Chocolate Coffee Stout

[Shonuff]

How do you feel about this?

4.00 lb Dark Dry Extract (17.5 SRM) Dry Extract 30.98 %
3.50 lb Dark Liquid Extract (17.5 SRM) Extract 27.11 %
1.00 lb Black (Patent) Malt (500.0 SRM) Grain 7.75 %
0.33 lb Black Barley (Stout) (500.0 SRM) Grain 2.56 %
0.33 lb Roasted Barley (300.0 SRM) Grain 2.56 %
1.50 oz Northern Brewer [8.50 %] (60 min) Hops 18.7 IBU
0.50 oz Williamette [5.50 %] (10 min) Hops 1.5 IBU
6.00 oz Cocoa (Powdered Baker's) (Boil 1.0 min) Misc
8.00 oz Coffee (Boil 1.0 min) Misc
37.96 gm Gypsum (Calcium Sulfate) (Mash 60.0 min) Misc
1 Pkgs Irish Ale (White Labs #WLP004) Yeast-Ale

Love Stouts. Not a huge fan of flavored stouts but the wife want me to make a stout with a chocolate and coffee flavor. Since she is tolerant through my hobbie I thought I would do it for her.

Anyone else used coffee or chocolate? I was thinking of adding them to the wort while I let it cool. Suggestions?

 

[Judd]

I don't know a lot, but I know some. Coffee is a difficult thing to brew with. Most people will recommend cold-brewing the coffee and/or putting it in in secondary. I've never tried it that way, but I tried using regular hot-brewed coffee, and the result tasted like garbage water. Certainly the oils from both coffee and cocoa can destroy your head. I would recommend a little bit (maybe 2 oz) chocolate malt to steep, for some of that toasty flavour that goes so well with chocolate beers.

 

[Professor Frink]

I made a mocha java stout that came out great. Definitely cold brew the coffee. You want to get good, quality coffee, ground very finely (espresso fine), and mix the grounds in with water and put it in the fridge for a couple days, then filter out the grounds and add to secondary. You don't want to boil the coffee, it'll give you a very acidic taste.

 

[paranode]

You might want to tone down the black patent. That stuff can be pretty bitter in quantities greater than 1/4-1/2lb. For more of that 'roasted' coffee flavor the roasted barley is a better choice.

 

[Tonedef131]

When I make my breakfast stout I use the knowledge I have of coffee and mix it with brewing, great fun. I basically brewed a gallon of coffee and added it to the wort before pitching the yeast. I took a half pound of coarsly ground coffee to a gallon of water. Ideal extraction of coffee is 6min at 195-200F. So get the water to about 200 and add the coffee, after 6 min strain out, your mash tun just became a big french press. Chill this and add it to the primary.

You can use a pretty light roast because you will already have a lot of roast profile from the malt. Go to a local roaster and get a house blend or something and have them grind it coarsly the day you will be using it. You want it coarse so it is easy to strain out, it will also be spending more time with the water than in a drip machine, so the french press method applies. If you use a fine grind you will get some silt through which will cause cloudy final product and bitterness. Under no circumstance should you ever boil the coffee. Also never use less than the 1/2lb to gal ratio or it will be overextracted and be bitter and disgusting.

 

[OskeeI]

Cold brewed 1 liter with expresso beans over night and added to keg. In addition aged the stout with 1/2 pound of expresso in the secondary for a week.

After a week on CO2 in the keg. Flavors have mended together well. . although getting zero head. Thinking I added too much cold brewed expresso.

 

[rraisedhaze]

I made a coffee stout where I added the cracked beans to the wort while I was steeping other grains. I definitely wish that I would have added coffee to the secondary instead. The result was a strong, acidic, burnt, day-old coffee flavor which I could have done without. The coffee I chose was the darkest blend Caribou offered. I'm not quite sure what to do with it, but I have cut it with lighter beers to dilute the flavor and make it drinkable.