Sweet Stout Left Hand Milk Stout Clone

Thank you for this fantastic recipe. Followed to the letter and it was amazing.

 

I've brewed this twice now and we are almost through our 2nd batch. Thanks for the great recipe.

 

So I'm brewing this next week, and its going to be my first stout so I'm pretty excited. Anyway my question is this...I've been reading a lot about protein rests to bring out the enzymes during the mash on unmodified malts such as flaked oats, flaked barley, roasted barley etc which are used fairly largely in a stout. Do you think this would be a bad idea with this beer? Or do you think it would water it down or take away from the body too much? Any thoughts?

 

That won't be necessary for 2 reasons - reason one is that protein rests are done in part to reduce the proteins that would be responsible for chill haze, and protein haze isn't an issue in a stout because it is black. Reason 2 is that flaked grains are not malted and have no diastolic power. However the base malt in the recipe is more than adequate to convert the starches in the grains. I recommend making it to the book the first time, and then decide if you want to change something after that.

 

Thank you for the input and thorough answer, good sir!

 

Im going to use this recipe this weekend. Anybody else have any luck using this?

 

I brewed this up last fall. Great tasting beer with a lot of great comments from my beer drinking friends.

I sent it into the Boneyard comp. Scored a 30 and 32. Both judges commented it was a great drinking beer, but was too roasty for a sweet stout. Out of style I guess.

Next time I may try adding the roasted grains late in the mash or simply cut back on the chocolate malt.

 

I have everything except the Munich malt. Will this be a problem? Should I add more crystal?

 

No. This is a heavier beer as it is, you don't want added crystal. Just roll without it, maybe add a pound of base malt.

 

Sounds great thanks!

 

I've brewed variations of this 3 times now and all have been terrific. Question for the all grain brewers: Has anyone mashed this beer really low? Like ~144-146? I've always had this beer end up around 1.028 because of the lactose, but I'd like something with less body for the summer. I've also felt the roasted barley took a backseat to the lactose sweetness and I'd like to bring it a little more to the front.

I'm thinking the lactose will still keep enough sweetness to balance the roasted barley but the thinner body might make it more appealing on a hot summer evening.

 

Brewing this one up in a couple hours when my wife/brewers helper gets off work. Can't wait

 

So i took a sample while racking to my carboy and my OG is 1.074. I think that's a bit high, I'm still learning about efficiency so is this a good or a bad thing?

 

Does that include your lactose? For this I personally think it's a good thing. I got 1.066 and it only went down to 1.028 giving me barely 5% ABV. I was hoping for at least 6%.

 

My OG was only 1.052 and I'm not sure why. I used the partial mash recipe and it should have been over 1.060. This was my first partial mash so maybe I did something wrong

 

I did a full mash and the sparge went a lot faster than I thought it would for a 5 gal batch. And I took the sample before I pitched in my yeast. I guess I could be looking at a pretty big beer now, I'll let you know in a couple weeks when I go to the secondary

 

Is the 21 days in the primary accurate? Mine has been in for a week and its seems to be done moving around for the most part. I was going to go to a secondary in another week but will this mess with the flavor before bottling?

 

DoubleDuse,

I pulled mine out of primary after 2 weeks, but I was on a time crunch to get the beer kegged for a New Years party.

It was technically "done" according to the SG, but I think that giving it another week would have helped the flavor a little better. Its so far been the best beer I've made, even with rushing it.

I guess check the SG, and if its where its supposed to be, then decide what to do. I don't really see the point of transferring to a secondary for this beer though. Its not like its being dry-hopped or flavored with something at this point, so leaving it in primary until bottling is probably your best bet.

 

I think the graininess drops out and you get a cleaner flavor with a secondary fermentation on this beer.

 

Thanks for the advice, I lent my secondary out last week so I guess she'll stay in the primary until this weekend, planning on bottling it up Saturday!!!!

 

This recipe is a solid W.I.N. best beer I've made to date, and probably best stout I've had.

My OG was 1.066 and finished at 1.017. It stayed in primary for 45 days @ 68 and racked right to keg and force carbed to about 1.7

Not too sweet super smooth its like a nice cup if coffee. Thanks for this winner.

Oh... And I personally feel it has a slight edge on the original. I feel like its smoother.

 

I was curious if the lactose is factored in to the OG at 1.062.

When one is working up the ppg on a grain bill I assume you do not include non-fermentables but don't they add to the OG?

Does anyone know how this works?

 

It will add gravity for sure. It seems if you add it on the fermentable a section of most brewing software, it treats it like a regular fermentable sugar for starting and finishing gravity. If you put it under misc, you don't capture gravity at all. I just put it in the brewing grains/fermentables section and know the program is dumb.

FYI, I don't pay for my software, so I can overlook it. If I paid for a software package, I'd be working with them to fix the bug.

 

I use BeerAlchemy and it treats lactose like a nonfermentable sugar so I don't have to do any additional calculations.

 

Bottled this morning, smells really good. My FG came out to 1.034 so I'm looking at about 5.8%. HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY

 

I just bottled this on Sunday, FG of 1.022 .. Tasted so good when I racked into the bottling bucket, I almost didn't want to carb it!

 

So after a week of conditioning in the bottles I decided it was time for a sample. It tasted so good that it turned into five 12 ounce samples. Quite possibly my best brew yet. Happy Easter everyone

 

10 days after bottling, delicious. really excited to see how this one turns out after 3 weeks

thanks for the recipe!!

 

Damn this beer is good..

DEFINITELY making it again.

Thanks for the recipe!!

 

IMHO this beer needs to bottle condition about ~8 weeks. It is good at ~4 weeks but the additional time really makes this beer very delicious. The coffee/chocolate/milk notes certainly are more developed with additional time.

I do agree that this recipe produced a very good Milk Stout! This is probably one of the best beers I have brewed and I am not a huge Stout fan.

 

I'll agree with that. The few bottles that last that long are excellent.

 

This one is next in my rotation. Can't wait to get to it after all the Belgians and saisons are gone!

 

Excellent recipe! Kegged this a week ago, after 28 days in the primary, and the early samples are outstanding.
Will definitely brew again, next time with a split secondary, half on cocoa nibs, half on vanilla beans. And will probably bottle the next batch for some longer term conditioning.

 

+1 awesome recipe. Definitely will be brewing this again

 

So the second time I brewed this it was for a party, and about half the keg was left over. The party pump probably oxidized the crap out of it, and it sat at room temperature for 3 days before being bottled (using proper beer gun). Turns out, even the oxidation and fluctuating temperatures can't ruin this beer! Still delicious! A local brewer in Sellwood, OR tried it, and he is brewing a half barrel to go on tap in a couple of weeks.

 

Noob to all grain here. Can anyone give me a heads up on how to treat RO water for this? Would just the one tsp of calcium chloride be sufficient or should I add anything else?

 

This article should help you understand the basics of water chemistry.

http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f128/brewing-water-chemistry-primer-198460/

I also use the EZ water calculator. Just plug your numbers in and change the values. It takes about a 1/2 hour to figure out

 

That EZ water calc is nice. How would I plug in the flaked oats and barley? Would I list that as other? Would those really have much of an influence on pH at all?

 

What was the mash size for 5 gallon batch?