Let's figure out an Abraxas clone

[HeadyG]

Not sure, did you add sugar? Mine is all grain. I have read long boils can modify some of the sugar to unfermentable. I think a lot of high gravity stouts use pure sugar, late additions to overcome this and finish at lower gravity.

I did add light DME at the very beginning of the boil to get the pre-boil gravity up. I guess I assumed that was pretty much the same as having a lot of simple sugars from a lower-temp mash before doing a long boil but maybe it just radically upped the fermentability of the wort. I'll try to avoid doing that next time.

 

[InspectorJon]

Plato 33isch is around 1.140-1.145 OG so I guess that is just a typo.

That was my typo, thanks for clarifying that. I fixed it in the original post above. Brewer's Friend conversion chart says 1.144 for P. 33. That's some seriously high OG. Like the consistency of thick syrup. I had trouble getting my wort to siphon through a 1/8 inch piece of tubing for a a gravity sample even after it was down to 1.050. My 1.118 wort was slow going through 3/8 inch tubing.

 

[InspectorJon]

Gravity reading today looks like 1.029. 74%AA, respectable for such high gravity. 11.5-13.3 ABV depending on which calculator you use.

 

[InspectorJon]

I’ll let it ride until this weekend, then I’ll add roasted cocoa nibs and pacilla pepper tinctures I’ve made. The cinnamon is still pretty pronounced from the amount I added to the boil.

 

[HeadyG]

I’ll let it ride until this weekend, then I’ll add roasted cocoa nibs and pacilla pepper tinctures I’ve made. The cinnamon is still pretty pronounced from the amount I added to the boil.

Very nice. I was curious how the cinnamon in the boil would work for you. My experience with my pumpkin ale has been a very pronounced flavor from a relatively small amount of cinnamon. How much cocoa nibs are you using?

 

[InspectorJon]

Cacoa nibs @ 1 oz/gallon, roasted at 350* for 15 minutes. Cooled and covered with vodka in a jar for a week. I'll dump it all in and let set for a week. I also have pepper and vanilla tinctures I made. I will add them to taste in the bottling bucket. I will also add enough lactose to bring FG up to 1.040.

 

[InspectorJon]

3 gallons racked onto cocoa nibs. Probably bottle this next weekend. This beer produced an entire gallon (25% volume) of trub and yeast.

 

[odie]

where are we at guys? How close did y'all get it? what would you change/alter? I see what looks like 3 different recipes for Abraxas.

Looking at doing another big beer soon. Very interested in trying one of these. Or even taking all 3 and merging them somehow?

 

[InspectorJon]

@odie I just put a bottle in the refrigerator. I’ll update in a couple days.

 

[InspectorJon]

I'm happy with the outcome. It is a beer you don't really want to drink a lot of at one time. The flavor is very distinctive. I have not had Abraxas in a few years so I am not sure how to compare the two. This beer is absolutely opaque, dark dark brown. FG is measured measured at 1.032, I just degassed a sample. It is quite viscous, like thin syrup. I'm not sure it needed the maltodextrin but I have never used it before, so I'm not sure if it accounts for the viscosity or if it's just everything else combining into a final outcome. It is sweet but also bitter and mildly roasty. The brown foam disappears pretty quickly. I am happy with the grain bill. I like the non grain adjunct balance pretty well but that will be a bit difficult to duplicate. The alcohol flavor is very present adding to the sweet perception. It is not hot or fusel at all. The cinnamon, chocolate, vanilla and pepper combine into a very distinctive flavor. No one flavor seems to outshine the others. Overall it is a great cool weather sipping beer. Not the best for the current heat we have been experiencing in the Sierra Foothills. That calls for some lower FG, yellow beer.

My pepper tincture was a few Ancho chilies soaked in vodka since last fall when I made a cross between Xocoveza and KBS. The Anchos were shredded and packed loosely into an 8 oz jar, then enough vodka was added to cover. I added about 1.5 oz of the tincture per gallon (poured all I had left in). The Ancho gives a very present pepper flavor but almost no heat. I did not use weight to measure the original pepper addition, which would yield more repeatable results but peppers are an imprecise variable on their own. Vanilla tincture was 5 beans also in an 8 oz jar filled with vodka, soaked over a year. I used about 1 fluid oz of tincture per gallon. Prior to bottling I felt like it could use some more cinnamon so I simmered one 4 inch Ceylon cinnamon stick, crumbled, in 400 ml of water for 20 minutes to extract flavor. I added 10 OZ of lactose, 3 oz maltodextrine and 56 grams of cane sugar to this. That went in the priming bucket with the beer making up a total of 12 liters. The 400 ml of water lowered the FG, the lactose and malto raised it and in the end it went from 1.028 measured before the additions to 1.032 after 2 months in the bottle.

Next big stout I want to make when this begins to run low will be @day_trippr 's Triple Chocolate Imperial Honey Stout.

 

[InspectorJon]

I want to report back on this 1.5 years later. I feel like this beer is too sweet and needed some more hops for bittering, I'll bump it up to 80 or 90 IBU next time. I also think I'd leave the maltodextrine out as the beer is quite viscous. I like it better blended with the Deception Cream Stout found on this site I made a couple months ago. I have also blended it with a hoppy pale ale and liked that.