Mashing Chocolate (The food, not the malt)

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KingBrianI

KingBrianI

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I love chocolate stouts. Especially Young's. Mmmm. So now that I've got a nitro setup, I can make a nice creamy chocolate stout so I can pull a pint whenever I want. The plan is to make a TRIPLE chocolate stout! Cocoa powder in the boil, chocolate extract at kegging, AND chocolate bars in the mash! Has anyone done this or am I the first genius to try it? The plan is to go find the highest %cacao chocolate bar I can (to minimize fats), grind them up in a food processor, and add them to the mash. The idea is that the mash will absorb any fat from the chocolate, keeping it out of the beer. But the flavor should be well incorporated. Sounds like a good idea right? i'm also planning on adding maybe half a vanilla bean in secondary to help get the chocolate flavors to pop. So what do you think?
 
yeah, my guess is that the fat would be passed through to the boil, for the most part. Could use cocoa nibs in secondary to make it a triple...
 
I've seen chocolate bars that are up to 86% cocoa. Of the remaining 14%, a large portion has to be sugar, so that leaves little fat remaining. I thought I'd read somewhere that the grains in a mash will absorb oils. Can anyone back that up?

As for the extract, I'm trying to go as high quality as possible to avoid unnatural, artificially flavors. Anyone have a good recommendation. So far, I'm leaning towards this stuff: http://www.amazon.com/Pure-Chocolate-Extract-4-oz/dp/B000FCI6JU/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=grocery&qid=1268965856&sr=8-2
 
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why not simply just add cocoa powder and skip the risk? I've done an Imperial Chocolate stout using the "Generic Rasputin" recipe found on the forums here with 8oz of cocoa in the boil, 4 oz cocoa in the primary, and 8oz of cocoa in the secondary. It was pure chocolate. Worked great.
 
A little lecithin will emulsify any oil from the chocolate - or any other fatty ingredient. I've made some oily beers with lecithin and have had 0 head retention issues
 
Lecithin can be got from egg yolks. It's what I use for my wine. Maybe somebody knows more than me - but isn't the chocolate bar with the highest % just cocoa with fats/oils and sugars? If you're boiling off (or emulsifying) the oils, and the sugars are simple sugars, what do you gain over adding real chocolate as opposed to cocoa?
 
While I am new, only one worry comes to mine and it may in fact be mute and not a problem at all.

Does chocolate bars release their bitters/tannins (lack of a better word) at the same temp as the malts and grains? I have a slight impression of imparting a "baker's chocolate" taste. But if this in fact is not an issue, I say it sounds Freakin Delicious!
 
how much cacao powder are your going to use? im doing a chocolate coffee stout soon and want the chocolate to be around youngs double chocolate stout.

I think ahs clone of the brew only calls for 1oz of powder. But BYO clone calls for 6oz of powder AND chocolate extract
 
I'll probably go with 6 oz, but of something good, not hersheys or some other crap. As for the lecithin, I think I'll take my chances with the oil hurting head retention, though I'm pretty sure the grains will catch most of it. The reason of doing chocolate bars in addition to cocoa and extract is because I'm crazy.:cross: Seriously though, it's partly just making the beer actually triple chocolate, but more because I feel like chocolate bars, especially the really high %cocoa bars are probably better quality than most cocoa. I also imagine the cocoa in them is less processed than cocoa powder. I don't know if you've ever mixed cocoa powder, some sugar, and some fat together, but it doesn't taste nearly as good as a good chocolate bar. Hopefully between all three sources, I'll be able to capture a round, full chocolate essence.
 
i would crush the bar into powder using the blender and than add to secondary and not care about head retention on this brew
 
how much different is chocolate extract verus some cocoa powder soaked in vodka?
 
bkov said:
i would crush the bar into powder using the blender and than add to secondary and not care about head retention on this brew
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The thing that would hold me back from doing this is that I feel like even though the bar would be ground up, the fat may still be holding the small bits together and since fat is hydrophobic, it would make the flavor unavailable to be extracted.

bkov said:
how much different is chocolate extract verus some cocoa powder soaked in vodka?
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I imagine it's probably pretty similar. I think that is how they make most commercial extracts, though there are probably a few more steps in the process to increase extract efficiency or refine/concentrate the final product. I think a high quality commercial extract like I linked to earlier would probably be better than anything I could make myself for those reasons.
 
I plan on doing a chocolate stout for my next brew and keep going back and forth on what I plan to do. I've considered using extract and creme de cacao in addition to a nice helping of cocoa powder.
 
bkov said:
how did the triple chocolate stout turn out?
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Still haven't gotten around to brewing one. It keeps getting pushed back by other stuff. I'm still going back and forth with what to add to get the chocolate flavor. I think the only thing that is really going to give it a lot of chocolate flavor is chocolate extract. I'm beginning to wonder whether everything else would just be more trouble than it's worth.
 
Cocoa nibs still have fat, to the tune of 13g per oz, if memory serves (that's roughly 1/2 fat). Higher % chocolate bars may or may not have less fat than lower % bars, based on what the added ingredients are. Lots of cocoa powders are high in fat, too. It's tough to get cocoa without the cocoa butter (or, if you can, it often doesn't taste like cocoa anymore). You can try chocolate syrup, which often has fats removed, but otherwise it's all fat, all the time. How this affects brewing, well, I really don't know. Try it, and let me know! If you can come up with a fool proof recipe (so even I can do it) for a triple chocolate stout, I'm all ears!
 
I made a chocolate stout a fee years ago. It was awesome. I added bakers chocolate at the end of the boil. It had slight head retention issues, but it still looked great pouring through my stout faucet. Cascade and all
 
I just brewed a Chocolate Imperial Stout yesterday, 1.099 OG and hoping for a really high FG (like around 1.032-ish). I used 3 oz Callebaut (Belgian) bittersweet chocolate (~70% cocoa solids) plus 6 oz Pernigotti (Italian) cocoa powder towards the end of the boil. That Pernigotti cocoa powder has some vanilla in it. I plan to use Star Kay White chocolate extract at kegging (not sure how much yet). I also used a very small amount of coarse ground coffee a few minutes after flameout, Julia Child's chocolate mousse recipe uses a small amount of coffee because she says it helps bring out the chocolate flavor.

I've used the Belgian bittersweet and Italian powder in a recipe before and as it went into the fermenter I thought; "Oh noes, this will have zero head." because it REFUSED to foam at all (and I usually have a monster pillow of foam when filling the carboy). But after fermentation it somehow magically regained the ability to form/retain head (albeit still reduced a bit).
 
Good info SCA. Be sure to let us know how that Chocolate RIS turns out.

The bumping of this thread motivated me to go ahead and start planning this brew. I figured what the hell, why not mash some chocolate. So I picked up two bars of Sharffen Berger extra dark (82% cacao) chocolate today (at $5 each! ouch!). I'll roughly chop them and add them to the mash (minus whatever little bits I eat!). I also picked up some non-alkalized cocoa powder I'll add during the boil. Probably throw it in at 15 minutes remaining. Not 100% sure how much to use. I went with the non-dutch processed stuff but I'm hoping that doesn't drop the boil pH too much. Have you guys who have added cocoa powder to the boil used the dutched or non-dutched cocoa? I figured the non-dutched stuff was closer to the actual bean so went with that. I also picked up some really nice 100% madagascar bourbon pure vanilla extract to be added at kegging along with some chocolate extract I'm going to have to buy on amazon since I couldn't find it locally. I figure just a touch of the vanilla would help to bring out the chocolate flavors.

I think my recipe is going to look something like this:

OG 1.050-1.054
IBU ~30

7 lbs Maris Otter
1 lb home-toasted oats
0.8 lbs british chocolate malt
0.7 lbs british crystal 75
0.75 lbs demerara sugar

Northern Brewer at 90 minutes to 30 IBU

(2) 3.5 oz chocolate bars added to the mash
~4 oz non-alkalized cocoa powder added to boil
vanilla and chocolate extracts added at kegging to taste
 
Just made some hot chocolate with the cocoa I just bought. Yum. It's more like a chocolate bar than typical alkalized cocoa powders. Great aroma and really nice chocolate flavor. Hopefully it makes it through to the beer!
 
I just tried out a chocolate experiment today. I have a bean to bar chocolatier nearby and I asked them if I could get some of the cacao shells that they normally discard. I know some companies use them for tea, so I was thinking they could be a cool way to introduce a nutty/dark chocolate character to a chocolate beer.

I did an experiment today where I made a tea with the shells (also called chaff). I steeped them in 180 degree water for 20 min and started tasted after 5min onward. As it went on it became more dark-chocolatey, so it didn't go bad with a long steep. Then, I took half the tea and boiled it for 15min to see if it could take being boiled. I compared it to the non-boiled tea and while it maintained most of the flavor, it was slightly astringent.

I was thinking it'd be cool to use it in the mash, but since it's not as good when boiled I think I'll either make a separate tea and add it to the wort or actually steep the shells in wort (maybe remove 1gallon of wort after the boil and steep, then cool and add to the fermenter with the rest of the wort).

I'm planning on a chocolate stout with cacao nibs so I'll use them in that, but I'm also thinking it'd be interesting to use the shells in an english mild as the only form of chocolate.
 
Interesting about the chaff, I hadn't thought of that. There's a local bean to bar chocolatier here too so I'll check in with them to see if they'd sell me the same thing. They sell the whole bean (fermented not roasted) as well as roasted, then the nibs, and the powder among other parts.
Among the racking over nibs, there was a post (about ginger ale) that lead to a page about pressure infusing that I'm considering partially doing with the nibs for a secondary.

I'm not sure about the dutch process. I remember the the alkalized cocoa can throw off some ph amounts (baking cakes with baking powder & soda), but I don't know if that would affect anything other than the initial mash.
 
I've done it several times on my Chocolate mole porters, using abuelita instant coco disks. It works great. The grain helps absorbs any fats (if anyone's telling you you will have lousy head retention they are full of crap- I've never had that issue.)

I've also mashed with instant hot chocolate,(dissolving it in the mash water in my tun, THEN adding the grain that works great as well.

My mole porter has won awards in every contest I've enterred. Various batches all with chocolate in one form or another in the mash.
 
KingBrianI said:
I've seen chocolate bars that are up to 86% cocoa. Of the remaining 14%, a large portion has to be sugar, so that leaves little fat remaining. I thought I'd read somewhere that the grains in a mash will absorb oils. Can anyone back that up?

As for the extract, I'm trying to go as high quality as possible to avoid unnatural, artificially flavors. Anyone have a good recommendation. So far, I'm leaning towards this stuff: http://www.amazon.com/Pure-Chocolate-Extract-4-oz/dp/B000FCI6JU/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=grocery&qid=1268965856&sr=8-2
Click to expand...

That 86% isn't cocoa it's chocolate solids or chocolate "liquor". Bar chocolate has lots of fat content. Cocoa is the powder resulting after the chocolate solids have had most of their fat removed. There is no advantage to add a chocolate product to the mash. Mashing is for converting starches to sugars. Adding a non-fermenting flavoring agent is best done down the line, post primary, although according to their website Young's does add actual chocolate bars to the kettle.
 
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BigEd said:
That 86% isn't cocoa it's chocolate solids or chocolate "liquor". Bar chocolate has lots of fat content. Cocoa is the powder resulting after the chocolate solids have had most of their fat removed. There is no advantage to add a chocolate product to the mash. Mashing is for converting starches to sugars. Adding a non-fermenting flavoring agent is best done down the line, post primary, although according to their website Young's does add actual chocolate bars to the kettle.
Click to expand...

I realized the thing about the bars being labeled as an expression of % cacao and not %cocoa today when I saw one labeled 100% cacao. Looked on the back and it had a fair amount of fat. The 82% bars I picked up have something like 19 g each (they are 3.5 oz bars). I'm hoping that like Revvy said, the grains absorb most of that. And if not, who cares. I'll be serving this on nitro so I'm sure there will be some head.

As far as whether it is actually adding anything to the beer at that point, I don't know. It seems like other people like Revvy have had success in getting chocolate flavor into the beer by mashing it. I only wonder about the wisdom of using $10 worth of premium chocolate for that step! :D I might be better off eating it and throwing some cheaper stuff in the mash!

I'll also be adding cocoa to the boil and extract at kegging. Between all that I'm not worried about the beer not tasting chocolatey. I'm just trying something a bit novel to maybe enhance or deepen the layers of chocolate complexity. Oh, and I can call it a "Triple" Chocolate Stout now too! :D
 
KingBrianI said:
I only wonder about the wisdom of using $10 worth of premium chocolate for that step! :D I might be better off eating it and throwing some cheaper stuff in the mash!

D
Click to expand...

Yeah, you're probably crazy, but WTF, go big or go home....or go mildy expensive. You're not going to do this all the time, you're not doing this on a megabbl batch we're your tossing in 1,000 bucks worth. I'd say go for it.

It could be amazing.
 
Revvy said:
Yeah, you're probably crazy, but WTF, go big or go home....or go mildy expensive. You're not going to do this all the time, you're not doing this on a megabbl batch we're your tossing in 1,000 bucks worth. I'd say go for it.

It could be amazing.
Click to expand...

This. No point in half-assing a homebrew. I'll be tossing some 99% Lindt (no point in paying for the sugars with lower % bars) into the chocolate milk stout I'm brewing this weekend. Still not sure of the best time to add it though (during boil or in fermenter, and at what point), and how to add it (broken into squares, melted in a double-boiler, shaved with a microplane).

Maybe I'll do it at both times and put some chocolate in a randalizer :) I could call it QUADRUPLE chocolate! Well... I'd need some actual kegs first, but there's not much point as long as I'm on a medication on which drinking kegged beer carries a risk of stroke :/
 
Oh man, chocolate in the randall....can it get any better than that.



Hey, has anyone tried hand dipping hop cones in melted chocolate? You know, I hear chocolate covered insects are pretty tasty. Maybe serving chocolate covered hops as an acompanyment?
 
Have you guys who have added cocoa powder to the boil used the dutched or non-dutched cocoa?
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The powder I used was dutch-processed. I measured pH with a digital meter both pre and post boil and they were very close (don't remember exact number but around 5.45, notes are at home).

EDIT: I filled my carboy pretty full on my CIS and fully expected to see blowoff when I got home from work next day, it was fermenting strongly but wasn't making any foam. Then about a day later it started making foam and actually blew-off a little. So something happens during fermentation that allows it to make foam even with the fat of the chocolate.

It also will be interesting what the post-ferm pH is.
 
I wonder, if you're gonna use 99% Lindt, why not just use something like quality baking chocolate. It should be cheaper and the same thing, just the Lindt one will be smoother which doesn't affect your beer at all.
 
bovineblitz said:
I wonder, if you're gonna use 99% Lindt, why not just use something like quality baking chocolate. It should be cheaper and the same thing, just the Lindt one will be smoother which doesn't affect your beer at all.
Click to expand...

I can get them at a significant discount. I admittedly don't know much about the chocolate process, but I was under the impression that the quality of cocoa mass and cocoa solids varied, but with a good deal and a small batch, I don't mind going the extra mile just because I can. I can try with good quality baking chocolate in a 1gal batch of the wort I guess, and see later if the difference is substantial or not. Only problem is I don't bake and I'd have no idea if I was buying something good or something awful, the only indication I'd have is price :D
 
...but iirc, I added 5.2 buffer to it (I think it was the first time i ever used it.)
Click to expand...
Someone who knows way more about water than I've drank my entire life likes to say this about 5.2: It seems to work for those that don't have pH meters and not work for those who do. I like (rather, LOVE) PBW and Starsan but 5.2 is junk.
 
SpanishCastleAle said:
Someone who knows way more about water than I've drank my entire life likes to say this about 5.2: It seems to work for those that don't have pH meters and not work for those who do. I like (rather, LOVE) PBW and Starsan but 5.2 is junk.
Click to expand...

LOL...

Half the time it's like Irish moss for me...I remember to think maybe about using it, when the beer is being racked into the fermenter. Then I slap my forehead and go *doh*.
 
Revvy said:
LOL...

Half the time it's like Irish moss for me...I remember to think maybe about using it, when the beer is being racked into the fermenter. Then I slap my forehead and go *doh*.
Click to expand...
I still have to write down: add WF/Nut @ 12:30 (or whatever time is 10 min before flame-out) or I'll forget. I even have to write out: IC @ 12:10 or I'll forget to put the IC in. And nothing ever goes into my oven without setting a timer. I forget stuff.

WF/Nut = Whirlfloc + Yeast Nutrient
 
Finally going to brew this beer this coming weekend. I've been changing the recipe every day but I think it's going to be something very close to this:

Triple Chocolate Stout!
1.056 OG
30 IBU

77% Maris Otter
5% British Crystal 75
8% Crisp Chocolate Malt
10% invert sugar No. 2

NB hops to 30 IBU for 60 minutes

2 bars sharffen berger chocolate chopped and added to mash
4 oz. non-alkalized cocoa powder added to boil at 15 min
chocolate and vanilla extracts added to taste at bottling/kegging

fermenting with 2nd generation Wy1968
mashing at 150 for 90 minutes

I'm thinking about throwing in a couple oz. of torrified wheat for a little head retention. I'm going to be serving on nitro and it would be nice if the head hung around. The wheat may help counteract and lipids that get through the mash or that are extracted from the cocoa powder during the boil. Either way though, I think this beer will rock.:rockin:
 

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