Bourbon County Stout clone attempt

[mbbransc]

Checked the gravity yesterday; 1.048. I was hoping to hit 1.040 which for some reason sticks in my head as the target FG. I could be wrong. It tasted really nice. Not cloying at all. No heat at all. Has a nice chocolatey coffee finish. I have to say, I'm a bit surprised how palatable it is so early. I've brewed much smaller stouts that took much more time to come around. I gave each fermenter a good swirl to kick up some (no doubt tired) yeast, and turned off temp control. Ambient is about 74°-76° during the day. We'll see if I can get it down a couple more points. I'm planning to add bourbon and oak spirals to (1) fermenter, and rye whiskey and fresh vanilla tincture to the other (Vanilla Rye, anyone?).

 

[tjosborne]

I purchased the ingredients for this one but forgot to get 1056. Out of 1728 and 1028 which should work best? Or should I wait until I order again and just pick up 1056?

 

[BrewCityBaller]

I purchased the ingredients for this one but forgot to get 1056. Out of 1728 and 1028 which should work best? Or should I wait until I order again and just pick up 1056?

I would wait for sure. Neither of those are neutral enough and I don't know how they'll play with the high alcohol.

 

[smagic14]

Attempted 10 gallons of this beast today. Hit my og of 1.125 on the dot! Great day so far now to chill

View attachment 1487712027325.jpg

View attachment 1487712036121.jpg

 

[Tijuanatovar]

Picking this thread back up. Starting a brew on this to age for the colder weather around the corner. How has this recipe turned out for people? Anything they would change on the malt/yeast or even water profile? I'd like to know what salts, if any, people are adding. As well as mash and boil PH. Will attempt this beast this month and trying to glean as much info as possible. Cheers

 

[abrew2u]

Just kegged mine today and of course I had to try a little,it's been in secondary on 8 oz of bourbon 2 0z oak chips and 3 vanilla beans for 7 months
Has lots of bourbon,alcohol burn,nice oak flavour,lots of chocolate and toasty undertones very little vanilla,hope it comes out more with it carbed

 

[urg8rb8]

So what's the verdict on this thread? What's the "proven" go-to recipe? I'd like to try my hand at this. Is everyone using vanilla beans? Or are they getting the vanilla flavor from the oak?

 

[ultravista]

Does the base recipe change year to year? What is the latest homebrew recipe?

 

[Tijuanatovar]

The BCBS recipe is found here, which is pretty simple but not simple to brew really, unless you’ve done it plenty of times. I attempted this recipe but on a lesser attempt with 1098 OG and 1027 FG. While it isn’t exactly tasting like BCBS, it’s in the right direction. If you’re considering this brew, I recommend starting right now with getting some air dried white oak and cutting up some small blocks small enough to fit in a mason jar and charring the crap out of them and tossing them each in a jar with your desired spirit, bourbon for BCBS obviously. And age these as long as possible. That will mimic as best as possible the barrel and bourbon notes you get from these style brews without the big ass 55g barrels. This link was helpful.

http://www.bertusbrewery.com/2015/12/barrel-aged-stouts-and-charred-oak.html

Anyone else have any other ideas, thoughts, advice?

 

[urg8rb8]

What about using heavy toast oak cubes?

 

[ultravista]

Does the base recipe change each year? Has anyone come close to cloning it yet?

 

[urg8rb8]

Does the base recipe change each year? Has anyone come close to cloning it yet?

That's what I want to know!

 

[smagic14]

View attachment 311027

I used this recipe and it is very close obviously hard to recreate the barrel and bourbon flavor but I enjoy the taste of my version where I aged it in a keg with oak cubes that were soaked in makers Mark for 7 months.

 

[urg8rb8]

I used this recipe and it is very close obviously hard to recreate the barrel and bourbon flavor but I enjoy the taste of my version where I aged it in a keg with oak cubes that were soaked in makers Mark for 7 months. View attachment 553339

Thanks for sharing this. Gotta try it now!

 

[smagic14]

I should clarify... I aged the cubes in the whiskey for 6 weeks then added to beer which was aged in a sealed keg at room temperature for 7 months then placed in kegerator. Came out to around 12 percent, i am sending it to a competition next month to see how I did

I made 10 gallons and maxed out my 120 quart cooler

 

[urg8rb8]

I should clarify... I aged the cubes in the whiskey for 6 weeks then added to beer which was aged in a sealed keg at room temperature for 7 months then placed in kegerator. Came out to around 12 percent, i am sending it to a competition next month to see how I did

Did you use heavy toast cubes? Let us know how it does in the competition.

 

[smagic14]

I used medium I believe but don't quote me on that it's been over a year and I didn't take too good of notes back then

 

[urg8rb8]

How much oak did you use? How much bourbon did you soak it in? Did you pour all the bourbon together with oak into the beer?

 

[smagic14]

https://www.northernbrewer.com/oak-cubes-american-medium-toast

3 oz of cubes the enough makers Mark bourbon to cover the cubes I a quart Mason jar, I added half the cubes to one keg with no bourbon

I added the other half of the cubes to another keg with half the bourbon.. I'd recommend this option

 

[urg8rb8]

https://www.northernbrewer.com/oak-cubes-american-medium-toast

3 oz of cubes the enough makers Mark bourbon to cover the cubes I a quart Mason jar, I added half the cubes to one keg with no bourbon

I added the other half of the cubes to another keg with half the bourbon.. I'd recommend this option

And each keg is 5 gallons? So 1.5 oz of cubes for 5 gallons, I'll probably use Jim Bean or some other whiskey I have laying around.

Thanks! I can't wait to do this. I hope it comes out close.

 

[smagic14]

Yeah each keg is 5 gallons

 

[bg1414]

The grain % that GI uses is:

64% 2 Row
21% Bolander Munich Malt
4% Chocolate Malt
4% Caramel 60
4% Roasted barley
3% Debittered Black Malt

Those % are from GI brew log sheets for this years BCBS, however, I would wager that is the % every year and the slight differences are crop differences, efficiency and aging.

I brewed a 6 gallon batch using the percentages above. Did a no sparge mash hitting 55% efficiency in my new 70qt Coleman Extreme. OG came out to 1.129. It's still fermenting like a champ 4 days later. I plan to age for a month in a 5 gallon Balcones Barrel then bulk age in a keg for 6 months before bottling. We'll see how this goes. Looked great going into carboy. Motor oil for sure.

 

[ATOpro]

I brewed a 6 gallon batch using the percentages above. Did a no sparge mash hitting 55% efficiency in my new 70qt Coleman Extreme. OG came out to 1.129. It's still fermenting like a champ 4 days later. I plan to age for a month in a 5 gallon Balcones Barrel then bulk age in a keg for 6 months before bottling. We'll see how this goes. Looked great going into carboy. Motor oil for sure.

bq1414- Can you please post your grain bill in pounds? I'm trying to brew this on Sunday. Also what was your mash temp, strike temp, & preboil volume?

 

[jammin]

bq1414- Can you please post your grain bill in pounds

FWIW - Getting a recipe in pounds won't give you a duplicate batch. You need to learn your system's efficiency and then you can scale the grains to meet your batch size. A recipe like this is like similar to an annoying word problem in math class due to a couple things. High gravity & lots of dark grains decrease efficiency quite a bit. To make matters worse, the huge grain bill means that most of us will be nearly maxing out our mash tuns which forces us to decrease mash ratio.
A low mash ratio (1.25 quarts mash water ≤ 1lb of grist) & an appreciable amount of roasted (& crystal) malts will lower your normal efficiency. As noted, @bg1414 hit 55% efficiency which is quite low compared to what he/most home brewers probably get (+75%).
Brewing software makes all these crazy numbers much easier to digest. Lots of options out there to choose from. Personally, I like Brewers Friend. Here is a quick mock-up I did there for you at the same 6g batch size & 55% efficiency.
Cheers

 

[smagic14]

bq1414- Can you please post your grain bill in pounds? I'm trying to brew this on Sunday. Also what was your mash temp, strike temp, & preboil volume?

This is the recipe I used

 

[ATOpro]

This is the recipe I used View attachment 555355

Referencing the BYO recipe above, Are you supposed to add water to the post boil volume to achieve 5 gallons if your evaporation rate is higher than 1gal/hr?

 

[bg1414]

bq1414- Can you please post your grain bill in pounds? I'm trying to brew this on Sunday. Also what was your mash temp, strike temp, & preboil volume?

sorry for late reply. Below is what i used. I estimated a 60% efficiency but got 55% and added 2lb DME to hit OG of 1.129. It was the first time using the coleman so i missed my mash temp by 5 degrees or so (it was cold outside and took awhile to fill that sob), but i think it was a good thing for the yeast in the end. It's still bubbling about 10 times a minute 2 weeks later, checked gravity a few days ago and it was 1.045 so hopefully will finish between 1.035-1.040ish which i'd be happy with.

25# 2 row
8.25# Munich 10L
1# 10oz each of Caramel 60L, Chocolate and Roasted
1# 2oz Debittered Black

Targeted a mash temp of 154, hit around 148-150 degrees, mashed in with close to 14.14 gallons of water (slightly lower than that so i could get the lid shut). mashed for 90 min and sparged SLOW. Worked out great but was a long ass day.

 

[bg1414]

 

[smagic14]

All bottled and ready to age!

 

[urg8rb8]

So all you guys used the same recipe??