Brewing with flaked oats.

[brandoncox]

I'm brewing my first real batch of beer with no kits next week after I gather up my supply from NB. It is going to be somewhat of a breakfast stout or porter. The brew will consist of chocolate specialty grains and flaked oats (steeped), organic LME, mild bitter and aroma hops, coffee (grounds or fresh brewed), and pure maple syrup as the prime. I'm planning to yield 2 gallons because I already have a Mr. Beer fermenter that I plan to use a few more times until I'm comfortable brewing larger batches. I have a few questions...

1.) Should I steep the flaked oats in 150 F water for 30 minutes or should I toast them first before steeping? Will toasting them still release the sugars from the oats for my yeast to eat up and turn to alcohol? I want to steep them regardless.
2.) I plan to do a full boil. So for two gallons yield would I brew with 2 1/2 gallons of water with 3.3 LBS of liquid malt extract or should I use less extract?
3.) How much maple syrup should be added to 12oz bottles for priming?

Here is a rough draft of my recipie:
*Steep grains and oats 30 min at 150F.
*Bring to boil then adding LME and bittering hops for one hour.
*Add aroma hops last 15 minutes.
*Cool wort quickly to 70F.
*Pitch yeast.
*Sack 2oz of fresh coffee grounds while fermentation completes.
*Prime with pure maple syrup.

And finally... does this look ok? Thanks in advance!

 

[Germelli1]

I would recommend trying a partial mash for this. The oats really will not contribute much without being mashed.

The cerial mash/toasting you are considering only gelatinizes the startches, but does not actually convert them to sugars.

Since it is such a small batch, you can successfully mash in your oven or on your stovetop! Add a pound or less of 2 row barley and subtract a little bit of LME, crush all your grains (except flaked oats), put it all in a pot with a few quarts of water, and put the pot in your overn around 150-155 for and hour. Boom, your frist mash and you can successfully convert the oats!

 

[ArcaneXor]

If you don't want to do a partial mash, you can use amylase enzyme in powdered form that will convert the starches for you. But I'd recommend the partial mash, it's easy and a good skill to learn.

Toasting them tends to increase their flavor contribution and make them taste more, well, toasted! Can be quite yummy, and doesn't affect conversion significantly.

For the maple syrup, you need to find out what the fermentability and pppg (gravity points per pound per gallon) is - then you can calculate how much you need.