Nearly Murphy's

[chozzie]

An exile in Australia from Cork I have long struggled to make a stout that tastes as close as possible to the best stout in Ireland, Murphy's.

My knockoff is kit based as the thought of full grain sent me into endless what ifs for too long so I reviewed all the 2 can recipes I could find and here it is...

1 Coopers stout kit
1 Coopers dark ale kit
1 Kg raw sugar
300 gms rolled oats

Method

Make a starter with both yeasts
Steep rolled oats in 3 Lts of just boiled water (I just covered the pot and turned off the gas for 30 minutes)

Both kits and the sugar into the fermenter.
Strain the oat liquor into the fermenter, I used it to get out the last of the flavour from the opened tins.

I always add 6 Lts of hot water from the tap to make my kits so I made sure I had a total of 6 Lts of hot liquor and hot water.

Made the fermenter up to 21 Lts with cold tap water and added the starter.

Then I closed the fermenter and put it in the bath for the first few days. Easy to clean up any froth escaping through the airlock.

I left the fermentation for 2 weeks and kegged up. Two days to cool down and a week on low pressure.

The result

Dark, very dark as good as a decent Cork pint. When poured it lays down into the glass like a Murphy's, although the entertainment is cut short as it happens relatively quickly (at least until I venture into nitrogen).

A thick foam with fine bubbles, darker than a Murphs but still as fine if you use a creamer tap.

Plenty of fine bubbles but not over-gassed.

Strong maltiness without the liquorice of Guinness aftertaste. Deep flavours reminiscent of long afternoons and longer nights in Cork city.

Not sweet like Beamish a mature flavour.

A good pat on the back too with 6.5% ABV.

[johnrm]

Congrats Chozzie and welcome.
I'm working on stouts at the moment. I have an AG Beamish wannabe on nitro at the moment.

[Will_D]

Looking good Chozzie - love the bar area!

When I started again with kits in the 90's I used the two can approach.

After all as auld Arthur used to say "See what two cans do" or was it 'Toucan' (can never remember  )

[Drzava]

Looks good!

[Kevin O'Roundwood]

Nice one sham, definitely adding this one to the list. 

Would 'rolled oats' basically be porridge? Your bog standard Flahavans?

[LordEoin]

Welcome to the forums chozzie.
now i want a pint of murphy's

[Will_D]

An exile in Australia from Cork

So thats where the 'handle' comes from:

Cork / Aussie !!

[RobShamrock]

Thats looks tasty