Recipe adjustment for higher ABV

[Ungoliant]

I'm currently brewing this specialty grain recipe, which is a chocolate coffee stout.

7.5 lbs Pale LME
0.5 lbs Crystal 120L
" " Chocolate Malt
" " Rolled Oats
3.0 oz. Roasted Barley
4.0 oz Cascade Hops (90, 60, 30, KO)
WYEAST Denny's Favorite 50

Secondary will have coffee and chocolate extract in it.

So fermentation finished on this batch at 5.2% (still in primary, 19 days and counting to 30, @ 68F). I didn't get a reading at brew day, but a brew calculator says my OG would have been 1.055, but my FG is 1.012.

What can I do to this recipe to encourage a higher ABV? I'm shooting for about 8%.

 

[motorneuron]

Do you mean adjustments to make if you made this recipe again, but at a higher ABV? Or do you mean what can you do now to increase the ABV of your existing already-fermented beer?

(Small note: in the future, I would not use 4 oz of hops for a stout, especially not one that has other flavors in it, like coffee and chocolate. I also wouldn't use that hop schedule. You probably just want a single bittering addition, for which you can use a small amount of something higher in AA right at the beginning of the boil.)

 

[MrKrinkle151]

If you don't have any brewing software, I recommend this: http://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/calculator

Enter your recipe as is, then increase the amounts while keeping the original percentages of fermentables the same (that way your ingredients ratios will remain the same as the original recipe) until you reach desired ABV. Don't forget to scale hops, etc. as well, maintaining the desired IBUs

You're also going to want to make a yeast starter

 

[JordanKnudson]

Enter your recipe as is, then increase the amounts while keeping the original percentages of fermentables the same (that way your ingredients ratios will remain the same as the original recipe) until you reach desired ABV.

I don't agree with just scaling up while keeping percentages the same. My experience when scaling up a "normal" gravity beer to a high grav one is that you really want to keep the actual quantity of roasted/crystal malts the same (not the percentage) while bringing up the OG by adding more base malt, or in certain cases simple sugars like dextrose. I started increasing the gravity of some of my average abv recipes this way after listening to an interview with John Palmer in which he recommended this strategy, and I have to say that it works better 99% of the time. The balance of flavors contributed by base malt and specialty malt do not scale proportionally, and it's super easy to end up with too much sweet/burnt/etc flavor if you focus on keeping the percentages, same as it happens with spices.

I do agree that you'll want to make a yeast starter (or if you're lazy and rich, just buy additional yeast).

 

[Ungoliant]

Do you mean adjustments to make if you made this recipe again, but at a higher ABV? Or do you mean what can you do now to increase the ABV of your existing already-fermented beer?

(Small note: in the future, I would not use 4 oz of hops for a stout, especially not one that has other flavors in it, like coffee and chocolate. I also wouldn't use that hop schedule. You probably just want a single bittering addition, for which you can use a small amount of something higher in AA right at the beginning of the boil.)

I felt there was a lot of hops in this recipe, but Cascade is fairly mellow, so it should turn out alright. I'm okay with hoppy beers anyway, but I'll adjust it in the future based on how it turns out.

I was asking about how to increase the ABV for a future batch with this recipe, but if there are things I can do now to bump the ABV, please enlighten me.

 

[motorneuron]

If you want to increase the ABV now, you could add a little sugar (if you also rouse the yeast) directly to the carboy. Beware that this will increase your ABV without changing your FG, which could wind up leaving you with a beer that feels a little thin or insufficiently sweet, depending on what you're going for. So I wouldn't go crazy. Then again, since this is a stout, you could add a little bit of lactose, which is not fermentable and will increase your FG without affecting the ABV. Lactose will add some sweetness and body.

Yeah, cascade is not that crazy, and the last addition is at 30 minutes, so I don't think it'll be a problem. But you should think about the focus of your beer. No point in spending the money on the hops if they're just being used for inefficient bittering. And I think the flavor would be more likely to clash than complement.

 

[Ungoliant]

Hm I think I'll just hold off till next time but I will definitely keep that in mind. I'm not sure I want to risk the character of my beer that much.

 

[JordanKnudson]

Yeah, cascade is not that crazy, and the last addition is at 30 minutes, so I don't think it'll be a problem. But you should think about the focus of your beer. No point in spending the money on the hops if they're just being used for inefficient bittering. And I think the flavor would be more likely to clash than complement.

The recipe appears to have one more addition at flameout, so there will be some aroma contribution beyond just bittering. But otherwise, I completely agree with this statement. 4 oz of Cascade to essentially accomplish what could have been done with an ounce or two of Magnum is not the best use of your hops (save those Cascades for a SNPA clone or something!). I also think that the choice of a citrusy American hop will be tough to match to the coffee and chocolate flavors in secondary. They will either clash with or mask the hops.

Now, I realize that it might sound like I'm being very critical, so let me say that I think the grain bill and the yeast choice are very good! If I were going to bump the recipe up into the Imperial Stout range, I would do it like this:

Batch Size: 5 gallons (US)
O.G.: 1.082
IBU: 30.9 (assuming a partial boil of 2.8 gallons with top-up water. If you can do a full boil, you can reduce the hops a bit.)
SRM: 31 (until you add the coffee, then it's going to go fully opaque)
ABV: ~8.0%

7.5 lbs Pale LME
4 lbs Light DME
10.0 oz Chocolate Malt (steep)
9.5 oz C120 (steep)
8.0 oz Flaked Oats (should be mashed, but you're not doing PM, so try steeping)
4.0 oz Roasted Barley (steep)

2 oz Magnum - 60 minutes (this will get you less bittering than the style minimum calls for, but since you are adding coffee to secondary, you want to leave some room for the extra bitterness that will provide)

WY1450 - Denny's Favorite 50 (build a big ol' starter or pitch multiple packs)

Coffee (secondary)
Cacao nibs (secondary)

Let me know if you try it (or something like it)!

EDIT: I just noticed how many parenthetical thoughts I typed out. Oh the joys of a cluttered mind...

 

[Ungoliant]

That actually sounds pretty good. I'll play around with some of those suggestions and see what I come up with for next time.

Are there any major considerations that need to be made for imperial stout vs stout?

 

[JordanKnudson]

That actually sounds pretty good. I'll play around with some of those suggestions and see what I come up with for next time.

Are there any major considerations that need to be made for imperial stout vs stout?

Biggest consideration is ensuring that you pitch enough yeast. Consult a pitching rate calculator like the one on Mr. Malty to see how much you need, and make an appropriately sized starter. (http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html)

 

[MrKrinkle151]

I don't agree with just scaling up while keeping percentages the same. My experience when scaling up a "normal" gravity beer to a high grav one is that you really want to keep the actual quantity of roasted/crystal malts the same (not the percentage) while bringing up the OG by adding more base malt, or in certain cases simple sugars like dextrose. I started increasing the gravity of some of my average abv recipes this way after listening to an interview with John Palmer in which he recommended this strategy, and I have to say that it works better 99% of the time. The balance of flavors contributed by base malt and specialty malt do not scale proportionally, and it's super easy to end up with too much sweet/burnt/etc flavor if you focus on keeping the percentages, same as it happens with spices.



I do agree that you'll want to make a yeast starter (or if you're lazy and rich, just buy additional yeast).

You know, I had always heard to scale proportionally for OG/efficiency and never really thought much of it, but now that I think about it, you're absolutely right. While all you want is more sugar out of the grain, increasing specialty malts also increases the absolute amounts of flavor components, etc. while maintaining the same volume. This could get messy with a stout, especially. I recant my advice, though that technique would still be useful for scaling to different batch volumes.

 

[Ungoliant]

Biggest consideration is ensuring that you pitch enough yeast. Consult a pitching rate calculator like the one on Mr. Malty to see how much you need, and make an appropriately sized starter. (http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html)

How much volume do I need for a starter?

I don't have an Erlenmeyer flask or anything. I do have a 1 gallon bucket w/lid that I can use for a starter. Would that be enough?

 

[JordanKnudson]

That calculator on Mr. Malty (see link in previous comment) will tell you what volume of starter you need based on the parameters of your wort. I put in an OG of 1.082, batch size of 5 gallons, yeast mfg date in mid-May (Wyeast has it printed on the package, White Labs uses a "best by" date instead that you have to work back from to get the rough mfg date). If you use a single pack of yeast, it says you will need a 5+ quart starter. You could do that, or do a multi-step starter (very easy, just takes longer), or use a smaller starter with multiple packs of yeast. Your choice. But I'd definitely put the info for your batch into the calculator yourself to double check me.

As for the container, an Erlenmeyer flask is not mandatory. I use a 1 gallon glass fermenting jug. As long as you use a sanitized, food-safe container, you will be fine. Also, stir plates are useful, but don't worry if you don't have one, you can still do a simple starter and be just fine.