Graham Cracker Porter?

Since I couldn't edit the title of my last post about this beer at Morgon Street Brewery in St. Louis, I have resorted to making another thread.

Does anyone have a recipe similar to a Graham Cracker Porter? How might one develop a graham cracker flavor in a beer?

Sorry I have no idea about graham cracker flavor in beer, but I will be in St. Louis in August, every time I ask about local beers over there I get the same answer... budweiser
Do you have any more info about other St Louis brewers?

Thanks

-magno

I would assume Honey and Cinnamon(sp) with a malty sweetness

magno said:

Sorry I have no idea about graham cracker flavor in beer, but I will be in St. Louis in August, every time I ask about local beers over there I get the same answer... budweiser
Do you have any more info about other St Louis brewers?

Thanks

-magno

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If you are in St. Louis, you should definitely hit Schlafly's brewpub. They have some very good beers - the pale ale is very well done. If you head down to Laclede's Landing, make sure you hit Morgan Street Brewery. Later in the night, there will be a massive college crowd move in. Make sure that you go upstairs because they had different beers upstairs than they did downstairs when I was there.

Try the graham cracker porter and let me know what you think. I was very skeptical regarding this beer when I ordered it because I usually have a bad impression of beers with "gimmicky" flavors. This is a very well done porter, IMO, and I really want to duplicate it.

My wife and my mother in law (who will not drink beer unless it is Miller Lite or Blue Moon) even loved it. Very sweet, very smooth . . . and it tasted like graham crackers!

maybe use a good fraction of biscuit malt? interested to see how well you can replicate it. have you called and asked the brewer? maybe they'd be willing to share a scaled-down recipe with you, or at least give you some pointers.

Getting in touch with the brewer is my next step. I will keep you all updated on this one.

Just got off the phone with Mark Gottfried - the brewer at Morgan Street Brewery in St. Louis. He was an extremely nice guy and was very knowledgable about his beers. In fact, he was not at all weird about divulging information about the Graham Cracker Porter. He even told me the story of its creation and his initial failures when attempting to use low-fat graham crackers to flavor the beer.

Anyway, he uses a Graham Cracker flavoring that he is able to purchase. He is sending me his recipe, and for that I am very appreciative.

Further, he lagers his Porter! Since Morgan Street is a lager brewery, he decided to lager the porter. I am going to brew it up fairly soon, and I will keep ya'll updated if you want.

post up that recipe when you get it... sounds pretty interesting!!

sonvolt said:

If you are in St. Louis, you should definitely hit Schlafly's brewpub. They have some very good beers - the pale ale is very well done. If you head down to Laclede's Landing, make sure you hit Morgan Street Brewery. Later in the night, there will be a massive college crowd move in. Make sure that you go upstairs because they had different beers upstairs than they did downstairs when I was there.

Try the graham cracker porter and let me know what you think. I was very skeptical regarding this beer when I ordered it because I usually have a bad impression of beers with "gimmicky" flavors. This is a very well done porter, IMO, and I really want to duplicate it.

My wife and my mother in law (who will not drink beer unless it is Miller Lite or Blue Moon) even loved it. Very sweet, very smooth . . . and it tasted like graham crackers!

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Thanks for the info I'll try the graham cracker porter when I go there.

- magno

sonvolt said:

... definitely hit Schlafly's...

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I second that! I love all of Schlafly's beers. I usually pick some sixers to bring home when I'm down there!

Gonna have to try Morgan Street next trip. Never been. I love Laclede's Landing and can't believe I've missed it!

I went to Morgan Street Brewery last night. They didnt have the Graham Cracker Porter anymore, so I tried their Vienna Lager and Irish Stout. The Vienna had no head retention or hop presence, but a nice malt flavor. I liked the Irish Stout, it reminded me of Guiness Extra Stout. Upstairs they had the same beers as downstairs.

We were the college crowd last night, definitely the youngest of the five out of towners in the bar. On the way in, we got accosted by a carriage driver who said we could "get freaky" in his carriage. Then when we were leaving the parking lot, the attendent had to stop braiding someones hair to make our change. Interesting night.

Today we are trying to make a tour at Schafly's, which happens to be really close to where we are staying. I'll let you know what we find.

- magno

sonvolt, did you ever get the recipe for the graham cracker porter from Mark Gottfried?

Yeah, I've been waiting for this one too...

I went to St louis in june with my wife and had the Graham Cracker Prter I also toured the brewery . If you go to schlafly go to the Tap room they had a pale ale on cask that was quite good.

I liked the Schlafly beers more than the Morgan Street ones. I toured their brewery and had the 80 Shilling, the American Pale (different from their Pale Ale) and the Oatmeal Stout. The APA is right on the money, and the other two werent bad either. I picked up some others to take home as well.

I am trying to make it down to the tap room but I may not have time.

- magno

The recipe is not nearly as mysterious as I thought it may be. This is primarily due to the fact that Graham Cracker flavoring is used. Here is the recipe. Anyone know how much beer 16hl is?

500lbs 2-Row
165lbs Dark Munich
22lbs Dark Crystal
55lbs Chocolate Malt
33lbs Black Malt

Step Mash:
45min @ 63C
45min @ 73C
Mash off and lauter @ 81C

50% German Tettnang @ Boil
25% German Tettnang @ 30 min
25% German Tettnang @ Whirlpool

20 IBU's

WLP 830 Yeast (White Labs)

230ml Virginia Dare Graham Cracker Food Flavoring Water Soluable added
at filtration

Yeild: 16hl

the google conversion calculator comes to the rescue!

16 hectoliter = 422.675282 US gallon

so can you just stop at the local grocery store and buy graham cracker flavoring?

sonvolt said:

Anyone know how much beer 16hl is?

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16hl = 16 hectoliters...
a hectoliter is a hundred liters....

so 16hl = ~422 gallons (almost 14 barrels)

artfldodger said:

so can you just stop at the local grocery store and buy graham cracker flavoring?

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No, I don't think so. The brewer mentioned that he gets from here.

I am not sure if you can order from them or not.

So this is looking like this?

Amount Item Type % or IBU
6 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) UK (3.0 SRM) Grain 64.8 %
2 lbs Munich Malt - 20L (20.0 SRM) Grain 21.6 %
10.0 oz Chocolate Malt (450.0 SRM) Grain 6.8 %
6.0 oz Black (Patent) Malt (500.0 SRM) Grain 4.1 %
4.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 2.7 %
1.00 oz Tettnang [4.50%] (60 min) Hops 16.6 IBU
0.50 oz Tettnang [4.50%] (20 min) Hops 5.0 IBU
0.50 oz Tettnang [4.50%] (0 min) (Aroma Hop-Steep) Hops -
1 Pkgs German Lager (White Labs #WLP830) Yeast-Lager

1/10 oz Graham Cracker Food Flavoring (water soluble) at flame out

Beer Profile

Est Original Gravity: 1.049 SG
Measured Original Gravity: 1.010 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.011 SG Measured Final Gravity: 1.005 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 4.9 % Actual Alcohol by Vol: 0.6 %
Bitterness: 21.6 IBU Calories: 43 cal/pint
Est Color: 37.3 SRM

How did this beer turn out? I was thinking about a graham cracker porter or stout today while eating surprise, surprise.......graham crackers.

todd_k said:

How did this beer turn out? I was thinking about a graham cracker porter or stout today while eating surprise, surprise.......graham crackers.

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Nope. Without access to that Graham Cracker flavoring, I did not even attempt the beer.

They make liquid graham cracker flavoring? That's so bizarre.

Anyway, graham crackers get their distinctive flavor largely due to the graham flour and honey used. I guess if you really wanted to experiment...

Graham cracker extract.

http://www.foodzar.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=BICKFORDP1001&click=1640

-J

miatawnt2b said:

Graham cracker extract.

http://www.foodzar.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=BICKFORDP1001&click=1640

-J

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This is years in the making, finally I can brew this....been waiting long enough.
Seriously though, nice find, how'd you find this old thread? Chicken and the egg if you know what I mean?

I can't remember how I found the thread, but I had seen it a few (maybe 2) months back, thought it looked awesome and started the search for extracts. I contacted several vendors including the one listed near the beginning, but had no luck finding someone to sell in small amounts. Yesterday I needed some lemongrass extract for a lemongrass heffe, and decided at the same time to search again for the graham cracker extract. Bingo! My brew schedule is full, so if someone brews this, please let me/us know how it turns out.
-J

holy thread resurrection batman!

I'm glad I got to read it though, this might have to get brewed... Although I really dislike the wlp830. That's a lager yeast which really doesn't belong in a porter. And I can't lager. I'd thing a good neutral yeast would do this well.

In a few of my ice cream recipes that I've done at home or work we've soaked stale cake in the base until it dissolves and then spin the ice cream. I wonder if soaking the graham crackers in primary and then racking into secondary would promote good flavor, or would destroy it.

Eh, I wouldn't add the extract at flameout, I would just add it at bottling/kegging. That way you can dose it to exactly where you want it, and you don't have to worry about the fermentation scrubbing out any of the aromatics.

bump - anyone have results?

Anyone considering this might want to listen to the basic brewing "Iron Brewer" competition episode. You might want to try adding some whole graham crackers into your mash tun.....like they did with ice box oatmeal cookies.

January 14, 2010 - GBS Iron Brewer Competition
Jeff Britton, president of the Garage Brewers Society of O'Fallon, Missouri, explains his club's current contest centering around mystery ingredients.

Click to listen- http://media.libsyn.com/media/basicbrewing/bbr01-14-10iron.mp3

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My centennial cream ale with 1/2 pound of tortilla chips in the mash tun got rave reviews by two Bjcp judges at the Big brew day on Sat. they couldn't believe what I did.

Saw this resurrected the other day. I don't typically like porters or stouts unless they have some added flavoring and this peaked my interest. Not sure what the ingredients are or how it would work as a flavoring exactly but here's a link to a small amount of graham cracker extract.

http://capellaflavordrops.com/grahamcracker.aspx

so, 2 years later...how did this turn out? i would like to make a smores style oatmeal-milk stout but some Nay sayers on BA are telling me it shouldnt be done. (of course i was just going to add the actual graham crackers)

also, if you liked the extract and have a new link or something to share i would appreciate it. the last link appears to be dead.

Another thought, an issue of BYO a few months ago had brewers making beers with breakfast cereals in the mash. What about using Golden Grahams?

nice...i have that issue.

BTW people tell me im crazy but i swear that golden grahams used to have little marshmallows in there

I hate to be a purist, but seriously, this Virginia Dare thing is a little lame. I respect people's tastes, but going to a website with a guy with a lab coat on the home page who probably isolated the exact compounds that created a taste/aroma and then put it into a liquid form, then throwing it in whatever the hell we feel like to make it taste as such. That's acceptable perhaps for vitamins, but we're going through all this trouble to hit the right mash Ph, the right sparge temp, the right sparge length, carefully selecting the right hops with the right AA and cohumulone, striving for efficiency, proper yeast pitching rates, etc....and then you dump in a chemical that tastes like graham crackers that some tool made in a lab.

I feel like we all put in too much work just to concede this final, and beer-flavor-defining portion of the recipe to something that is store-bought, and irreplicable if this "Virginia Dare" went out of business. Let's try to make a chocolate stout without dumping NesQuik in it, ey boys? 200 years ago they couldn't dump NesQuik in.

I'm not dissing technology, I'm just dissing the cop-out that it sometimes creates.

The Capella drops are available on Amazon.

hedonist91 said:

...and then you dump in a chemical

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i absolutely agree, especially after using the capella graham cracker extract. in small amounts it's fun for a secret spice or sorts, BUT it does contain propylene glycol a/k/a anti freeze in it. "Ingredients: Natural & Artificial flavor, propylene glycol, water, and/or caramel color." it also has made the beers taste thin, but that could be a separate matter from adjuncts.