Fire Build Oatmeal Stout

Well folks, I am back at it, and this time I'm stepping up my game a bit. I already have the LBDPA going, but I got my new carboys in the mail (yes, another set), so I decided I needed to keep the brewing going. Therefore, I give you Fire Build Oatmeal Stout.

It is going to be a milder stout, nothing imperial about it, but it is going to bring some complicated flavors to the game. For starters, I'm dialing down the malt on this recipe to a respectable quantity, but also keeping true to the style by adding some strong hops in small quantities. I think this will give the stout an overall balance that is very important with the amount of sweetness it may carry.

I also added some vanilla extract to the very end of the boil, just because I love the taste of vanilla in a stout, mostly because the sweetness of the malts mixed with the aroma of vanilla just make a stout jump out at you. The vanilla here is some decent stuff, but I wasn't willing to drop the cash for the vanilla beans or even some of the Mexican vanilla, but it is something I may consider if this batch goes really well.

Another fun thing this recipe is going to be getting is some aging with wood. I have some French oak chips that I will beging to soak in bourbon this weekend, plus some wormwood chips that are going to be boiled before being added to the carboy. Then, for 2 weeks, the stout will sit on this bed of extra flavor and coloring to add some unique complexities to the entire profile.

Well, that is all I have today.

As always, drink well, and be merry. Slainte!

Update 1: Well, a valuable lesson was learned on this brew. I pitched my yeast and as far as I can tell, everything was going just fine. Little did I know that the air lock was slowly becoming plugged, therefore becoming a cork. At 7:45 AM on a Sunday, I was informed that my beer was oozing all over the floor. After the short trip home, I was able to see the issue, and fixed it very quickly. I removed the blow out hose from the LBDPA and replaced it with the airlock, after it was cleaned of course. Then, the joyful task of getting out the ammonia and cleaning the brew room took place and lasted about 45 minutes. No, it wasn't fun, but it was a valuable lesson to say the least. Going foward, blow out hoses are a must for the first 4 days if not longer.

Update 2: I added the extra sugar to the carboy today. It was probably somewhere around 2 oz, but I wasn't worried about being accurate. This was an effort to 1) make up for the lack of beer from the episode over the weekend 2) add some ABV to make it a bit more "fun" 3) why the hell not? As I checked on it a few hours later and a few hours after that, the process appears to be moving along nicely, with a very gentle bit of extra fermentation taking place. I'm debating if I want to add some brown sugar to it now as well. Decision, decisions. Maybe I will wait for that on the next run of this recipe.

Update 3: Well, I still wasn't satisfied, so I added some high-end molasses to this batch. I added it roughly 12PM, but by 3PM it was fermenting like crazy. It is going so fast and hard now, but I figure it will slow down within 24 hours. I am going to let it settle down and then rack it 2 weeks from the day it was brewed. Then, when it goes into secondary, it will be sitting on some French toasted oak chips that have been soaking in bourbon for 1 week and some wormwood strips that have been boiled to release the oils in the wood. This is going to be a fantastic beer!

Update 4: This beer has been racked and is now on the French Oak chips that soaked in bourbon for 1 week and some boiled wormwood. The wood should impart some unique flavors and additional aromatics to the beer, in addition to upping the ABV (not a bad thing at all). The smell is a bit strong with the bourbon, but I anticipate this will mellow out as time goes on.

Update 5: Wow! This smells incredible! Complicated and woody, and there is a velvety aspect to the aroma, which I suspect is a result of the wood aging, malts, and bourbon mixing together. This is going to be a seriously complicated but fun beer. I'm so excited to try it, but I am giving it a full 3 weeks on the wood, so I need to wait until the 29th for a third racking to allow some filtering of the particulates from the wood and will only be 4-5 days in duration. Then, we will be bottling this brew and waiting another 4 weeks to sample it. Patience is a virtue, so they tell me.