Beer + flavor blending

Just do it. There's no right or wrong. Let your imagination run wild.

One of my favorite combos is Stoli Chocolat Kokonut vodka and Ten Fidy. I can only describe this as absolutely decadent. I've tried infusing porters with cacao nibs, dried chilies, coffee beans, and vanilla. I've made my own versions of bourbon barrel stouts by soaking Jack Daniel's smoker chips in bourbon, then French pressing them with the base beer. A little Creme de Cassis and Jim Beam Maple in an imperial stout makes a nice little blackcurrant / maple breakfast beer.

One of the local breweries produced an IPA that was rested on toasted coconut. Delicious on its own, but I mixed it with Pineapple Sculpin to make a piña colada IPA. The two beers were almost identical in ABV and IBU's, and the result was better than I expected. If you think a combo sounds good to you, try it. Then tell us about it so we can try it too.

 

@dcotom seems to have done this before, I’d trust him.

As for me, I’ve had limited experience with French-pressing beers, but recently pressed a low abv oatmeal stout with graham crackers and pumpkin spice.

Didn’t let it sit too long, and the graham crackers really didn’t do anything, but the pumpkin spice turned out well.

Ive been wanting to press a super dry, clean session ipa (like Stillwater Micro) with coconut, lime, lemon peel, and mint. Seems pretty tropical and fun.

Good luck and happy fusing!

 

I absolutely love adding an espresso shot or two to a stout and have tried it with some ipas and pales with mixed results

 

Damn ... all this makes me want to try something. I've always stuck with whatever's in the bottle/can/growler and have shied away from blending, but obviously BAs blend and blend well. Didn't realize to what extent. Soaking wood chips? Makes my wannabe-BBQ-pitmaster ears perk up.

 

You're all going to hell

 

I've used a French press to infuse coffee into Oskar Blues Old Chub - this was about a year ago. From what I remember, I really enjoyed it.

 

Get a Imperial Stout and a good bottle of Port wine. Blend 2/3 Stout and 1/3 Port awesome!

 

I'm thinking some Torani flavors might be good. I get pumpkin pie Torani to add to my coffee, perhaps I should try some in a stout. Raspberry, chocolate, or vanilla could be good. They've got Maple too, could add some of that to a KBS and make my own CBS.

 

We didn't get any Michigan Maple Jesus here. My next project is to create a homemade version of this by soaking barrel chips in Jim Beam Maple and resting some Even More Jesus on them. Who knows, I might even toss in a couple drops of liquid smoke and make my own Michigan Bacon Maple Jesus.

My next thing is going to be an infusion smoker. I can't wait to see what kind of havoc I can wreak with one of these babies. See you in hell, @ManforallSaisons !!

 

For adding coffee, I'd be more likely to go with a cold brew coffee steeped over night in the fridge, and then adding in shots to taste. This way I have some cold brew on hand, and I don't lose any carbonation by letting the beer sit. Of course, this is your beer, so do as you please. Let us know how it goes! I may steep one of my Black Chocolate stouts on some coffee beans next weekend, as it sounds delicious!

 

I just did a coffee stout. I bought the coffee from a roaster that produces it. He said he steeps it for 22 hours exactly. I used a medium roast because if you go too dark you can get additional acidity that you don't want in an already roasty dark beer. I used 5.5 gallons in a 5 bbl batch but I don't know if that can be worked down, and as others have suggested, I added the coffee bit by bit until I got the right flavor because I didn't want to over do it.

 

I can tell you as a brewing professional that what you would be doing from a "process" standpoint would be almost identical to what many professionals do to get the flavored beers they produce. Many I have seen simply add extract to more or less finished beer and serve it that way. So if you like such beers from breweries, by all means feel free to make them yourself at home.

 

I believe a lot of people have done this or other items like Whiskey, etc. I actually plan to mix some room temp coffee into a heavy ABV stout to bump up the coffee notes. Like others said you cannot hurt anything other than ruin the beer lol but that is not the end of the world.

 

Cold press coffee is the way to do it. The lighter the roast. The better representation of its being coffee, and brighter notes play better.
Dark roasted beans are too oily, and there's not much use for them on the cold side of coffee.

 

Anyone played with Baileys with a beer. Just curious, I always love it this time of year with my coffee and was curious if any beers would work with it. I think it could be way too sweet but then again someone may have tried and loved it lol.
Cheers.

Edit: I am aware of Irish Car Bomb with Guinness, Whiskey and Baileys but looking to just use Baileys with some other beers outside Guinness.

 

Just to clarify, you used 5.5 gallons of already brewed coffee, and mixed that within a 5 bbl batch of already brewed coffee?

If so, I'll give this a go (I'm no math whiz). That breaks down to about 5.376 fluid ounces of coffee per gallon of beer (5 bbl = 129 gallons, 5.5 gallons of coffee divided by 129 gallons of beer = 0.0426 gallons which converts to 5.376 ounces). 12 fluid ounces = 0.09375 of a gallon, so it would work out to 1/2 fluid ounce of cold brew coffee within each 12 fluid ounces of beer.

If you wanted to steep this in a typical warm french press, you'd be looking at roughly a 12:1 ratio of coarse coffee grounds to water, meaning you'd need 1/2 fluid ounce (~15 mL) steeping in 1.25 grams of coffee.

I'd recommend a coffee brewing method more along the lines of what you're roaster suggested (slow steeped cold brew), as the coffee will take a while to impart its full flavor at lower temperatures, and it won't warm the beer when added. Stumptown has a good write up on doing a long, slow, and cold steep.Their ratio works out more along the lines of 6:1, water to coffee. So the ratios are pretty open to your brewing method and personal taste.

 

I might be tempted to try this with GI Fulton Street. What could possibly go wrong?

 

Not a thing.

This thread's kicking up a notch, and now all the talk's got me wanting to infuse a pint of Schlenkerla (a marzen probably) with the next rack of ribs that come off my pit. I'm only half kidding. Not sure a rib bone will fit in my French press, though ...

 

Some info here:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/adding-coffee-to-your-beer.511605/