Getting chocolate into my stout.

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Stevoster

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Galway, Ireland
Hi all,

I've had a busy weekend - bottled my blonde beer (after letting it sit for 6 months in it's own trub.... should be interesting) and put two extract batches of stout into primary. Now, what I'd like to do is make one of them into a chocolate stout and I'm guessing that this means I'll have to add it somehow when I'm sticking it into secondary. Any ideas on how to do this? Also thinking it might be nice to stick some coffee flavour in there too.

All advice appreciated!

Thanks,
Steve.
 
sorry no one has commented for you. I hate when that happens! I have not added chocolate, but I have seen coffee added several ways. One way would be to use a french press but make it strong so you dont add to much "water" to your beer. You could also cold press it. There is a video on youtube about coffee in beer. Hope I helped a little.
 
I did 6oz of herseys cocoa to the last 15min of my boil. Sat in Primary for 3 weeks and bottle conditioned for 3 weeks. Still could have gone More. Very faint chocolate hints. I have read 8oz cocoa and I have read adding chips to the secondary. I definately would have gone with more. I was going for the Youngs Double Chocolate Stout as my target.
 
i just did a chocolate oatmeal stout and added 8oz of Hersey cocoa powder 30 min into boil. it's in my secondary right now, but i did a taste test when i transferred and it had a strong chocolate profile. i guess we'll see how it turns out.
 
Hey,

Thanks a lot for the replies guys. Since it's already in primary I'm probably going to grate a half pound of extra dark chocolate and syphone the brew on top of it for the secondary. Or maybe sprinkle it on top of secondary once it is syphoned in. Will let you know how successful (or otherwise) this is!

Cheers,
Steve.
 
Hi, sorry it's late but I did do a chocolate stout about four months ago. Personally I felt it wasn't that great - should have been either more or less chocolatey (The chocolate lingered as a cloying aftertaste - less would give a subtle chocolate flavour; more would give full on)! I'd have preferred less, but it was only my second extract brew, so I was cobbling together various recipes. Anyway, I steeped at 65C:
5 oz. black malt
5 oz. chocolate malt
5 oz. roast barley
I then added:
4.8kg dark LME and brought to the boil... then the hops:
22g Target (60 min) @ 10.2%
31 oz Fuggles (15 min) @ 3.7%
Chocolate was cocoa powder:
5 oz cocoa powder (10 mins)

I made this up to 5 Imperial (non-US) gallons.

O.G. was 1068

Sorry for the mixed units, I have since switched fully to metric if only because us Brits get bigger pints (and hence gallons) than the many Yanks who dominate a lot of the homebrew world, and so I often get confused over what needs converting!
As I said, this beer was too chocolately for my taste, although the chocolate was more of an aftertaste than an in-your-face-chocolate-milkshake-type-beer. I've read that many brewers (e.g. Young's) prefer to use chocolate extract, however, and add it at secondary or even bottling/barrelling time as chocolate is not exactly water-soluble!

Hope this helps for future (or maybe even current) projects!
 
Hey,

Thanks a lot for the replies guys. Since it's already in primary I'm probably going to grate a half pound of extra dark chocolate and syphone the brew on top of it for the secondary. Or maybe sprinkle it on top of secondary once it is syphoned in. Will let you know how successful (or otherwise) this is!

Cheers,
Steve.

I'd recommend getting bakers cocoa rather than using solid chocolate. Even extra dark chocolate is going to have more fats in it than you want. Could ruin your head.
 
I just bottled my chocolate mint coffee stout.
For the coffee, I added a full pound of ground coffee to 2 quarts of water cold steeped for 24 hours. added it to the secondary. (not the grounds, just the liquid.)
About the cocoa, 4 oz at flame out, 4 more oz with the coffee.
I added the mint later so I could taste the coffee and the chocolate
Over the top coffee flavor, finished with a chocolate taste.
I also added half a pound of lactose to sweeten it up a little. The cocoa made it pretty bitter.
good luck.
 
Deadly! Thanks a mill guys. Didn't realise that chocolate extract was just that syrupy stuff. I have now decided to lash 3/4 ounce of that into the secondary and rack on top of it. Huzzah!!
 
Cool, let us know how it turns out, I'd like to try mine again but I'd need to change the chocolating method.
 
The extract version of Founders Breakfast Stout that was in the last issue of BYO uses the following added at the end of the boil:

2.0 oz. (57 g) ground Sumatran coffee
2.5 oz. (71 g) dark, bittersweet baker’s chocolate
1.5 oz. (43 g) unsweetened chocolate baking nibs

then after fermentation, rack it to secondary added pretty much like you would dryhop it, add:
2.0 oz. (57 g) ground Kona coffee

for a week. Then bottle.

I'm planning on making this beer next up actually.
 
If you added enough chocolate malt to the brew some lactose in secondary could simulate chocolate IMO. I've been drinking Left Hand's Milk Stout lately and it definately has a chocolate bar taste to it even though real chocolate is not listed in their recipe. I'm brewing a sweet stout now with lactose so we'll see.
 
I have had a chocolate stout in secondary for 11 days now and did not add lactose, but I did at 8oz of malto dextrine. Would it be wise for me to add in some lactose to the secondary tomorrow to try to avoid the bitterness everyone is talking about in this thread? I was hoping for a creamy stout, but now I am worried that skipping the lactose might prevent that. If I were to add it to the secondary, should I boil it in a bit of water? How long should I keep it in the secondary? Could I just add it right before I rack?
 
I have had a chocolate stout in secondary for 11 days now and did not add lactose, but I did at 8oz of malto dextrine. Would it be wise for me to add in some lactose to the secondary tomorrow to try to avoid the bitterness everyone is talking about in this thread? I was hoping for a creamy stout, but now I am worried that skipping the lactose might prevent that. If I were to add it to the secondary, should I boil it in a bit of water? How long should I keep it in the secondary? Could I just add it right before I rack?

I wouldnt think that it would be that bitter. The lactose is a toss up, but when in doubt...try it!
 
Hey hey,

Just a follow up here. I am terribly lazy. I left my stout in primary until about 6 weeks ago (yes, 7 months in primary) then chucked in about 250g of bakers cocoa disolved (mostly) in water (still in primary) and just got around to bottling it last weekend. I had a little taste before priming and surprisingly it was pretty lovely!! A real chocolatey aftertaste in the mouth. Really looking forward to cracking open a bottle in a few weeks.

Cheers,
Steve.
 
I just bottled my chocolate mint coffee stout.
For the coffee, I added a full pound of ground coffee to 2 quarts of water cold steeped for 24 hours. added it to the secondary. (not the grounds, just the liquid.)
About the cocoa, 4 oz at flame out, 4 more oz with the coffee.
I added the mint later so I could taste the coffee and the chocolate
Over the top coffee flavor, finished with a chocolate taste.
I also added half a pound of lactose to sweeten it up a little. The cocoa made it pretty bitter.
good luck.

This chocolate mint coffee stout sounds absolutely amazing. Would you care to share this recipe with us? I would love to give it a shot.

Stevoster, glad to hear your stout worked out well! Its always nice to try something new and have it work out for the better.:mug:

Thanks!
 
This chocolate mint coffee stout sounds absolutely amazing. Would you care to share this recipe with us? I would love to give it a shot.

Stevoster, glad to hear your stout worked out well! Its always nice to try something new and have it work out for the better.:mug:

Thanks!

It turned out awesome! Give me about a month, and my second go round with this will be bottled and being tasted. If it succeeds, I will be posting the recipe. I figured I would give it one more go round to make sure it works out. This time I did a 10 gallon batch all grain. The first was an extract kit with the chocolate and mint additions.
 
Just a heads up, bottled this last week, and it is on par with last years batch. I will give it a few weeks in the bottle before I try it, but it really needs about 4 months to get really good.
 
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