Chocolate Stout Recipe for a beginner !

Chris in Spain

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Hi, I'm so green to homebrew I must be organic! I've made 3 batches of beer so far all from extract kits. Now that I've got the hang of things and got rid of the fear factor, I decided I would try an all grain brew.

Decided to just do a 5litre batch so if I mess up then there's not too many tears! I live in Spain so on my last UK trip I visited a homebrew shop in Leeds and asked for advice on ingredients to buy. I really wanted to brew a small batch of Mild as my wife liked Hull mild from when we lived there. Unfortunately the homebrew shop couldn't help me with this but I got ingredients to make a chocolate stout, enough for 2 x 5 litre batches. The lady in the shop told me to use half the ingredients for each batch. I was so hyped that I didn't even think about asking for instructions on what to do with the ingredients! Now I'm back in Spain and although I've watched countless you tube videos I'm still unsure about temperature and timings, when to do what.

Can anyone help me with an idiot proof recipe that I can follow. The ingredients I have for 2 x 5 litres are :

1 kg Maris Other
500gms Chocolate Malt
2 Fuggles Hop Tea Bag packs
2 sachets of Brewers Yeast

I've found recipes online but none match these ingredients, some have oats in which I can buy locally but hope I'm not missing anything major?

I emailed the shop but the lady pointed me towards this forum, don't think she's a brewer ! I would be extremely grateful for any help you can give me.

Thanks
 
Hi, I'm so green to homebrew I must be organic! I've made 3 batches of beer so far all from extract kits. Now that I've got the hang of things and got rid of the fear factor, I decided I would try an all grain brew.

Decided to just do a 5litre batch so if I mess up then there's not too many tears! I live in Spain so on my last UK trip I visited a homebrew shop in Leeds and asked for advice on ingredients to buy. I really wanted to brew a small batch of Mild as my wife liked Hull mild from when we lived there. Unfortunately the homebrew shop couldn't help me with this but I got ingredients to make a chocolate stout, enough for 2 x 5 litre batches. The lady in the shop told me to use half the ingredients for each batch. I was so hyped that I didn't even think about asking for instructions on what to do with the ingredients! Now I'm back in Spain and although I've watched countless you tube videos I'm still unsure about temperature and timings, when to do what.

Can anyone help me with an idiot proof recipe that I can follow. The ingredients I have for 2 x 5 litres are :

1 kg Maris Other
500gms Chocolate Malt
2 Fuggles Hop Tea Bag packs
2 sachets of Brewers Yeast

I've found recipes online but none match these ingredients, some have oats in which I can buy locally but hope I'm not missing anything major?

I emailed the shop but the lady pointed me towards this forum, don't think she's a brewer ! I would be extremely grateful for any help you can give me.

Thanks
well well well you have gone in head first as per another brewers forum name on here my other words aint fit for this forum.
well 65c is a good temperature to mash at do that for 60 min.
have you tried to formulate a recipie on here using the grains you were given.

i l dont do 5lt batches but 21lt but the scale tool in the recipie calculator can fix this for you this is only choc stout ive done.
what sort of equipment you using?

https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/509259/choccoffee-stout
 
ok here is a throw together on my imagination of what youve got in stock there.
1 what yeast you got?
2 how much fuggles you got?
3 i dont think you got enough for 2 brews.

here ya go

https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/640794/help-old-mate
try some cocoa nibs @ 10 min left in boil wizz em up in blender and toss em in for chocolate flavour lets say around 100g

chocolate malt dont taste like chocolate grab some and chew on it and post here what you taste good luck and fire away with any questions.
 
I’m actually in a similar position to you but I’m a little bit further ahead so I might be able to help. I’ve just started brewing in 5 litre batches as well (I’ve done 2) and put together what I feel like I have a pretty decent method. The only thing is I haven’t had a finished sample yet, so I don’t completely have the proof. I am going to open my first bottle tonight though, so if everything tastes ok then I’ll write up my full method for you.

One thing I will say now though is that you probably don’t have quite enough grain for two batches. I think you generally need about 1kg of grain per 5lt batch. If you can’t get your hands on more grain you can always just add more fermentables (maybe honey would work well for your beer). From what I’ve read oats add to the mouthfeel but not the alcohol and they should only make up 5-10% of the grain bill, so by all means get some but don’t use it all to make up the shortfall in grain.
 
Alright, so I tasted my beer and it turns out to be beer! Given that it works, I’ll share my method for a 5L batch BIAB. This was all done in a kitchen with non brewing specific items so you should be able to find everything I used. The only thing that you must have that you may not already have is a thermometer. Don’t try anything until you have one.

First if your grains aren’t already milled up, then do it. If you don’t have a mill like me then I just put small batches in a blender and pulse it 5-6 times to crack all the grains. Repeat as many batches as necessary to do all your grains. I also turn on my oven to about 65 degrees at this point (will explain why later).

Next is heating your water to strike temp. I think you need about 8L of water to make a 5L batch. It will vary a bit but aim for 8 to begin with and if you are under you can always add more water later. This means you will need about a 10-12L pot if you want to get all the water in to begin with (because the grain adds volume and the water will rise when boiling).
I only have a 6L pot so I do as follows.

I aim to mash with 3L. I put 2L it the kettle to boil and add 1L of water from my fridge. When I add these two in the pot it is very close to strike temp (71c for my recipe). You don’t need to do it this way but I find it goes quicker than just heating the pot on my stove.

Next add the grains in the bag and drop the bag in the water open the bag and stir everything through so there are no clumps. Check temp and if too hot add a little cold water or if not hot enough the heat on the stove for a bit. I aim for 65c for my mash temp. Once I’ve hit 65 I put the lid on and put the entire pot in the pre heated oven. This way I don’t have to worry about my mash temp changing over the hour.

Whilst this is happening I heat up another 3L of water to 75c ( you won’t need to do this if you’ve already got all your water in the pot).

Once the hour is up I pull out the grain bag and place in a colander on top of the pot and then sparge the 3L of heated water over the grains.

Next bring all the wort to the boil and maintain on a low boil for an hour. Add your hops etc at whatever time you need to for your recipe. You can also add more water at this point if you have lost too much.

5 minutes before it finishes boiling I add a bag of ice and a little water in my sink to make an ice bath. As soon as the boil has finished add your pot to the ice bath. Take a small sample (about 50 ml) and cool rapidly to around 27c (follow temps on your yeast pack and do it at the higher end of the temp range) Pitch 4gms of dry yeast in to this sample once at correct temp and stir occasionally. This is your yeast starter.

Once the wort comes down to pitching temp in the ice bath, put the wort in to your fermentation vessel (6L water bottle for me). I strain the wort as I put it in to catch most of the boiled hops but you may want to leave them in there. Up to you. Once wort is in the bottle, shake it up for a couple of minutes and then pitch the yeast. I don’t have an airlock but I just put foil over the top of the bottle.

I then put the bottle inside a foam cooler and I also put a bottle with 1.5L of ice in with it and change the ice bottle over every 24 hours. I find this keeps it to about 18c temp. If you need to go colder then change the bottle more regularly or put more bottles in the cooler as well. It will be trial and error.

Leave it for 2 weeks and then bottle.

One tip for you, to make things simple if is cheap and available just buy a new 6L water bottle each time. I use the water for brewing and then the bottle for fermentation and I dont have to worry about cleaning or sanitation problems with it next time. It only cost me about $1.50 here for 6L so well worth it for me.

Hope this helps
 
I’m actually in a similar position to you but I’m a little bit further ahead so I might be able to help. I’ve just started brewing in 5 litre batches as well (I’ve done 2) and put together what I feel like I have a pretty decent method. The only thing is I haven’t had a finished sample yet, so I don’t completely have the proof. I am going to open my first bottle tonight though, so if everything tastes ok then I’ll write up my full method for you.

One thing I will say now though is that you probably don’t have quite enough grain for two batches. I think you generally need about 1kg of grain per 5lt batch. If you can’t get your hands on more grain you can always just add more fermentables (maybe honey would work well for your beer). From what I’ve read oats add to the mouthfeel but not the alcohol and they should only make up 5-10% of the grain bill, so by all means get some but don’t use it all to make up the shortfall in grain.
Thanks I'm happy to do just one batch for now, and thanks for your detailed instructions. I do have a thermometer but not a 6litre water bottle, was thinking I could get by with an empty 5litre one that i bought for the other brews. I will see if I can buy a bigger one. With your method and other advice I've received I think I can go ahead soon and if nothing else it will will be a learning curve! Thanks again.
 

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