WTK: Adding Coffee & Cacao to Recipe

[ultravista]

I am planning an imperial coffee porter with cacao.

The large batch recipe calls for 3 pounds of coffee and 2 pounds of cacao per barrel. If my math is correct, the multiplier for 5.5 gallons is 0.1774 (3*(5.5/31)*16)

For 5.5 gallons, I plan on:
8.5 ounces of coffee
5.7 ounces of cacao nibs

First, does that seem excessive for a 5.5 gallon batch?

Second, what is the best way to add the coffee and cacao nibs? I’ve read about cold pressing the coffee and vodka soaking the nibs and looking for opinions on which is the best way to extract flavor without astringency. Others put both into the primary, secondary, or keg. I’ve also read about a brewer soaking the cacao in vodka and hitting it with a blender/processor to emulsify the batch.

Normally my batch size is 5.5 gallons to net 5 gallons in the keg; however, with the introduction of coffee and cacao, I may need to adjust the batch size to account for the extra volume or potential loss due to absorption.

When cold pressing coffee, is there a ratio of water to crushed coffee? Do you use all of the liquid or condense it down to a slurry?

The same goes for the cacao.

Is there a disadvantage to adding the coffee and cacao slurry to the chilled fermenter or is it best to do it post-fermentation.

Looking for your best practices – please chime in.

[craft brewing]

that seems excessive to me, Im about to do something similar and wondered the same thing. If you listen to the wake and bake podcast the brewer adds 100g which is roughly 4 ounces of ground coffee direct to the fermentor for 48hrs. This is what Im going to do for my victory at sea clone. Im unsure on the vanilla bit - let me know how you go with your method.

cheers

[ultravista]

Darrin - please post your Victory at Sea recipe. I've had it a few times and it's a damned fine brew.

The cacao and coffee are a recipe for Pizza Port's Coffee Monster, a very coffee and cacao forward beer. I'm trying to gauge the best way to do the coffee & cacao.

I have an ounce of cacao "steeping" in vodka right now. It tastes chocolaty; however, when I put a little into a glass of stout, I couldn't taste it.

I may throw it all into a 200 micron bag and shove it into the keg for a while. Just trying to figure out the best way to do it. Normally, I fill the keg as far as it will go, nearly to the gas post. I suspect that I'll have to fill it less to account for 12 ounces or so of the coffee & cacao.

[Bokonon]

I've got a Brewhemoth conical fermenter that has a 4" Tri-Clamp opening on top. When I made my last coffee beer I put the cacoa nibs in one bag and coffee beans in another, tied them up with dental floss and attached to the top.

My plan was to remove them when the flavor got where I wanted, but after soaking up all the beer it was tough to pull them out without potentially ripping the bags and making a huge mess. I decided to just pull them up so they were out of the beer.

Since mine was well over coffee'd, if I brew it again I will add the nibs first and keep tasting till I find the sweet spot. Then remove them and add the coffee.

If you are going to add the bags to the keg, you should add the bags first and purge well with co2, then fill the keg. You'll definitely have less than 5 gallons in there but then you don't need to try to guess how much beer to put in.

[siwelwerd]

Is there a disadvantage to adding the coffee and cacao slurry to the chilled fermenter or is it best to do it post-fermentation.

No, just more of a lack of advantage. The later you can wait to add something to your beer, the easier it is to adjust the amount to balance with the other flavors already present.

My method for Chocolate Coffee Porter: Let your porter ferment out (2 weeks usually). Add 4 oz Cocoa nibs per 5 gallon to fermenter; give it two days, then taste daily. Rack to a keg when the cocoa nib character is where you want it (usually 3-4 days). Coffee is added to taste at kegging; mix up 1/2 lb coarse ground coffee in a half gallon of cold water. Stick it in the fridge. Every time you walk by the fridge for the next 12-18 hours, shake the coffee mixture. Filter, and add to taste to the kg (I find about half of this, i.e. 1 quart is about right for 5 gallons of porter). You will probably need more time/more coffee in an imperial porter, but go by taste.

[ultravista]

siwelwerd - add it to the fermenter loose or bagged in something? Do you sanitize the cracked nibs beforehand?

[ScottyB-Brewing]

I bottle condition and when I did a coffee stout I boiled a pint of strong Dark Sumatra coffee and dissolved the priming sugar in it, cooled it down of course then added it to the bottling bucket. Seems lazy and too easy but it came out great. It was a 5 gallon batch.

Not everybody bottle conditions so that of course wouldn't work for force carbonating kegs but I would recommend trying to for folks who want to do a coffee stout if you bottle condition, the results are awesome.

[Hardcore]

I took off some of the already fermented beer about a pint or so and cold steeped coffee in that for a week or so and then added it back to the keg alittle at a time until I got the desired amount of coffee flavor