Irish Dry Stout advice

[thrashandburn]

Hi guys, the time has come, in my opinion, to start trying out my own recipes. While I know can just wing it and adjust through trial and error, I thought, why not get some opinions from the more experienced in hopes of maximizing the potential of making a great beer.

So, I'm thinking of brewing this Irish Dry Stout

5.5# 2 -Row - Pale - 66%
1# 6oz. Flaked Barley - 16%
14 oz. Black Barley - 10%
6 oz. Acid Malt - 4%
4 oz. Wheat - 3%

1.5 oz. east kent goldings 60 minutes

Irish Ale yeast 1084

My thinking here is that by adding the acid malt I'll get that sour twang that these beers typically have, and the wheat for a little bit of added body while also contributing to a creamy head, as many of these beers have as well (I know that Guinness carbs with nitrogen, but that's not an option). I know that these malts would make up a small percentage of the grist, but at what point are they noticeable subtleties vs. being pointless additions?

Any feedback is appreciated, and FYI, I used this http://beercalculus.hopville.com/recipe to put this all together.

 

[slarkin712]

I think that's a good recipe. I did something very similar to this based off the dry stout recipe in Brewing Classics Styles. I think I did something like this:

5.5 lbs Pale Malt
2 lbs Flaked Barley
1 lb Roasted Barley
6 oz Acidualted Malt

EK Goldings @ 60 min to get ~40 IBUs
Wyeast 1084

It had good flavor, and finished nice and dry. The only problem I had was that it had very little head and maybe could use just a little more body. So adding the wheat as in your recipe would help, but I say 4 oz might not be enough. I'd say 1/2 lb or more. I going to brew my recipe again in Nov, but replace .5 lb Pale with .5 lb Carapils. I've read that this should be enough to give better head and still keep the dryness.

 

[wolfman_48442]

I think that's a good recipe too. I've gone as high as 25% flaked barley which gave an awesome head, 20% is probably as low as I would go.
Mash around 150, EKG at ~40 IBU like slarkin said seems about right to me as well.

I'm also a big fan of only adding the dark/crystal grains to the mash at vorlauf as this minimizes bitterness while retaining the color and roastiness desired, and doesn't mess with your mash ph as much either.
I've also heard good things about the cold press addition at the end of boil, but I've yet to try that myself.

 

[billl]

That could be a lot of acid malt - depending on your water profile.

I'm sure the wheat is fine, but the flaked barley is doing a lot of the same things, so I'm not sure you will notice it.

If you can get some british pale malt vs american, that would be good.

BTW - guinness is just pale malt, roasted barley and flaked barley. That "twag" comes from them souring a portion of the batch, reboiling it, and the blending it back in.

 

[thrashandburn]

thanks for the feedback everyone. It's good to know I'm on the right track with this. there's a lot of good information to consider. I was considering adding carapils as slarkin mentions, but at what ratio and what should it replace? I was also thinking that if I just increased the amount of flaked barley I could then eliminate the wheat. Also, I'm not really familiar with adding the dark/crystal during vorlauf, any chance someone could be a bit more specific on the procedure? Finally, I usually use bottled water, and I don't add any brewing salts or anything as I'm still pretty uneducated in the water science aspect of brewing. Considering that, is there too much acid?

 

[The_Doctor]

I've found that wyeast 1272 American ale II has a slight twang that prefer over the use of acidulated malt. The acid malt also lowers the mash pH, which has already been lowered by the roasted barley. The yeast doesn't do that. I've found 1272 to be my go to DIS yeast.

Also, if you're using bottled water without salts, I'd definitely skip the acidulated malt as it could lead to issues.

 

[billl]

Personally, I think that unless you know you need to alter water ph/salts etc you should just leave them out. You are just guessing at that point and have about as good a chance of being right as you do of being wrong.

As for adding crystal at vorlauf, I don't personally bother, but it pretty simple. The idea is you don't let the crystal steep for the full mash. You just add it at the end of the mash, pour the first couple quarts back on top, and then just continue your sparge as usual.

As for general recipe advice - I think it's a good idea to start simple. If you try to add 10 things to a base recipe that you have never brewed before, it's pretty hard to determine what any of them did. It's a lot easier to brew a relatively simple recipe, taste it, and say "This is pretty good, but it could use a little more ........"

 

[thrashandburn]

that's a really good point, billl, I'll keep that in mind for the future. But I'm now concerned with having the acid malt in the recipe and having it ruin my mash because of the ph. Could anyone else perhaps weigh in on this?

 

[billl]

If you are using bottled water, it won't "ruin" your mash. Bottled water is pretty neutral and low in most minerals. The worst thing that is going to happen with the acid malt is that it lower the mash ph slightly and drops you below optimal levels and slightly lowers your efficiency. You aren't talking about adding pounds of the stuff though, so you aren't approaching anything in the "ruined" area no matter what.

The potential downside is that a bunch of roasted barley is going to be fairly acidic already in a neutral water and you might overshoot that twang you are going for. Traditional irish stouts are all brewed with really hard water that balances out the acidity of the grains.

 

[thrashandburn]

ok, that makes sense. thanks, I'll probably reduce the acid then.

 

[slarkin712]

When I made my stout with the acidulated malt I did notice that my efficiency was worse than normal. I had considered that the acid may have been part of the problem, but 6 oz didn't seem like much. One simple method to get that twang is to just add lactic acid during the boil. Skip the acid malt, and skip all the work required to sour some wort beforehand.