I love coffee stouts and porters in the cooler/colder months, but I have never brewed with coffee before. I have several questions about brewing with coffee, since I want to try brewing a beer with coffee.
1.) Do you use whole bean, or ground coffee?
2.) Do you use the coffee without brewing it first, or do you brew it first?
3.) When do you add the coffee to the wort?
4.) How much do I need for a 1 gallon batch? 5 gallon batch?
5.) Any other suggestions or things that I have not thought of would greatly be appreciated.
I have only done coffee by dosing in homemade or store-bought (like Stōk) coldbrew at packaging.
If I were you, I’d find a coffee stout recipe, scale it down to 1-gallon, make that once, and then adjust dosing to your preference for the next batch.
My method is similar to Denny’s. I add coarsely ground beans to the beer similar to dry hopping. Amounts depend on the style and the level of coffee flavor. For me it’s pretty experimental. I like darker roasts.
I’ve tried various methods. Adding at the end the boil, during fermentation. I’ve done a cold press addition at packaging. I’ve also added coarse ground beans in the keg. That last one was my favorite. For full transparency, each variation did not get the same amount and variety. This is not a scientific method that reduces variation to one variable. However, in a heavily roasted dark stout, I have continued to use about 5 ounces of coarse ground beans in the keg. I have not bagged and removed them, rather let them sit until the keg kicks. I personally do not feel like the flavor changes after the first week or two. It doesn’t get astringent or intense as the beer is drawn off.
I add very coarsely ground coffee beans in the fermentation vessel 24 hours before racking out to package. Generally at a 1oz/gal rate. If it doesn’t seem like it’s getting close to enough coffee flavor at 12 hours, add more for the remaining 12 hours. After about 24 hours you start to risk overextraction.
I used to make concentrated cold brew and add it to the bottling bucket (or the keg if you’re kegging) but putting beans/grounds directly into the beer is effectively making cold brew without adding extra water. The flavor is good, it’s just an extra step I found wasn’t any better.
if caffeine is a concern for anyone - you CAN get very good quality decaffeinated beans from select roasteries. the roastery near me makes decaffeinated dark roasts that taste just like a simiular standard roast.