So I recently posted a thread regarding my search for a Mexican Cake clone recipe, and was fruitless. Seems as though nobody has a decently close one. So I emailed the brewery itself, and much to my surprise, got a response. The result of that conversation is pasted below. Obviously they can't go giving out everything, so I'm working with my local brew shop owner (whose specialty is stouts) in an effort to finalize a recipe. I'll paste it below once we work it out. In the meantime, here is what I was given by Westbrook Brewery, with my contacts name anonymized, just in case:
Hey Erik,
For reasons that I hope are apparent, I won't go into details regarding much of this, but I will give you some guidance.
Malt bill isn't too crazy: you can go with a basic big stout malt bill (something with Chocolate, Dark/ExtraDark Crystal) bill and adjust it for ~10.5%. We do add a little bit of flaked oats to give it a slightly creamier mouth-feel. We also add Dextrose and Dark Belgian Candi Syrup (end of boil/whirlpool) to help get us enough sugar to hit 10.5%. Target OG: 1.1034 and Target FG: 1.0233.
We use basic CTZ (Columbus, Tomahawk, and/or Zeus) hopping for bitterness (60 minutes). No further hop additions.
We use our house english ale yeast. Again, nothing too special here.
Mash Water at 172 F shooting for 150 F at rest.
Regarding Adjuncts: We add all of the adjuncts to our bright tanks so I would recommend adding to your secondary for 3-5 days. Ratio wise, you will probably want to shoot for something like 1 : 5 : 10 : 15 (ground cinnamon : vanilla bean : habanero : cocoa nibs). The exact quantities don't scale to a homebrew size well (it's not very linear, and you will probably need a higher #/gal than we do). The habanero and cinnamon can be blended together using a blender or food processor. The vanilla bean can be chopped into bits, but leave the cocoa nibs whole. The biggest problem comes with the habaneros though. The amount of heat they provide can vary wildly from crop to crop. We usually end up adding more habaneros after a couple days to try to get the heat where we want it and sometimes have to do this multiple times. They are very tricky to work with.
I hope you find this helpful,
Hey Erik,
For reasons that I hope are apparent, I won't go into details regarding much of this, but I will give you some guidance.
Malt bill isn't too crazy: you can go with a basic big stout malt bill (something with Chocolate, Dark/ExtraDark Crystal) bill and adjust it for ~10.5%. We do add a little bit of flaked oats to give it a slightly creamier mouth-feel. We also add Dextrose and Dark Belgian Candi Syrup (end of boil/whirlpool) to help get us enough sugar to hit 10.5%. Target OG: 1.1034 and Target FG: 1.0233.
We use basic CTZ (Columbus, Tomahawk, and/or Zeus) hopping for bitterness (60 minutes). No further hop additions.
We use our house english ale yeast. Again, nothing too special here.
Mash Water at 172 F shooting for 150 F at rest.
Regarding Adjuncts: We add all of the adjuncts to our bright tanks so I would recommend adding to your secondary for 3-5 days. Ratio wise, you will probably want to shoot for something like 1 : 5 : 10 : 15 (ground cinnamon : vanilla bean : habanero : cocoa nibs). The exact quantities don't scale to a homebrew size well (it's not very linear, and you will probably need a higher #/gal than we do). The habanero and cinnamon can be blended together using a blender or food processor. The vanilla bean can be chopped into bits, but leave the cocoa nibs whole. The biggest problem comes with the habaneros though. The amount of heat they provide can vary wildly from crop to crop. We usually end up adding more habaneros after a couple days to try to get the heat where we want it and sometimes have to do this multiple times. They are very tricky to work with.
I hope you find this helpful,
