Toredan's Brew Journal

Seen this done a few times and rather liked it. Instead of multiple brew threads I'm just going to keep my logs here.

Today's brew was the American Stout by Greg Hughes from the bible. It called for Amarillo hops which unfortunately I was out of so subbed Centennial instead.

Target was 21L to the FV, 19L will go into a Corny and left untouched till Feb or so and the last 2L bottled for various friends to try.

In addition to the original recipe I added 100g of oats and 100g of flaked barley. I quite like a lot of mouth feel in my beers and really struggle to maintain a head. I figured on the American Stout the aroma was going to be a big part of the beer so head is crucial.

Brew went ok, Brewer's Friend calculator told me to raise initial strike water to 78c but after doughing in 6.5kg into 12L the temp had dropped quite a bit. Think next time I'll mash with more water and sparge less. Last 10 minutes of boil my pico boiler turned off for some reason. Maybe the element got a big gunked up. It is solid black at the minute but soaking over night in Oxiclean so will test it before next brew.

I brew from an apartment so my equipment is rather basic, I don't have much storage I'm afraid. I use a 25L pico boiler with a kettle element. Process is BIAB but I'll dunk/batch sparge in a separate bucket.

Target OG was 1.062 but this finished a bit short at 1.056. I find it hard to hit decent efficiency using BIAB and always end up a bit shorter than target. Oh well, worse has happened :lol:

Pictures below;

1. Obligatory grain rainbow
2. Draining batch sparge into boiler
3. Boil begins!
4. Finished beer in the FV, will pitch yeast in the morning as I tend to rock the no-chill method.


Any comments, questions or criticisms please feel free! Will try to document future brews here and taste tests. Also, if it's my own recipe I'll share. I don't feel comfortable sharing a recipe that someone has published, seems wrong. :lol:

Kicked off well :)

This was put into a corny keg after 10 days in the FV. Roll on 7 days and here it is! Tastes great, not as hoppy as I would have liked so next time I'll for sure dry hop. I can taste an initial hop flavor but there is zero hop aroma. However that being said it is super chocolaty. Getting loads of roasty-coffee-caramel flavor. I do think next time I'll use slightly less black malt as there is a bit too much of that burnt taste.I think this recipe is interesting as any really hoppy beer needs to be drank quickly, whereas most dark beers need some good conditioning time. I reckon these tasting notes will change over time quite drastically.

Thats a loveley dark colour. I brewed this and it wasn't very hoppy either. Nice beer though but tasted a little burned for a while. Not in a bad way.

Hi Toredan,

Brew looks lovely, nice photos too.

Is there a reason you are mashing in only 12l if doing BIAB? Your efficiency would benefit from mashing in say 20-25l then doing a dunk sparge also.

Does look a lovely pint though.