First Milk Stout Recipe Critique

[orlando]

Yeah, try it and adjust in future. If it's overpoweringly roasty or astringent from the roast grain then you know to use lower colour versions or less of them next time.

Send me a bottle

Ooh a queue?

[james1988]

If you can point me to a guide for packaging beer properly so the bottles don't get smashed and send me your addresses you're both more than welcome to one.

James

[orlando]

Most kind but I was only joking, I'm quite happy to read your own review when they're ready.

[MARMITE]

<t>This is all very interesting stuff.<br/>
Some of the lads in the local recently visited Sheffield and were very impressed with a hazelnut milk stout.It was brewed by Little Critters and came out at 6%.They brought me a sample even though the brewpub would not allow takeouts and insisted that I should brew it on their behalf.<br/>
I did try e-mailing Little Critters but they did not reply.The pump clip gives the IBU's and hazelnut essence is available on line.<br/>
I've never brewed a milk stout before and recipes I've researched are quite different. Some contain roast and/or flaked barley and others omit both.<br/>
James I can see has decided to omit the roast barley.<br/>
Any ideas please?</t>

[james1988]

Evening Marmite,

To be totally honest the reason I didn't include the oats is because I didn't have any in stock. I used the flaked barley in order to promote head retention and to give it body. Initially I was going to mash low for a lighter stout (I realise this goes against the grain) as I wanted to emulate a mug of coffee. However, after much thought I decided to mash higher and go for a heavier beer so the idea was to use the flaked barley to promote this.

James

[james1988]

Morning All,

I tapped the keg last night and was pleasantly surprised at the outcome of the beer. The beer has a chocolate nose, off white / light brown head and is rather black in colour. Its heavy but not too heavy so that you could only get through one pint in a sitting; it has a chocolate and a very minor coffee taste to it, no bitter astringency and is very creamy. I would say it was a triumph of an experiment but it is unfortunately lacking the coffee flavour I was looking for.

James

[orlando]

Excellent well done James. Next time add some strong espresso to the batch.

[Barley Water]

Buy (or better yet roast your own) some high quality coffee beans then do a cold extraction. Once you have the concentrated coffee they you can add it to your beer to taste. The cold extraction will keep everything really smooth, it's easy and it works great. By the way, the fresher the roasted coffee the better the results; it make a really big difference if you are a coffee snob.

[james1988]

Buy (or better yet roast your own) some high quality coffee beans then do a cold extraction. Once you have the concentrated coffee they you can add it to your beer to taste. The cold extraction will keep everything really smooth, it's easy and it works great. By the way, the fresher the roasted coffee the better the results; it make a really big difference if you are a coffee snob.

Excellent, another coffee snob with a sideline in brewing too. I'd thought of using 'coffee malt' but I'd rather a full on coffee flavour to the brew than failing to do it with malts.

How much coffee would you use in terms of french presses?

Apologies for the slow replies,
James

[Barley Water]

I can't remember how I did it as it was a few years ago. If you add to taste however I don't know that it will matter that much, I would make the coffee pretty strong however so that you don't have to add a lot to the beer. What remains won't be wasted however as you can just add hot water and drink it, you will be truly surprised at how smooth it comes out. By the way, you can also cold steep dark grains and get the same effect; I have done it two or three times and you will notice the difference (in a good way, less astringent). There is this guy over here, Gordon Strong, who is big into the cold extraction thing and in my limited experience it works. If you want to make beer really, really smooth try that technique and also do the oatmeal thing as advocated by our boy Seymour; the beer should fairly ooze out of the glass and down the drinkers throat.