Canadian Breakfast Stout recipe ideas??

[JOHN51277]

I have heard great things about this one! Founders limited production Canadian Breakfast Stout........

Well, I am searching for some ideas on how to incorporate the maple syrup into the stout without fermenting all the good syrupy flavor out of it. Has anyone used maple syrup with good reusults? Or does anyone have some sort of clone recipe for this one?

I was thinking of doing the regular KBS clone I have now, and subtract the oak and bourbon, and using pure maple syrup in the secondary, or at 5 mins left in the boil.

 

[SumnerH]

http://www.themadfermentationist.com/2009/11/breakfast-stout-riff.html has the base Breakfast Stout version one member here (OldSock) tried.
http://www.themadfermentationist.com/2009/12/chile-cocoa-coffee-vanilla-maple.html has the infusion he used for the Canadian version (note that this is for 1 gallon):

The "Canadian Breakfast" portion got a touch less chocolate paste (1.375 oz), along with 2 oz of the bourbonized maple syrup [SumnerH: he explained how to make this on the first page], and 1.25 oz of the cubes that had been soaking in it (which spent several months in bourbon before that). 24 hours before bottling I added 2 oz of whole El Salvadorian coffee beans to the fermenter. That is about double what I would normally use because of the lower surface area (in the past I have done coarse crushed beans), if nothing else it made transferring the beer off the coffee much easier.

This is the only one that saw significant fermentation in secondary, it also had by far the largest yeast cake in the bottom of the fermenter. I am hoping that the sugars from fermentation were completely fermented out before I bottled, despite the fact that it was pretty cold in my basement the last few weeks.

His tasting notes are at http://www.themadfermentationist.com/2010/05/coffee-chocolate-maple-imperial-stout.html including a note for the future: "Next time I'll age the beer on the cubes longer and add more than 2 oz of syrup per gallon, starting at a lower gravity to compensate."

 

[dukeredhair]

I've not tried it and I am not sure of the calculations (so this isn't terribly helpful but it might point you in the right direction) , BUT I now a guy who used the maple syrup as the bottling sugar and it tasted great. Definitely a strong maple flavor but he was from Vermont and proud of his home grown maple so he was all about it.

 

[moosetav]

I had CBS and KBS this weekend @ Founders in Grand Rapids.......I didn't want to ever leave. Godspeed, and if you come up with something good be sure to let us know.

 

[JOHN51277]

I have the grains/hops all ready to make the KBS clone this weekend. The CBS is about 2% ABV less than the KBS. I wonder if I should just throw about 2.5-3 oz maple syrup per gallon in and make it a hybrid KBS/CBS. I think that would be somewhere around MBS, AKA Michigan Breakfast Stout. Makes sense, afterall, Founders is in MI!

 

[Oldsock]

Well I guess I don't have anything else to add…

The extra ABV in KBS might just be from the barrel, since they are freshly dumped spirit barrels and CBS is held in barrels that held maple syrup. Make sure to get grade B syrup, lots more flavor than the light grade A stuff.

Also make sure to go for moderate-low carbonation, I should have batch primed and been more precise rather than bottle priming. Using maple syrup is a fine idea, but the amount of carbonation you get will be less predictable since you won’t know the exact fermentability of the syrup.

 

[JOHN51277]

I always keg my beer and then bottle once I get it at the desired carbonation. I never knew about the Grade B syrup, thanks for the tip!

 

[Oldsock]

I never knew about the Grade B syrup, thanks for the tip!

Sadly despite the name it costs just as much as grade A, you should be able to find it at places like Trader Joe's or Whole Foods, might not see it at a mega-mart.

 

[SumnerH]

Well I guess I don't have anything else to add…

Apologies for stealing your thunder, I just spent a lot of time on those pages working out a try at a Hunahpu's-style RIS (which is largely based on yours).

On the cocoa front (posting in this thread since this would apply equally to the Canadian Breakfast riff), I wound up going with a smaller amount of non-Dutch-process as I couldn't find the latter (in hindsight I should have checked Whole Foods). Thoughts on whether that's going to bitter things overly much? I used 3 oz in a 5 gallon batch (along with 2 vanilla beans, 1.2 oz ancho, .8 oz pasilla, .5 oz mulato, and 5.5 g cinnamon).

 

[Oldsock]

Apologies for stealing your thunder, I just spent a lot of time on those pages working out a try at a Hunahpu's-style RIS (which is largely based on yours).

On the cocoa front (posting in this thread since this would apply equally to the Canadian Breakfast riff), I wound up going with a smaller amount of non-Dutch-process as I couldn't find the latter (in hindsight I should have checked Whole Foods). Thoughts on whether that's going to bitter things overly much? I used 3 oz in a 5 gallon batch (along with 2 vanilla beans, 1.2 oz ancho, .8 oz pasilla, .5 oz mulato, and 5.5 g cinnamon).

Just kidding, I always appreciate when people find my posts interesting enough to link to them (espically when they take the time to post links to all the relevent pages). I'm actually annoyed in real life when I try to tell a friend about a beer I brewed and they respond, "Yeah, I read that post." The blog ruins all my good material.

Hopefully the Hunnahpu's comes out well, I really liked my version (although the original was a bit thicker/richer). I don't think the "natural" cocoa will be an issue, I've done a few beers with it without issue.

 

[SumnerH]

Hopefully the Hunnahpu's comes out well, I really liked my version (although the original was a bit thicker/richer). I don't think the "natural" cocoa will be an issue, I've done a few beers with it without issue.

Mine grain bill was a little simpler than yours, too; the biggest variances were all British chocolate instead of both Belgian and British, no black patent, and more roasted barley:
13 lb. British pale (74%)
7 oz. American crystal 120L (2.5%)
10 oz. Carafa II (3.6%)
1 lb. British chocolate (5.7%)
13 oz. Roasted barley (4.6%)
1 lb. 10 oz. Rolled oats (9.3%)

It's a couple of weeks in bottles now, I'll probably get impatient and crack one open in a month or so. The hydro samples sure tasted good; if the chili presence stays about the same I'll be pretty happy with it.

 

[Oldsock]

Mine grain bill was a little simpler than yours, too; the biggest variances were all British chocolate instead of both Belgian and British, no black patent, and more roasted barley:
13 lb. British pale (74%)
7 oz. American crystal 120L (2.5%)
10 oz. Carafa II (3.6%)
1 lb. British chocolate (5.7%)
13 oz. Roasted barley (4.6%)
1 lb. 10 oz. Rolled oats (9.3%)

It's a couple of weeks in bottles now, I'll probably get impatient and crack one open in a month or so. The hydro samples sure tasted good; if the chili presence stays about the same I'll be pretty happy with it.

Looks tasty, if you ever want to get together at a homebrew club meeting or one of our places to taste the two beers side-by-side let me know (seeing as how we live so close).

 

[mtnagel]

Bump.

I'm thinking of brewing up a couple gallons of the BYO Breakfast Stout clone and splitting into 2 x 1 gallon secondaries and making one a CBS and one a KBS.

It sounds like from what I've read online that adding syrup (whether to the boil, secondary or at bottling) won't give you much maple flavor. I'm thinking of using some maple extract for the maple flavor. I'm also thinking of using bourbon and oak chips to round it out.

Anyone have any advice on getting that maple flavor like CBS? I only had a portion of 5 oz sample like 3 years ago, but I remember it was awesome!

 

[GuldTuborg]

Um...there's no Canadian Bacon in this recipe? What kind of breakfast is that?

 

[mtnagel]

No one like the Rouge Voodoo Bacon Maple ale, so I'm not going for that!

Actually, thinking new plan may to be just try 2 gallons of CBS. 1 gallon would get the maple extract and one would get maple syrup to the bottle. Those seem to be the only good ways to get maple flavor. Then I'm only wasting a little bit if they don't work and I can tweak them if they are good, but need to change something.

Anyone else have any thoughts?

 

[mtnagel]

Just to update this, I ended up trying this. I used the BYO Founder's Breakfast stout clone as the base.

Then I added a bit of oak to secondary (to mimic the maple syrup barrels that Founder's used). I used 1 oz medium toast chips soaked for a week in whiskey. I drained off the whiskey and added the chips to secondary along with the coffee addition. After 1 week, I split the 3 gallon batch into three 1 gallon batches at bottling:
1) control - nothing; primed with corn sugar
2) maple syrup - primed with 100% grade B maple syrup
3) maple flavor - used 20 g of natural maple flavor (not extract) in 1 gallon at bottling; primed with corn sugar

I tasted all 3 bottles around ~6 weeks in the bottle.

1) the control tasted great. Hard to pick out the oak with all the other strong flavors in there.
2) maple syrup as priming sugar - No difference from the control. Great beer, but no maple.
3) maple flavor added - definitely can taste maple in there and tasted pretty good, but not the "hit you over the head" maple flavor I was looking for. Next time I'd add more, but obviously this is dependent on the strength of your maple flavor and your tastes.

 

[mtnagel]

UPDATE:

8 months after bottling. The maple flavor ones now have a more prominent maple flavor, maybe because of the other flavors are being reduced. Anyway, it smells great and tastes pretty good. Still not CBS good though.

Next attempt is already planned. I'm going to soak some oak chips in pure maple syrup for a couple weeks and then put them in secondary. I also plan to add some more maple flavor to one of those batches. Thinking separating into 3 one gallon secondaries to test 3 different things. Will update when that happens.

 

[svendryden]

Hey mtnagel, did you end up doing round 2 with the maple syrup soaked chips? How did it turn out?

I'm planning a KBS(-ish) brew day soon and wanted to do 1-3 gallons with a maple kick, wondering if you have any new insights?

And instead of using the maple syrup as priming sugar, has anyone considered "de-activating" or removing the yeast before adding the maple syrup?
This might only work for keg carbonating, but what if the beer is cold crashed and filtered with a .5 micron filter to remove most to all yeast and then have the maple syrup added?
I'd hope it would be mostly a flavoring at this point.
Obviously, I would think the beer would need to be properly aged before doing so, and therefore not overly practical... but theoretically possible.

The only other method I can think of is to take a shot at finding the max alcohol tolerance of the chosen yeast and try to make it go dormant before adding the syrup.

Or maybe combining some of both methods by using a high flocc'ing low-ish tolerance english ale yeast like 1187 or 1335 (that should stop around 10% and maybe be easier to remove).

Hopefully it worked for you. If I end up doing one of these methods, I'll update with my findings.

 

[Oophaga]

I noticed on first tasting of CBS that it is most likely a very different base recipe than both KBS and Breakfast stout. Its body and flavor is way higher than both the others. I know when reading on their descriptions that make it seem that they are in fact different bases.

 

[Oldsock]

I recently brewed a riff on HoTD's Adam with maple. Ended up adding a quart of grade B maple syrup in 5 gallons and the flavor is still subtle. This was in primary, but after the bulk of fermentation was complete. I've read that some much-sought-after maple beers are as high as 10% by volume maple syrup. I wouldn't want that much simple sugar in the beer, but I could see adding a cup in the keg once the beer was cold.

 

[Oophaga]

If you are not against using spicing I keep reading that the right amount of fenugreek is a great way to add maple notes.

 

[mtnagel]

Hey mtnagel, did you end up doing round 2 with the maple syrup soaked chips? How did it turn out?

I did. I soaked the chips for about a month in grade B 100% pure maple syrup. When I was going to add them to the beer in secondary, I strained off the syrup and added the chips. I sampled after 5 and 11 days and there was no maple flavor unfortunately So at bottling, I added maple flavor to taste. I wanted a huge maple flavor, but I ended up overdoing it. I'm now at about 8 months since bottling and I haven't tried one in a few months, so I'm curious if the maple flavor will mellow out at all.

And instead of using the maple syrup as priming sugar, has anyone considered "de-activating" or removing the yeast before adding the maple syrup?

Not a bad idea if you are going to keg it.

 

[svendryden]

Ended up adding a quart of grade B maple syrup in 5 gallons and the flavor is still subtle. This was in primary, but after the bulk of fermentation was complete.

Thanks for the info Oldsock. At least we've had ample empirical evidence now which points to NOT adding the syrup too early (or at least not with any potentially active yeast in solution)

If you are not against using spicing I keep reading that the right amount of fenugreek is a great way to add maple notes.

Oophaga, appreciate the heads up. I've only seen Fenugreek as an ingredient in Curry dishes. Didn't realize it had a maple flavor. Maybe a combo of some fenugreek and maple extract would work, though I think I want to try it with the real thing first. Worst that could happen is that I raise the ABV on my beer and get subtle to no maple flavor like Oldsock/mtnagel and others found. I could then try the fenugreek/extract tincture (with some whiskey of course) to see if I can artificially add the flavor I need.

I sampled after 5 and 11 days and there was no maple flavor unfortunately So at bottling, I added maple flavor to taste. I wanted a huge maple flavor, but I ended up overdoing it. I'm now at about 8 months since bottling and I haven't tried one in a few months, so I'm curious if the maple flavor will mellow out at all.

mtnagel, sorry the chips didn't work out, but looks like we definitely need to look for a new method. The yeast just love that syrup too much to leave it intact. If and when you crack a bottle open, let us know how it turned out!

Of course, you could just make sure you pour some syrup into your glass before you pour your stout from the bottle! Might be cheating, but could be tasty

...but I could see adding a cup in the keg once the beer was cold.

Yeah, I think I will try kegging my stout, chilling and aging. Then after I feel the flavor profile is where I want it for an imperial stout (6 months - 1 year perhaps), I'll go ahead and filter 5 gallons as mentioned and try to pressure-transfer the filtered beer into a keg that I first add some maple syrup to... If it works, I might have to call it an Imperial Maple Sweet Stout, because that'll be a lot of unfermented sugar left over!

If I remember to, I'll have to update everyone sometime in 2016!

 

[mtnagel]

Of course, you could just make sure you pour some syrup into your glass before you pour your stout from the bottle! Might be cheating, but could be tasty

Ha! Great idea

 

[svendryden]

With a draft system, I wonder if you could use an inline syrup dispensing system like in a soda fountain?

Fill it with maple syrup and you could add all sorts of flavors at serving time...
Make a wheat, then combine it with fruit syrups on the fly...
Want extra chocolate in your Porter?
How about some Hop Syrup to bump the flavor on that IPA?

Not sure how practical it would be to use a dispensing system... but a couple Mrs. Buttersworth squeeze bottles cleaned and repurposed and you could flavor your beer with all sorts of things.

 

[jonnyhammastix]

Im taking my first stab at KBS/CBS this Saturday and i was wondering just for starters, how the coffee and chocolate additions turned out for everyone in this forum who have given this monster a try? Most of the discussion here i will be taking in with me along the conditioning process and into secondary. What methods did you guys use to get your coffee and chocolate in, and what types did you use?

 

[m00ps]

Im taking my first stab at KBS/CBS this Saturday and i was wondering just for starters, how the coffee and chocolate additions turned out for everyone in this forum who have given this monster a try? Most of the discussion here i will be taking in with me along the conditioning process and into secondary. What methods did you guys use to get your coffee and chocolate in, and what types did you use?

I've done a breakfast stout similar to founders 3 times now and these are my preferred methods from trial and error with coffee and chocolate

Chocolate - use cacao bins (4oz or so) boiled in some water to sanitize. I also like to add vanilla beans to get more of a milk chocolate character and round out the bitterness

Coffee - hands down whole beans in teh fermentor. Works better than grounds at flameout or cold pressing. Both of those methods got a fleeting coffee flavor for me that got nasty and astringent down the road. 3-4oz of whole beans like a dry hop works amazingly well. If you crawl through this thread and the founders breakfast stout clone thread, youll find similar opinions from people that tried it. The mad fermentationist is where I first read about this technique