Chocolate-Coffee-Raspberry Imperial Stout

[The Blow Leprechaun]

I am considering splitting into 2 batches, one chocolate raspberry, one chocolate espresso. But only mildly considering it...

If you have the empty fermenters, I'd say go for it, but if you'd have to buy them I wouldn't bother.

 

[oberon567]

I just took a gravity reading... it is a little early to expect this to be ready to go, but I was taking readings from my other brews which are closer to being put into a secondary for dry hopping and figured I might as well go for the hat trick. As of today, with 7 days in the primary, the SG was 1.034, which is about .009 more than TastyBrew's Recipe Calculator is estimating. We will give it a few more days and see how it goes. The more exciting part is that it looked beautiful, black as oil and almost as thick and creamy. The chocolate aroma was very noticeable but the taste was subtle. The taste was actually a little more powerful on the hops than I had anticipated, but it has some more time to go and some more additions yet before it is done, never mind a few months aging. However, even as green/not even done fermenting as it was, the flavor and aroma made me very excited...

 

[wurensh]

Just came onto this site, and found this dialogue - very cool. As a matter of fact, I just did a Raspberry Imperial Stout last night, and oooeee - once the raspberry puree (Oregon) was added, the aroma just notched right up there. I have tried the Weyerbacher Raspberry Imperial (was out in PA earlier this summer), and absolutely loved it - the rasberries were more of an "accompanyment" than an overbearing flavor (Weyerbachers' moderate in weight, at 8% abv).

By no means am I trying to replicate their recipe, just trying my own (as I prefer heavier brew generally). According to the recipe I was using, the SG should have been 1.10 - this was beyond the scope of my hydrometer (1.08)... I could only extrapolate the reading lines and figure I was about 1.11 with the addition of the puree. Needless to say, the bubbler valve is going crazy right now!

Here's the recipe I used:
12oz crystal malt
10oz chocolate malt
3oz roasted barley
3oz black patent
10# dark DME
1# corn sugar
1.3# molasses
2.5oz target hops (bitering)
1oz " " (flavor) (last 15mins)
.5oz " " (aroma) (5 mins)
1 can Oregon raspberry puree (49oz) (5 mins)

This was dark as night, and the fragrance during the process was strong, not overbearing, and just what I was hoping for. Like I said, once I added the puree (last 5 mins), the whole thing just blossomed.

Going back to the original discussion, I've used canned whole raspberries as well as fresh/frozen rasperries before - this was my first time with the puree. I'm sold... *none* of the hassles of dealing with the fruit... all fluid.

My son was bummed, as he wanted me to save some fo the puree to make raspberry sherbet in our ice cream maker, but when I calculated out that this amounts to less than 1 oz per bottle, on top of a strong stout, that I wasn't going to worry about it being to strong of a flavor (and I'm not dealing with the palate of flavors with the chocolate and coffee - though I'll admit - I'm making note to possibly come back to that recipe for next winter's brew!). Also, not to worry, I've promised him another (smaller) can just for the sherbet this next weekend ;-)

I look forward to bouncing around through homebrewtalk... having this be the first post, what a great place to start!

 

[oberon567]

Thanks for the post and sharing your recipe, and welcome to the forum. Let us know how it turns out when you get a chance to taste it! I am going to be cold-brewing espresso tonight to add to my secondary tomorrow...

 

[oberon567]

Bottled today, and the FG was 1.034, which was higher than I wanted... I had hoped for it to be closer to 1.024. But it was in the fermenting bucket for 3 full weeks, and the gravity was the same three days in a row, and it is actually not higher than the style guidelines allow.... It was in a room that had an ambient temp of of 64 degrees, so the beer had more than high enough temperature, probably a little too high.

Oh well, that's in large part what comes from using Dark DME instead of all grain. In the future, as I navigate my way into all grain, I would use 2-row, Crystal 40, Crystal 60 and Crystal 120 (small amounts of the crystal but to give it color and flavor depth). We will see how this tastes. If it is good I will post it in the Recipe section. But I won't be testing it for a few months...

 

[wurensh]

Thanks for the welcome ;-)

WOW! I was calendaring to bottle this last weekend (or at least to test), but a friend had a baby boy . So, tonight, 16 days later, I opened up to take a hydrometer reading... WOW! (did I say that already?!?!?) When I opened the fermenter, my olfactory sensory neurons went bonkers! I just sat there for a moment and savoured the moment... The fragrance was *exactly* what I could only have dreamed of!

Similarly, my reading came in at 1.038, looking for a FG ~1.024. An inital search of fermentation times leaves me comfortable in re-capping and letting it sit for at least another week before I take a second reading, with a target of bottling over the Labor Day weekend.

 

[The Blow Leprechaun]

I used dark extract for my first ever brew and the final gravity came in much higher than I expected as well. As much as I enjoyed that beer, I won't use the same recipe because I've not interest in using anything other than light extract or straight grains again.

 

[oberon567]

I used dark extract for my first ever brew and the final gravity came in much higher than I expected as well. As much as I enjoyed that beer, I won't use the same recipe because I've not interest in using anything other than light extract or straight grains again.

+1 on this. My goal is to be Ag from now on, and if I enjoy the way this turns out I am going to try it over again AG and see how it works out.

 

[soontobepcv]

I am considering splitting into 2 batches, one chocolate raspberry, one chocolate espresso. But only mildly considering it...

I am a HUGE fan of smaller (2 gallon) plastic fermenters that you can get for $6 each. Usually I'll take a gallon or two of each batch and set it aside as a mini-experiments, racking with extra fruits, spices, sugars, etc. etc. It requires very little extra labor and investment, and definitely makes up for it in what you'll learn. If nothing else, you get extra variety, and my otherwise disappointing recent saison was somewhat salvaged with the more interesting one gallon of mango saison.

 

[landis]

Have you tried any of these yet? That's about three weeks in the bottle, right?

I tried my Chocolate Oatmeal stout earlier this week and it was delicious, the only thing I feel it's missing is that thick creamy mouth feel. I tried using the oats for that, but doesn't look like it did much of anything. I was afraid of the sweetness when it stopped at 1.020, but the bitterness of the chocolate really shines through.

 

[oberon567]

I plan on popping one of these guys open this weekend. I had originally planned on waiting until late October before even tasting them, but a friend is coming to visit from CA (I am in Boston) and I got him into homebrewing, so I want him to try my latest... I will report back on Sunday evening afterwards. I know when I bottled it really seemed like I was going to get the mouth feel I wanted, using the flaked barley, so here's to hoping... The only thing I am a little worried about is the baking coca...

 

[oberon567]

I cracked the first bottle of this yesterday evening.

The color was black, as would be expected. It only formed a small head, the whole thing maybe should have been a little more carbonated, but it was not flat. The cocoa aroma was certainly present, on top of your usual dark grain/kind of burnt/roasty aroma that come with RIS. The mouth feel was very nice, not a viscous sludge but it had some heft to it. The residual sweetness I was concerned about due to the high FG was not really a problem. The cocoa flavor is what lasted on the palate the most, it is what the beer ended on. The espresso/coffee flavors were certainly present, but were in no way overwhelming. In fact, if you had not told me that coffee had been added and had said that all of the coffee flavors were coming from the Roasted Barley, because there was a lot of it, I would not second guess you. But the flavors were there, and I suppose they peeked their way through in the aroma as well. The alcohol was not present at all, but at only 8% that is not a surprise.

This beer is still what I would think of as green, which is to say that it is done fermenting and everything, but I intended for it to bottle condition for a few months before drinking it, and it has been conditioning for less than one month. I expect the cocoa flavor to drop out some on the palate as it ages, or at least that is my hop, and possibly the dropping out of the cocoa will accentuate the coffee a little more.

It is hard to say what I would do different, considering it isn't "ready" yet, but I already know that I want to brew this again and instead of being scientific and changing one thing I am going to go ahead and change a LOT of things. First off I am going to brew it as an AG recipe (but if I was doing extract I would use pale DME) and I am going to throw a small amount of Crystal 120 and maybe a small amount of Crystal 40. The ABV really should be at least 9, so I would aim for that in my mash profile. In big stouts while I dont like a strong alcohol nose or flavor, per se, in my opinion the alcohol helps lift the beer a little, it helps bring some of the complex, buried flavors more to the surface, and it helps warm the stomach, which, for me, is important in a big stout like this. I might up the flaked barley, or switch to oats, to give more mouth feel and compensate for a lower mash temp. I think I would either leave the espresso the same or I might add a little bit more, I was really hoping for that flavor more upfront, and I might also add less cocoa in my secondary addition. However, those last two changes are difficult to quantify until I have tasted this in another month or two. So I will not brew it again until then at the earliest.

While I lament not using the raspberries, it was for the best, as this look like it will be a solid beer that is thoroughly enjoyable. It is certainly not a dessert beer, it can be drank all around, which was my goal... I had hoped to achieve that with raspberries, and decided against it. Maybe when I brew this again I will split off a gallon and make a dessert beer with the raspberries. We will see.

 

[wurensh]

Ok - Chiming back in after quite a lapse (teaching keeps me pretty much laid up until the next break!). I've cracked open a couple of my Raspberry Imperial Stouts, and overall I'm pleased with the results. Thick, thick, thick. Robust flavor that one would expect from an imperial stout, and the raspberry rounds out in both the aroma and flavor... much akin to a rich, raspberry-filled dark chocolate . I too did not see much of a head - the first I opened after about 2 weeks in the bottle... no head, but the sip revealed slight carbonation. Finding a second bottle opened just last week (now something like 5 weeks) garnered better results. I'm wondering if this has something to do with the alcohol level, leaving only traces of yeast left alive (final clock-in @ 11%)? Thoughts from others with heavy-brew experience? The rest will sit in the back of a closet until winter sets in (which isn't until at least February for SoAZ ;-)

 

[oberon567]

This is mighty delicious now. Glad I saved most of it. Yum.

 

[radamadar]

Hey... thanks for the thread. Got an AG imperial stout going and just racked onto 3 lbs of raspberries after 10 oz of cocoa at flameout. OG was 1.078, ABV looks to run about 8.2, trying to figure out timing for tertiary, bulk aging options, etc. Going to add a quarter pound of lactose at racking time and gauge again near bottling. Planning to age into Christmas and well into 2011. All advice appreciated... particularly on aging times and balancing sweetness. At first racking, was quite bitter, despite not boiling the cocoa at all.