Cooper's Stout

[onesoma]

Quick write up on this batch, my 6th brew, which I bottled on Monday evening.

Ingredients:
Cooper's Stout Kit
1Kg Dark DME
500g Dextrose
Kit Yeast

Made this to 23l. Pitched the yeast at 23C. Fermented for 15 days. Temperature fluctuations due to heatwave: up to 26C after two days! Then hovered around 24-23CC for the remainder. Bottled with 1/2 teaspoon (US measure - haven't got a scales to figure out what this is in grams...) dextrose per bottle.
SG 1.050
FG 1.012

[Dunkel]

Was thinking of trying this (well, Dunkel Jr.) shortly. Please give a tasting note after a few weeks!

[Eoghan]

When I was at the homebrew expo in the Franciscan Well a few weeks ago I bought a Coopers Stout kit from The Homebrew Company. So I am looking forward to hearing how you get on with it.

The guy who sold it to me gave me some Light DME, and being new to brewing I didn't think to question it.
Do you think it will make much difference if I use the Light stuff for the Stout or should I get some Dark DME?

[onesoma]

Not sure myself with respect to the difference between light and dark DME. I think it will taste good either way. If you have nothing else to brew at the moment, stick it on!! Plenty of time to experiment in the future!

I'll post some tasting notes in a week or two.

[Ciderhead]

Its just colour difference, the majority of which will come from your tin.
It might be marginally lighter but will still make very drinkable beer so crack on

[LordEoin]

Normally I'd use 500g dark, 500g wheat, 500g dextrose, chocolate grain, fuggles and EKG
i usually like this kit, although the last batch was slightly disappointing.
I have another one in the FV at the moment brewing with 1.5kg LME, Saaz and S23 lager yeast. I'll carbonate it like a lager too.
Looking forward to it

[Dunkel]

Normally I'd use 500g dark, 500g wheat, 500g dextrose, chocolate grain, fuggles and EKG
i usually like this kit, although the last batch was slightly disappointing.
I have another one in the FV at the moment brewing with 1.5kg LME, Saaz and S23 lager yeast. I'll carbonate it like a lager too.
Looking forward to it

The 500g wheat looks interesting in this. Does it impact much on the flavour? And what quantities of chocolate malt and hops do you use?

[johnrm]

I'll carbonate it like a lager too.

If you're bottling do half and half.
Carb in Stout is just not right. The CO2 changes flavour, body and mouthfeel and depending on recipe will give you a foamy head.
If the batch ends up over-fizzy you could degas and recap.

[LordEoin]

@dunkel - the wheatmalt doesn't do much for the flavor but seems to help with the mouthfeel and head. about 150g chocolate seems to work well.
Looking back through my brewbook, the nicest one was actually 1kg light DME, 200g carapils, 100g chocolate, 200g dex, 10g fuggles 20min boil, 10g fuggles 5 min boil, 10g fuggles dryhop, kit yeast, 1 carb drop per 500ml bottle (6g/l).
I had it a a rebel brewer meet in january and it seemed to go down quite well, much better than the one i brought this time which was 500g each of dark dme, wheat dme, dex and 10g fuggles 15 min, 10gfuggles 5 min, 20g fuggles dry, kit yeast, primed at 6g/l which had a slightly metalic taste to it.
But I'm going to blame the abundance of dextrose and lack of time in the bottle.

@john - 'carb in stout is just not right', true but this will be a very dark lager with intended changes in flovor, body, mouthfeel and head!  I'll drink it regardless, and I'm sure that if it works well they won't last long in the swap-shop..

[onesoma]

We've been working our way through this steadily, about 10 out of the 40 or so bottles I had are left.

It is nice. Quite sweet tasting. Bit of chocolate/coffee or some other flavours going on. Heavy enough body - three of these would be enough. Not sure what to compare it to other than draught Beamish/Guinness, which it is very different too. Much heavier, sweeter, maltier. Not much bitter coming through, maybe that's masked by all the dark malt though, not sure.

I'll do it again, maybe with medium instead of dark DME, or even light. Ciderhead says that's just colour difference though so that wouldn't really make a difference. I'd like to try it with some hops added.

[LordEoin]

Wow, in the bottle 2 weeks and 30 pints gone! Thirsty lads. 
This kit improves with some age, so keep some bottles to try in a few months.
I like Fuggles or East Kent Goldings in this kit, but use whatever hops you like