; it increases my ABV and it gets used before it goes bad. I'm shooting for 9.5-10.5% ABV.

I see what you mean on the hop schedule ... the hops I chose should accentuate and contribute to the chocolate, fruit (berry) and spices while giving it some balls to support itself. The dry hops probably aren't necessary tho...the aroma from the chocolate, raspberry & vanilla should be more than enough. Good point!

Thanks!

I wouldn't dry Hop, other then that it sounds good, though I usually go less with the crystal malt but seeing as you don't have a choice and I'm NOT A PROFESSIONAL I say go for it, just retort back how it works

I'm not a fan of All-Extract batches, but I see what you are trying to do.

- Just concentrating on the extract breakdown. 19% Crystal seems way too high. ~2% Black/Roasted seems way too low for a Stout.

- With that recipe, you are not getting anywhere near 1.025 as an FG.

- Why the Candi sugar and Belgian yeast?

- Drop the Lactose, it is going to end up very sweet as it is.

- What is the calculated IBUs. Look like it will be very low. For a big stout, I would expect decent bittering; Maybe in the region of 50 IBUs

Calder said:

I'm not a fan of All-Extract batches, but I see what you are trying to do.

- Just concentrating on the extract breakdown. 19% Crystal seems way too high. ~2% Black/Roasted seems way too low for a Stout.

- With that recipe, you are not getting anywhere near 1.025 as an FG.

- Why the Candi sugar and Belgian yeast?

- Drop the Lactose, it is going to end up very sweet as it is.

- What is the calculated IBUs. Look like it will be very low. For a big stout, I would expect decent bittering; Maybe in the region of 50 IBUs

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There's quite a big percentage of crystal in both "dark" LME's; Special Dark is comprised of 29% and the Traditional has 13%. I plugged this recipe into 2 different software programs and both estimated the FG around 1.025...why would this not reach that number? I chose the sugar and lactose to counter the bitter from the cacao powder and nibs. The yeast was on the list of recommended options from WYeast for Imperial Stouts and was more forgiving with higher temps than others. What's your recommendation? The IBU's calculate to 61.9.

I've already bought .5lb Amber and 1.5lbs Light as well as (2) 3.3lb Special Dark...the rest I was planning on buying at my LHBS (they sell it in bulk so I can buy by the ounce). If omitting some LME and substituting with steeping grains is a better solution, I'm game. I was trying to "tinker" by doing this in all LME...I'd rather have a better Stout so I'm open to suggestions...

TwistedLiquidBrew said:

I already have the amber and light mixed together from a previous purchase (decided not to use in another brew) that needs to be used soon.

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Ok, that makes perfect sense. I was worried you were ordering fresh LME and only planning to use 1/2 lb out of it.

Twisted has a point, your beer is going to end up rather sweet. Some ideas: find a yeast with higher attenuation, replace lactose with table sugar, or reduce the amount of LME. Whatever you end up doing, I think this calls for a large, and vigorous yeast starter. Good luck!

TwistedLiquidBrew said:

There's quite a big percentage of crystal in both "dark" LME's; Special Dark is comprised of 29% and the Traditional has 13%. I plugged this recipe into 2 different software programs and both estimated the FG around 1.025...why would this not reach that number? I chose the sugar and lactose to counter the bitter from the cacao powder and nibs. The yeast was on the list of recommended options from WYeast for Imperial Stouts and was more forgiving with higher temps than others. What's your recommendation? The IBU's calculate to 61.9.

I've already bought .5lb Amber and 1.5lbs Light as well as (2) 3.3lb Special Dark...the rest I was planning on buying at my LHBS (they sell it in bulk so I can buy by the ounce). If omitting some LME and substituting with steeping grains is a better solution, I'm game. I was trying to "tinker" by doing this in all LME...I'd rather have a better Stout so I'm open to suggestions...

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All recipe calculators are dumb. They may be getting better, but I think you will find they have a default for attenuation at 75%, which is why you get an FG of 1.025 when starting with 1.099. Try this: Replace all the extract with lactose and see what the result is. Then replace all the extract with sugar. I think you will find it will still end up with a 75% attenuation. Lactose is non-fermentable, and if the calculator were 'smart' it would give you zero attenuation when you use all-lactose. On the other hand, sugar is 100% fermentable, and a 'smart' calculator would give you greater than 100% apparent attenuation.

You have a lot of crystal malts (which are mostly non-fermentable), which will lower the attenuation (leave a higher FG). Extract is not super fermentable, and will generally leave a sweeter beer than all-grain. Adding in the lactose, which is non-fermentable will only make you end higher.

I understand you want some sweetness to bring out the chocolate and the raspberries. I think you will have that already without adding any lactose. If anything I think you might want to make it a little drier. Simple sugar and candi sugar are both 100% fermentable. Neither will make the beer sweeter; they will actually make it a little drier. If you are still debating the lactose addition, you can always add it later. Taste the beer when it is done before bottling, and then decide if it needs sweetening at that point.

List the items you already have (plus the grain breakdown where ever you got that from), and maybe someone can provide some suggestions as to what you might do to get the beer you are looking for. I think you want to get more lighter extract (not dark), and steep grains (roasted barley) to get the roasty background, chocolate notes, and balance the recipe.

As most have mentioned, there are waaaaaay to much specialty malts here even for an imperial stout. You;ve only got 40% base malts. I make sure I never go below 80%....I'm pretty sure this will be extremely sweet and have an FG of like 1.040

Definitely cut back the darker malt extracts and add in extra light extracts

Calder said:

List the items you already have (plus the grain breakdown where ever you got that from), and maybe someone can provide some suggestions as to what you might do to get the beer you are looking for. I think you want to get more lighter extract (not dark), and steep grains (roasted barley) to get the roasty background, chocolate notes, and balance the recipe.

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Thanks for the explanation...makes sense! I agree with you on the recipe calculators. I plug my info into 3 of them and I get 3 results for EVERYTHING...how the hell am I suppose to know what's what? IBU different, ABV different, SRM different...

I'm pretty new (less than 2 months at this) so I'm finding my way thru it all. I think I'll drop the Traditional Dark completely and add some steeping grains, cut the lactose in half as well as the Belgian candi.

With that I'd have the following:
6.60lbs Special Dark LME - have
1.50lbs Golden Light LME - have
0.50lbs Amber LME - have

1.00lbs Roasted Barley - need
0.50lbs Black Barley - need
0.50lbs Black Malt - need

I have all the hops in hand as well. I do need to get the yeast still.

m00ps said:

As most have mentioned, there are waaaaaay to much specialty malts here even for an imperial stout. You;ve only got 40% base malts. I make sure I never go below 80%....I'm pretty sure this will be extremely sweet and have an FG of like 1.040

Definitely cut back the darker malt extracts and add in extra light extracts

Click to expand...

Thanks! I'll re-work some things and put more base malts into the equation...

m00ps said:

As most have mentioned, there are waaaaaay to much specialty malts here even for an imperial stout. You;ve only got 40% base malts. I make sure I never go below 80%....I'm pretty sure this will be extremely sweet and have an FG of like 1.040

Definitely cut back the darker malt extracts and add in extra light extracts

Click to expand...

I agree with the general premise that the wort needs to be made more fermentable. However, the 40% base malt is not entirely accurate. The wheat, munich, and malted barley also count as base malts. This gets you up close to 70% which is much more reasonable than 40%.

TwistedLiquidBrew said:

I'm pretty new (less than 2 months at this) so I'm finding my way thru it all. I think I'll drop the Traditional Dark completely and add some steeping grains, cut the lactose in half as well as the Belgian candi.

With that I'd have the following:
6.60lbs Special Dark LME - have
1.50lbs Golden Light LME - have
0.50lbs Amber LME - have

1.00lbs Roasted Barley - need
0.50lbs Black Barley - need
0.50lbs Black Malt - need

Click to expand...

Now I think you are going way over-board on the roasted grains. Could end up very acrid, which is not what you want. Also, why 3 different black grains, you just confuse the flavors. This is going to be an expensive beer; I'm sure you are wanting to have it drinkable.

I admit I prefer less of the dark roast grains than many, and prefer to use chocolate to get most of my flavors. I recently made a great oatmeal stout with an OG of 1.064. In 7 gallons I used less roasted grains than you plan on for 5 ..... and that doesn't include any that are in the extract. My recipe is below - I'm posting it so you can see the relative proportions of the grains:

For 7 gallons - Oatmeal Stout
2.5 lbs 2-Row
1.4 lbs Crystal 120
1.4 lbs Chocolate
0.4 lbs Roasted Barley
1.4 lbs Rolled Oats

5.15 lbs Pilsner LME

1.0 lbs light brown sugar

OG: 1.064, FG: 1.011

Can you provide the grain breakdown for the extracts you plan to use.

Calder said:

Can you provide the grain breakdown for the extracts you plan to use.

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Here are the grain breakdowns for Special Dark, Amber and Golden Light (I'll not use Traditional Dark):
Special Dark
0.24 Base Malt
0.25 Wheat Malt
0.29 Caramel Malt 60L
0.19 Chocolate Malt
0.03 Roasted Barley

Golden Light
0.99 Base Malt
0.01 CaraPils

Amber
1.00 Malted Barley

I have 6.6lbs of Special Dark, 1.5lbs of Golden Light and .5lbs of Amber currently. The Special Dark is (2) 3.3lb containers.

That's my "base"...I'm open to adding steeping grains or more LME/DME...I am shooting for an ABV of 9.5% +/- 1% ... so my OG will be between 1.090 and 1.100 ...

Thanks for your recipe btw...

OK, I found the breakdown of your extracts.

How about the following:

You have:
6.60lbs Special Dark LME - have
- Approx Equivalent to 2 lbs Base Malt, 2 lbs Wheat, 2.5 lbs Crystal, 2 lbs Chocolate, and 0.35 lbs Roasted Barley

1.50lbs Golden Light LME - have
- Approx Equivalent to 2 lbs Base malt

0.50lbs Amber LME - have
- Approx Equivalent to 0.65 lbs Base malt

Add:
4 lbs Light Extract (LME)
1 lb Plain sugar (brown or white)

Steep:
0.5 lbs Roasted Barley.

This should get you to about 1.100 OG in 5 gallons.

For reference, this would be similar/equivalent to an all-grain recipe as follows:

9.25 lbs Base malt (2-row)
2.0 lbs Wheat Malt
2.5 lbs Crystal (what color is unknown)
2.0 lbs Chocolate
0.85 lbs Roasted Barley
1.0 lbs Plain Sugar (you will not get any benefit from using expensive candi sugar in this recipe, and don't need to use corn sugar)

As I noted earlier, move some hops to earlier in the boil to get somewhere around 50 IBUs.

Whatever you brew, I hope it turns out great.

I tried to accommodate the extracts that you have on hand, but thinking about it, I still think it is high in specialty malts which will leave a high FG.

A further suggestion would be to drop half the dark extract (save it for another Stout, or Porter), and replace it with 2 lbs more of a light extract. This will give you an OG of about 1.090, and should finish somewhere around 1.020-1.025, with and abv of 8.5% to 9.2%.

Rough all-grain equivalent would be:

12 lbs Base malt (2-row)
1.0 lbs Wheat Malt
1.25 lbs Crystal (what color is unknown)
1.0 lbs Chocolate
0.7 lbs Roasted Barley
1.0 lbs Plain Sugar

Other additions would be:

+1.0 lbs sugar if you want to dry it out more or up the abv, but you want it sweet in the finish.
0.5 lbs of Chocolate if you want more choc/roast flavor.

Awesome guys!!!! Thanks! I'll make my shopping list tonight & head to the LHBS tomorrow...brewing Saturday. I'll post the recipe I land on!

Here's what I've decided on...thanks for everyone's help...going with a mix of advice to hopefully end up with some tasty nectar!

Chocolate Raspberry
13-F Russian Imperial Stout

Size: 5.0 gal
Original Gravity: 1.098
Terminal Gravity: 1.025
Color: 37.1
Alcohol: 9.77%
Bitterness: range from 52 to 83

IBU is debatable...I've plugged my hop schedule into 5 calculators. I've gotten anything from 52 to 83 depending on Rager's or Tinseth's formula. Homebrewing.com uses 4 formulas and averages them...that average for me is 62.8

Ingredients:
Grains Steep for 45 minutes
.5 lb Roasted Barley
.5 lb Chocolate Malt

Malts/Adjuncts Boil for 45 minutes
6.60 lb CBW® Special Dark LME - 45 min
5.50 lb CBW® Golden Light LME - 45 min
0.50 lb CBW® Sparkling Amber LME - 45 min
1.00 oz Irish Moss - 15 min
16 oz Dark Brown Sugar - 5 min
8.00 oz Lactose - 5 min
8.00 oz Cacao Powder - 5 min
4.00 oz Cacao Nibs Roasted - 5 min

Hops
1.00 oz Phoenix (10.5%) - 40 min
1.00 oz Pilgrim (10.1%) - 30 min
0.66 oz Phoenix (10.5%) - 15 min
0.75 oz Pilgrim (10.1%) - 5 min
0.75 oz Falconer’s Flight™ 7C's (9.5%) - 5 min

Pitch
WYeast 1056 American Ale

Primary for 3 weeks
49 oz Raspberries Pureed - add beginning of week 2

Secondary for 2 weeks (rack primary onto items below)
4 oz Cacao Powder (Vodka conditioned)
2 beans Vanilla Bean (Vodka conditioned)
4 oz Cacao Nibs Roasted

I've said it before - It will be sweet, and you will not get down to 1.025. Report back on what you end up at.

I still don't see any need for lactose in that recipe.


Good luck with the beer.

I do want sweet but not OMG sweet...I did cut the lactose in half from my original recipe; you think it's still going to be too much, huh?

I didn't plug the lactose into my recipe calculator so the gravity numbers aren't reflective of lactose being incorrectly calculated.

I'd take the lactose out. Since it is unfermentable, you can add it at any time. Wait until the beer has fermented out, and if not sweet enough, add it then (dissolve in a little boiling water, cool, and add).

That sounds like a good plan....can always add it but not remove it! Thanks

Did you see the IBU ratings? Why is there such a huge variance across calculators? How's a person suppose to know what the heck they've created? Regardless of the calculator, I think I'm good to go!

Stick with one calculator and one scale, and make what suits you.

I use BeerSmith, and the Rager scale. A lot of people prefer the Tinseth scale, but I think it over-estimates late hop additions. Since I make a lot of my IBUs in IPAs from big late additions, I prefer to be on the conservative side ....... it also allows me to add more hops while feeling the IBUs are not getting out of hand.

Yeah, I've heard to pick one & stick with whatever it tells you...I use BeerTools on my laptop & Brew Log on my iPhone....they both calculate differently...one uses final volume and one formula while the other uses boil volume and a different formula...a complete pain in the ass! I need a tool that is consistent across both platforms!

Today was brew day! Here's what I settled on for a recipe. Per Calder's advice, I left off the lactose for now...going to taste along the way and if it needs sweetened, I'll add then. The estimated OG was 1.098; I hit it dead on!

Chocolate Raspberry
Date: 12/21/2014

Size: 5.0 gal
Calories: 330.1 kcal per 12.0 fl oz

Original Gravity: 1.098 (1.075 - 1.115)
Estimated Terminal Gravity: 1.025 (1.018 - 1.030)
Color: 37.1 (30.0 - 40.0)
Alcohol: 9.77% (8.0% - 12.0%)
Bitterness: 77.3 (50.0 - 90.0) .... this seems high to me...the Tinseth IBU is 51.7 (Rager calculations vary from 50-77).

Steep 45 min
0.50 lb Roasted Barley
0.50 lb Chocolate Malt

Boil 45 min
0.75 oz Phoenix (12%) - 40 min
0.75 oz Pilgrim (10.5%) - 30 min
0.75 oz Phoenix (12%) - 15 min
1.00 oz Irish Moss - 15 min
0.75 oz Falconer’s Flight™ 7C's (9.9%) - 10 min
0.75 oz Pilgrim (10.5%) - 5 min
16.00 oz Dark Brown Sugar - 5 min
8.00 oz Ghirardelli 100% Unsweetened Baking Cocoa Powder - 5 min
4.00 oz Cacao Nibs Roasted - 5 min
6.60 lb CBW® Special Dark LME - added at flameout
5.50 lb CBW® Golden Light LME - added at flameout
0.50 lb CBW® Sparkling Amber LME - added at flameout

3 week Primary
49 oz Raspberries (pureed) - added to Primary after week 2

2 week Secondary
4 oz Cacao Powder (Vodka Solution)
2 ea Vanilla Bean (Vodka Solution)