Stout newbie

[sean_99]

Hi all thanks for accepting me to your community, total newbie only a few brews in to my new venture. Am a stout only guy and using St Peters kits to now I have enjoyed mostly every drop I have brewed and am learning by a few mistakes have made. 3 weeks fermenting and 3 weeks bottled seems to work very well (got a good few tips from browsing the members posts on this forum before joining today) cheers all

 

[An Ankoù]

Welcome Sean the Stout.
Are you going to stick with the St Peter's kits or are you going to venture into all or partial grain brewing. What commercial beers do you like?

 

[Baldbrewer]

Hi Sean and welcome,

There used to be a guy called "Ditch" over on jimsbeerkit who made a "Ditch's stout" I won't paste from the page as I don't know if it breaks forum protocols etc.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

I won't paste from the page as I don't know if it breaks forum protocols etc.

@Baldbrewer
Post a Ditchies Stout recipe thread with a link to the thread at Jim's ln the relevent forum here .

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Welcome to the forum Sean.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

@Baldbrewer
Post a Ditchies Stout recipe thread with a link to the thread

Thread here -

https://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/threads/ditchs-stout.99588/

 

[The Baron]

Welcome to the forum

 

[sean_99]

Thanks for the welcome guys, am going to stick to what I am comfortable for the time being (kits) but will probably get into using partial grain further down the line. Currently have a St Peters fermenting from yesterday and I put a Muntons milk stout on last Tuesday. Not seen a bubble in the airlock on the Muntons at all yet and been nearly a week now. It has 500g of lactose to be added in the recipe after adding the 2 cans of malt extract, was only reading elsewhere later an realized the lactose is non fermentable. Have been going off the airlock bubbles in previous brews rather than taking a hydrometer og and fg reading (schoolboy error) but will from now be using it all the time. There is foam up the sides of the Muntons fermenter so it must have been a quick n non visible ferment. Also made up 6g of brewing yeast in warm water with some sugar and added that on saturday but still no bubble.

 

[Hazelwood Brewery]

Hey Sean,

There is lots of good advice on this site. Use the search feature and look for “stout” or “stout recipe” or “stout kit” or any other expression that better describes what you’re looking for to find something worthwhile.

…and welcome!

 

[Jim Brewster]

My first stout was a dash of roasted barley and some rolled oats, in a pale ale recipe, came out good. A lot of stouts on sale at the moment contain lactose.. not a fan.

 

[sean_99]

My first stout was a dash of roasted barley and some rolled oats, in a pale ale recipe, came out good. A lot of stouts on sale at the moment contain lactose.. not

Do you think if I were to do another Muntons milk stout that I could let it ferment for the 1st wk without adding the lactose until wk2 with that being non fermentable anyway? Have today got another 1 along with a Muntons Gold Imperial Stout and a Bulldog Beer "Easter Brew" Chocolate Stout (need to get some stock going and let it mature longer as am sampling the fruits of my labour too fast)

 

[Jim Brewster]

As far as I know it doesn't matter when you add the lactose since it's non fermentable. I would add it at the end of the boil so it's sterilised and fully mixed in (not sure how easy/hard it is to dissolve).

For adding to the fermenter if it's a powder that doesn't clump I guess it'll dissolve ok as long as it doesn't just sink. If it clumps, a bit of boiling water might be better to dissolve it in, then add to the FV.

I get through my batches too quick as well

 

[Hazelwood Brewery]

Something to remember - you will change the gravity when you add the lactose so if you do this mid-fermentation you might lose track of the ABV.

 

[sean_99]

As far as I know it doesn't matter when you add the lactose since it's non fermentable. I would add it at the end of the boil so it's sterilised and fully mixed in (not sure how easy/hard it is to dissolve).

For adding to the fermenter if it's a powder that doesn't clump I guess it'll dissolve ok as long as it doesn't just sink. If it clumps, a bit of boiling water might be better to dissolve it in, then add to the FV.

I get through my batches too quick as well

Thanks Jim I will have to experiment a bit with this 1 then

 

[sean_99]

Something to remember - you will change the gravity when you add the lactose so if you do this mid-fermentation you might lose track of the ABV.

Ok thanks but lowering the abv is not what am looking for with these 4.8 - 5% kits, just trying to get an extra 1% I would be happy with.

 

[Hazelwood Brewery]

Ok thanks but lowering the abv is not what am looking for with these 4.8 - 5% kits, just trying to get an extra 1% I would be happy with.

Lactose will not change the ABV but it will change the gravity.

For example your OG might be 1050, FG 1020 and you think the difference is 30 points. If you added lactose during fermentation though you may have raised the gravity by say 3 points so the FG would have been 1017 had you not added the lactose.

 

[sean_99]

Lactose will not change the ABV but it will change the gravity.

For example your OG might be 1050, FG 1020 and you think the difference is 30 points. If you added lactose during fermentation though you may have raised the gravity by say 3 points so the FG would have been 1017 had you not added the lactose.

Thanks for clearing that up, I will be adding the lactose at the start of wk2 now once I free up a fv