Cocoa nibs and fruit

[DonGavlar]

Hi guys,
Im only on my third ever brew, plan on brewing it in the next week and its going to be my first all grain brew.

I’m a big fan of stouts, especially chocolate stouts, and i found a lovely looking chocolate stout recipe that I really want to give a go.

Now, I’ve a searched the forums and not come up with much.. seems to be a lot of mixed suggestions and advice. I want to know wether its ok to just put cocoa nibs into the primary? Also fruit as well, if when i make a fruit beer.

See, i dont really like the idea of racking to a secondary just to help clear the beer. Even though im a very new brewer my last brew i bottled, i just left in the primary for 3 weeks, racked to a bottling bucket, bottled and let carb for another 3 weeks.

I was hoping that I could do the same here? The recipe calls to add nibs soaked in vodka to a secondary and then rack the beer in and let sit for 2 weeks. Can I just let the beer sit in the primary for 2 weeks, throw in the soaked nibs, let sit for another 2 weeks and then bottle?? Also if i was doing a fruit beer could i do this for fruit too?

Just dont really like the idea of secondarys, unless aging a beer for a longer period of time.

Can someone explain wether adding these things into the primary after fermentation is ok? And if its not, please explain why as I’m still learning. Also even if it is ok, will there be any differnce in flavour/ quality than if i did rack it to a secondary.

Thanks guys

 

[Bokito]

Hi!

Maybe it's a cultural thing (Europeans being more conservative than Americans with throwing stuff into beer), but my advice would be to keep the first few beers simple. If your third beer has cocoa, fruit, and whatnot in it, it is very hard to say where any eventual off-flavors come from. You can do incredible things with taste just using malt, hop and yeast.
I consider (home)brewing much more an art than a science, which gives you much more freedom but requires experience and feel. So brewing as much as possible before turning to crazy experiments is my approach.

Having said that, racking to secondary is something I almost never do. My beer doesn't necessarily need to be clear (although it is so more often than not). If I add stuff (like liquorice or oak), I do so in the fermentation bucket after the fermentation has calmed down a bit. This makes sure less aroma and taste get blown out with the CO2 formed. So that is exactly what you proposed. Some might argue keeping the beer on a yeast cake has effects on pH-values and taste, in the worst case adding autolyse taste from the yeast. I have never noticed that, but may be that says more about me than about the process.
I would, however, add the extra ingredient while there is still some fermentation going on. I would add it after fermentation calms down a little (can be after 3 days, can be a week) and then let it sit for a week or max. two. Most of the flavor should be extracted by the Vodka anyway. In this way, you make sure that there will be a 'CO2-blanket' formed on your beer after you have disturbed it with your nibs (as defense for aerobic infections), and also don't have the beer sit too long on dying yeast.

Have fun brewing!
Benno

 

[DonGavlar]

Hi!

Maybe it's a cultural thing (Europeans being more conservative than Americans with throwing stuff into beer), but my advice would be to keep the first few beers simple. If your third beer has cocoa, fruit, and whatnot in it, it is very hard to say where any eventual off-flavors come from. You can do incredible things with taste just using malt, hop and yeast.
I consider (home)brewing much more an art than a science, which gives you much more freedom but requires experience and feel. So brewing as much as possible before turning to crazy experiments is my approach.

Having said that, racking to secondary is something I almost never do. My beer doesn't necessarily need to be clear (although it is so more often than not). If I add stuff (like liquorice or oak), I do so in the fermentation bucket after the fermentation has calmed down a bit. This makes sure less aroma and taste get blown out with the CO2 formed. So that is exactly what you proposed. Some might argue keeping the beer on a yeast cake has effects on pH-values and taste, in the worst case adding autolyse taste from the yeast. I have never noticed that, but may be that says more about me than about the process.
I would, however, add the extra ingredient while there is still some fermentation going on. I would add it after fermentation calms down a little (can be after 3 days, can be a week) and then let it sit for a week or max. two. Most of the flavor should be extracted by the Vodka anyway. In this way, you make sure that there will be a 'CO2-blanket' formed on your beer after you have disturbed it with your nibs (as defense for aerobic infections), and also don't have the beer sit too long on dying yeast.

Have fun brewing!
Benno

Thanks! After some more digging around I found that a lot of people say that cocoa nibs are fine to put in either the primary or secondary. However, almost all bar a few have said that when adding fruit to make sure its in the secondary. I got the idea that adding to the primary will activate the yeast at the bottom and more flavour and aroma will be stripped away rather than if added to a secondary. Is that correct?

As for the experimenting with flavours part.. Yeah I'm definitely not jumping into fruit beers etc just yet but I thought just a few cocoa nibs in to give a stout or porter a bit of undertone flavour couldn't be that tricky. I will wait till im more experienced before I start trying to make big flavoured beers.

 

[Bokito]

No worries. It seems you can use a lot of cocoa nibs before the taste gets overpowering, so it's relatively safe to use.
As far as I know the reason to add spices, juice, or honey to the secondary is not so much activation but the constant flow of CO2 out of the vessel. This flow is strongest in primary, and could take the volatile aroma's with it. But that's just repeating things I read on the interwebs so it doesn't need to be true.

Cheers,
Benno

 

[Tommydee]

I just did this two weeks ago, and had same question! I made a northern brewer chocolate milk stout kit my dad got me for xmas, and didn't want to mess with secondary. I love Goslings black rum, so I soaked the nibs in that for 4 days (had to add more at day 2 since they swell) and then dumped in all the extract and half the nibs right into my primary on day 7, then racked it all to a keg on day 14. Everyone seems to love it. I was afraid to throw all the nibs in, just in case it got too bitter, but if I were to do it again, I'd just chuck it all in. Just don't extract for more than 4 days, based on what I've read.