Mashing Chocolate (The food, not the malt)

[emjay]

Double post

 

[Revvy]

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?

 

[SpanishCastleAle]

Have you guys who have added cocoa powder to the boil used the dutched or non-dutched cocoa?

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.

 

[Revvy]

It also will be interesting what the post-ferm pH is.

I wish I had a ph meter, or even test strips when I mashed in hot chocolate, I would have loved to known what it was then....but iirc, I added 5.2 buffer to it (I think it was the first time i ever used it.)

 

[bovineblitz]

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.

 

[emjay]

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.

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

 

[SpanishCastleAle]

...but iirc, I added 5.2 buffer to it (I think it was the first time i ever used it.)

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.

 

[Revvy]

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.

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*.

 

[SpanishCastleAle]

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*.

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

 

[KingBrianI]

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:

 

[Barc]

I've done a triple chocolate stout. I used dark cocoa powder at the end of the boil / knockout as well as chocolate extract at bottling along with the standard chocolate malts, etc. I also used vodka to extract more chocolate flavor and aroma from cocoa powder and added that to the bottling bucket, as well. Even accounting for the bitterness of cocoa powder and hops, it is massively sweet. Of course, my OG was over 1.1 and my FG was only around 1.03 or so.

 

[Rhoobarb]

Cacao nibs in secondary FTW. 6-8oz. in a five gal. batch. See here.

 

[KingBrianI]

Dang Barry! You have any left? Maybe we could swap a bottle when mine is ready.

 

[KingBrianI]

Cacao nibs in secondary FTW. 6-8oz. in a five gal. batch. See here.

I considered using cacao nibs and may use them in a future chocolate beer. At this point though, I'm going to have way too much cost already invested in this beer. $10 for the chocolate bars, I forget what the cocoa powder was, probably $10-15, though I won't be using all of it, vanilla extract was probably $10-15 too, but again I won't be using all of it, and the chocolate extract I have yet to buy will be $20 shipped, but I won't be using all of it either. Maybe the nibs will be in my quadruple chocolate stout.

Oh also, having just bought a sixer of Fuller's London Porter for the first time in a long time, I can see it working very well with chocolate. That might be worth experimenting with at some point. There's a recipe for the Fuller's London Porter in Graham Wheeler's BYOBRA.

 

[emjay]

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:

What's the expected SRM on that recipe? Maybe it's just my typical efficiency but it doesn't seem all that dark. I'd throw in some hulless black malt (I used Briess Blackprinz), but that's just me... the recipe just looks more like a Porter to me.

 

[Barc]

You have any left?

If I've got any left, I'll get you one at the next meet up. Like I said, it is sweet!

 

[TheSeether]

So I picked up two bars of Sharffen Berger extra dark (82% cacao) chocolate today (at $5 each! ouch!).

Excellent choice. I was cruising through this thread just to see if I needed to make the recommendation and I see I do not. The only other bar chocolate I would even consider is from Olive and Sinclair out of Nashville. Yeah, the price is high but you are absolutely getting what you paid for. Sharffen Berger sells bulk 99% cocoa powder. They used to make a 99% bar but I no longer see it on their site. Olive and Sinclair top out at 75% (IIRC) on their retail bars but they can be contacted for nibs or higher percentage product if you can buy in bulk.

 

[SpanishCastleAle]

Even accounting for the bitterness of cocoa powder and hops, it is massively sweet. Of course, my OG was over 1.1 and my FG was only around 1.03 or so.

I just kegged a Chocolate Stout and it finished at...1.039. OG was 1.099. But I mashed really high (like 160* F or so) and used 10 oz lactose and used the Fullers yeast. I did an FFT and it finished at 1.038 so the yeast finished the job. I didn't quite want it that high but still well into the thirties.

But when I tasted mine, it wasn't sweet and had a pretty high bitterness. I used a decent amount of hops though.

 

[KingBrianI]

What's the expected SRM on that recipe? Maybe it's just my typical efficiency but it doesn't seem all that dark. I'd throw in some hulless black malt (I used Briess Blackprinz), but that's just me... the recipe just looks more like a Porter to me.

SRM is looking like 33 or so right now. I'm not quite sure what the color is of the invert sugar I made, but it's pretty dark. And I would also usually advocate the use of roasted barley in something you're going to call a stout, but I've noticed a lot of the sweet stouts only use chocolate malt so I'm going to try that for this one. It seems like that is what Young's does for their double chocolate stout which I'm loosely basing this recipe on.

 

[SpanishCastleAle]

Interesting comment on the roast barley, I decided on my Chocolate Stout to not use roast barley either. 1 lb of UK chocolate malt (420 L) and 1/2 lb UK pale chocolate (210 L). It's very dark and opaque but still has a touch of deep/dark brown...so it even 'looks' more chocolatey. I have no idea how much color the actual chocolate added.

 

[KingBrianI]

Tomorrow's the big day. I think I've finally settled on a malt bill. I'm going to take pictures of the process tomorrow and I'll be sure to post them to the thread. Here's the final grain bill.

OG 1.056
IBU 30
SRM 30.5

8 lbs Maris Otter
0.85 lbs Crisp Chocolate Malt
0.5 lbs Simpson's Dark Crystal (75L)
0.3 lbs Torrified Wheat
1 lb homemade invert syrup no. 2 (~35 SRM)

1 oz Northern Brewer @ 60 min

Mashing @ 151*F

Fermenting with wy1968 (I'll be using the fermentation schedule I describe in my British Yeast thread if you've seen that)

I may or may not add lactose to the keg, depending on how it tastes.

Chocolate additions will be unchanged from what I stated before: 2 bars scharffen berger in mash, 4 oz. cocoa in boil @ 15 min., and chocolate and vanilla extracts at kegging to taste.

I'll be using filtered Durham, NC water with CaCl2 added to get the Ca+ to 50-70 ppm.

It should be good!

 

[KingBrianI]

Mash is underway!

Conditioned and Crushed Grain

Close-up of crush

Chocolate bars and cocoa

Close-up of chocolate bar

Chocolate bar info (38g fat per bar, hope the mash absorbs most of that!)

Unwrapped

Chopping Begun

One bar down

Both bars ready for mash

CaCl2 and NaHCO3 (mash and boil additions)

 

[KingBrianI]

Mash In

Salt additions

Adding chocolate

Chocolate in mash

Stirring it in (It started melting immediately for which I was grateful!)

Mash temp ended around 150 (maybe due to more stirring than usual and chocolate addition? I'm not sweating it)

 

[KingBrianI]

First Runnings. No amount of vorlaufing cleared it. I think the chocolate was causing some turbidity. It looked like turkish coffee.

First runnings in the kettle.

Hops

Cocoa

Yeast nutrient and half a whirlfloc tablet

Spent grain after batch sparge was run off. You can see a thick layer of chocolatey stuff on top

Here is how it looked when you scooped it off

 

[ChshreCat]

You should take some of those grains and use them to make some spent grain bread!

 

[KingBrianI]

On the burner

Cormorants and seagulls enjoying the warm day while we wait for the temp to rise

And here is where a damn beaver chewed down one of my willows (by the lake) and my mullberry tree (far right)

Getting close

The chocolate in the mash caused the pre-boil foam to look pretty weird

Reached boil

Hops in

Timer set

Spent Grain for the ducks

 

[KingBrianI]

Cocoa in

Invert sugar in

Cocoa caused a weird looking sludge on top

After that I was too busy running around trying to get everything wrapped up I didn't take any pictures. Gravity came in at 1.054 due to not boiling down enough. Wind was strong and the burner was having problems. The damn grommet popped out of the lid and into the wort when I tried to push the airlock in so that sucked. Whatever, I've been experimenting with open fermentation lately anyway, and the lack of a good seal around the airlock won't be a big deal. I'll keep updating as it progresses.

 

[Revvy]

You should take some of those grains and use them to make some spent grain bread!

Spent grain Chocolate Cake....mmmmmmmmmmmm

 

[KingBrianI]

You should take some of those grains and use them to make some spent grain bread!

Spent grain Chocolate Cake....mmmmmmmmmmmm

Haha, I tasted the spent grain and it definitely had a little bit of a chocolate flavor but I dumped it all out for the ducks. They will usually eat the whole lot within a day or so. Hope they aren't chocolate intolerant like dogs!

 

[Revvy]

I think in honor of my recovery that you should save a bottle for me....

I'm just sayin.