My first stout- SWMBO stout

[Darthbrewder]

So I’ve been thinking about doing this for a while and I finally decided to try it. My wife really enjoys stouts, so she asked if I would brew one that wasn’t too high in alcohol.

I mainly wanted to see what the experts(you) thought about this recipe.

SWIMBO stout(2.5 gallon)
2.5 lbs maris otter
2 oz c60
2 oz pale chocolate
6 oz carafa3
2 oz brown malt
2 oz special b
8 oz flaked barley
1 oz fuggles @ 4.5 aa

Yeast - S-05

Mash @ 153 in two gallons for 60mins
1.5-2 quarts per lb of grain

“Sparge” with two gallons room temp water.


1/2 oz fuggles 4.5aa @60
1/2 oz fuggles 4.5aa @15

SG 1.042 actual SG 1.039
FG 1.010

 

[chickypad]

The grainbill seems a little overly complicated for a low gravity stout. I'd probably drop the brown and special B and adjust the other grains accordingly. You'll want the roast for a stout so I would make sure that's regular carafa and not the debittered (regular would be comparable to black malt), though don't over do it. If I were making it I'd shoot for something like 10-11% total dark roasted grain (combo of black+chocolate), then 5-7% C60.

 

[Darthbrewder]

I thought the grain bill seemed a bit complicated also. Most of my favorite home brews usually have a less complicated grainbill. But I wanted a well rounded flavor profile, kind of a smoother stout, if you will. The carafa 3 is the debittered special kind. That’s why I added the brown malt. I’ve read that brown malt lends a roasted character, plus I really wanted to use brown malt . Added special b just to get a darker crystal malt in there.
I guess I was thinking the wide spectrum of grains might help this beer drink bigger than it actually is.

Do you think the crystal malts will get lost behind the carafa? Would this recipe be scale able? Maybe make a higher gravity version?

 

[chickypad]

I'm not sure that you need to get complicated to be well rounded or smooth, but if you want go for it. I was thinking that if you use all debittered malt except a tiny bit of pale chocolate and brown that it will drink more like a porter, but I guess it depends what you want.

 

[Darthbrewder]

Hmm maybe I’ll have to rename this to SWMBO porter instead lol. If I hadn’t brewed this already then I would definitely have gone with the more bitter grains. Just trying to make something She will like. Thanks for the input though. I’ll post updates as this goes, maybe it’ll turn into something good. Thanks for the input!

 

[chickypad]

Oh didn't realize you brewed it already. In that case I think it looks great!