I screwed up my ingredients...

[Gresco]

About to start my 2nd extract batch.

I wasn't paying very close attention when I decided to write down the ingredients needed for this vanilla coffee stout... https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/491212/vanilla-coffee-stout

.... and I made a pretty big mistake....

Basically had the brew shop mill all of the following together and didn't take into account the quantities, as I forgot to write them down...

1 lb Crystal 60L ---- recipe wanted 3 lbs
1 lb chocolate malt ---- recipe wanted 0.7 lb
1 lb roasted barley ---- wanted 0.5 lb
1 lb black malt --- wanted 0.5 OZ

Now that it's all mixed together.... there's not much I can do about it...

I have no experience with taste profiles and such and have no concept of how this would turn out either way....

I also have 6lbs of light DME, the proper hops, and adjuncts.

Any thoughts on how to approach this? I'm tempted to just steep 4 pounds of the mix together and see what happens...

 

[Coastalbrew]

I say roll with it. It won't be the beer you intended, but it will still be beer. You might buy the missing 2# of crystal malt to balance out the flavor profile a little. Good luck. Let us know how it goes.

Cheers!

 

[Gresco]

Thanks for the suggestion! I'm thinking of doing it tonight with what I have... Hope it's still good. Just a tad worried about what the pound of black malt will do to the taste. Thanks for the input! Maybe it'll be a delicious accident.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

Personally, I'd set aside the 4 lbs of grains. Get the right grains for the beer you want to brew. For my tastes, 25% black malt has a low change of being a "delicious accident".

Crushed grains will keep for a while (6 months, longer if one were to vacuum seal it into one pound packages). So you might consider experimenting with one gallon batches, perhaps blending in lighter crystal malts to get the black malt down below 5%.

 

[Gresco]

Personally, I'd set aside the 4 lbs of grains. Get the right grains for the beer you want to brew. For my tastes, 25% black malt has a low change of being a "delicious accident".

Crushed grains will keep for a while (6 months, longer if one were to vacuum seal it into one pound packages). So you might consider experimenting with one gallon batches, perhaps blending in lighter crystal malts to get the black malt down below 5%.

Great advice, I'll cut my losses on this one, and get the right grains. Thanks!

Also, I assume 25% black malt would lead to bitter and burnt flavours?

 

[CascadesBrewer]

First off, I would be wary of a recipe that used 3lbs of Crystal 60. 1 lb of Crystal 60 is plenty for most beers. I am also not sure what Flaked Oats and Flaked Barley add just steeped in an extract beer.

I would say that you could use half of the grain that you have to make a solid beer in the style you were looking for. Maybe add another half pound of Crystal in there to bring it up to 1 lb.

There are lots of crap recipes out there. I don't even know what "4 oz Vanilla" means. There is no way you are adding 4 liquid oz of Vanilla extract or 4 oz of Vanilla beans to a batch. 8 oz coffee is pretty vague as well. 8 oz of coffee beans is a lot for a batch (4 oz would be my suggestion) but they could be suggesting 8 oz of brewed coffee (cold brewed?).

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

I assume 25% black malt would lead to bitter and burnt flavours?

Those would be the polite descriptors .

As for the original recipe, I finally took a look at it. Pretty much what @CascadesBrewer brewer said: "There are lots of crap recipes out there".

A partial boil with all the DME up front is a good way to get unexpected flavors from the concentrated boil of the wort: recipe states 3 gal boil for a 5.5 gal batch and a pre-boil OG of 1.115. With extract+steep brewing, some people find that crystal malt, above 10% results in a beer that is excessively sweet. On the other hand, with a "five stars" rating and 51 votes (people? bots?), maybe the coffee and roasted barley provide the balance.

For a comparison recipe, consider: https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/homebrew-recipe/beer-recipe-of-the-week-coffee-stout/. The extract+steep recipe uses LME, but Briess makes a Munich DME (50% munich, 50% base malt) and conversion information from LME to DME is here (for free) https://jaysbrewingblog.com/2011/11/17/lazy-chart-for-converting-dme-lme-grain/ . Conversion information can also be found in How To Brew, 4e (if you don't own it, it can be a great gift idea).

 

[Gresco]

First off, I would be wary of a recipe that used 3lbs of Crystal 60. 1 lb of Crystal 60 is plenty for most beers. I am also not sure what Flaked Oats and Flaked Barley add just steeped in an extract beer.

I would say that you could use half of the grain that you have to make a solid beer in the style you were looking for. Maybe add another half pound of Crystal in there to bring it up to 1 lb.

There are lots of crap recipes out there. I don't even know what "4 oz Vanilla" means. There is no way you are adding 4 liquid oz of Vanilla extract or 4 oz of Vanilla beans to a batch. 8 oz coffee is pretty vague as well. 8 oz of coffee beans is a lot for a batch (4 oz would be my suggestion) but they could be suggesting 8 oz of brewed coffee (cold brewed?).

Maybe this recipe was a bit ambitious for me, especially with some of the points that you make.

 

[Gresco]

Those would be the polite descriptors .

As for the original recipe, I finally took a look at it. Pretty much what @CascadesBrewer brewer said: "There are lots of crap recipes out there".

A partial boil with all the DME up front is a good way to get unexpected flavors from the concentrated boil of the wort: recipe states 3 gal boil for a 5.5 gal batch and a pre-boil OG of 1.115. With extract+steep brewing, some people find that crystal malt, above 10% results in a beer that is excessively sweet. On the other hand, with a "five stars" rating and 51 votes (people? bots?), maybe the coffee and roasted barley provide the balance.

For a comparison recipe, consider: https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/homebrew-recipe/beer-recipe-of-the-week-coffee-stout/. The extract+steep recipe uses LME, but Briess makes a Munich DME (50% munich, 50% base malt) and conversion information from LME to DME is here (for free) https://jaysbrewingblog.com/2011/11/17/lazy-chart-for-converting-dme-lme-grain/ . Conversion information can also be found in How To Brew, 4e (if you don't own it, it can be a great gift idea).

Ya, I did a search using brewersfriend using light DME and stout and that was one of the first recipes, decided on it because he said it won an award at a home brew competition. Should have looked a little harder and maybe for something easier. But hey, still learning the ropes.

And thanks for the link, I’ll let you guys know what I decide to do...

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

decided on it because he said it won an award at a home brew competition.

Sometimes, if one ignores enough guidelines, something new and tasty is brewed. There are all-grain clone recipes for Pete's Wicked Ale (a malt forward brown ale) that use either 20% or 30% Crystal 60. I've brewed it a couple of times at 20% crystal and when I'm in the mood for malty and a little sweeter, it's a good beer.

But hey, still learning the ropes.

Kits get us started, discussion moves us forward.

 

[dwhite60]

Three pounds of crystal is a lot, I mean a LOT, of crystal in a five gallon batch. Would make for a high final gravity and a sweet beer. But, that's just my taste.

All the Best,
D. White

 

[CascadesBrewer]

Ya, I did a search using brewersfriend using light DME and stout and that was one of the first recipes, decided on it because he said it won an award at a home brew competition. Should have looked a little harder and maybe for something easier. But hey, still learning the ropes.

Honestly, finding solid recipes seems harder than it should be. You did what seems solid...found a recipe for the style you wanted that has several stars and says it won a competition. Maybe this recipe does make a very good beer, but based off my experience I would avoid it.

"Brewing Classic Styles" is one of the better books of recipes. The AHA site is one of the better sources of quality homebrew and clone recipes. I sometimes drill down to the recipe sheets for kits at places like MoreBeer or Northern Brewer (some sites list the exact ingredients, some don't). Many of my core recipes started as a kit that I tweaked over the years.

I brewed a couple all-grain batches based off this kit at MoreBeer: https://www.morebeer.com/products/milk-stout-jim-baumann-malt-extract.html It is a pretty versatile base milk stout that works well with various additions (coffee, cacao nibs, vanilla, etc.).

 

[Gadjobrinus]

About to start my 2nd extract batch.

I wasn't paying very close attention when I decided to write down the ingredients needed for this vanilla coffee stout... https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/491212/vanilla-coffee-stout

.... and I made a pretty big mistake....

Basically had the brew shop mill all of the following together and didn't take into account the quantities, as I forgot to write them down...

1 lb Crystal 60L ---- recipe wanted 3 lbs
1 lb chocolate malt ---- recipe wanted 0.7 lb
1 lb roasted barley ---- wanted 0.5 lb
1 lb black malt --- wanted 0.5 OZ

Now that it's all mixed together.... there's not much I can do about it...

I have no experience with taste profiles and such and have no concept of how this would turn out either way....

I also have 6lbs of light DME, the proper hops, and adjuncts.

Any thoughts on how to approach this? I'm tempted to just steep 4 pounds of the mix together and see what happens...

Brew it out. I had one beer that was really all I had left in the larder, composed of 7 malts. I knew it would roughly be a scottish ale. "Seven Sins Strong Scotch Ale."

Won 2nd in the midwest AHA's, slated for national finals but my &^%$#%^* in-laws drank the sample. Only beer I entered into competition then or since.

Point being, I had nothing to do with it, wish I could say I did. You might find some cool things from this. Have fun.