Vanilla, chocolate milk brown ale (AE)

A second attempt at a parti-gyle. Adding some dark grains and a bunch of adjuncts to get something dark and flavorful.

Brewed 5.0 gallons on 2015-03-08

Preboil gravity: 1.023

Original gravity: 1.028

Final gravity: 1.009

ABV: 2.5%

Apparent Attenuation: 67.9%

Parti-gyle first beer was American Barley Wine (AD)

Process notes

2015-03-09

Fermenting strong at 67°

2015-03-28

Kegged. Copper colored, a bit thin on the mouthfeel, hints of chocolate aroma, astringent. Not bad, but nothing special. Should be easy drinking.

Boil for 60 minutes

At 60 minutes

0.5 ounces of 12.6% Alpha Acid Magnum pellets

At 60 minutes

8 ounces of Lactose

At 5 minutes

4 ounces of Valrhona Grue De Cacao Cocoa Nibs

Mash

[41.18%] 7 ounces of Pale Chocolate Malt (CrispMalt)

[35.29%] 6 ounces of Caramel 60L (Briess) (The malts were added to the top of the previous mash before doing the second sparge)

[23.53%] 4 ounces of Caramel 120L (Briess)

Sparge

Sparged for 45 minutes with 5 gallons of 170° tap water.

Yeast

2015-03-08

Pitch 1 pack of Safale S-04 English Ale (Fermentis) at 70°. (Pitched directly into fermenter)

Dry additions

2015-03-28

2 Vanilla Bean. (These have been sitting in some Captain Morgan for a few weeks. Dumped the Captain Morgan directly into the keg.)

Tasting notes (6.00/10; 2 ratings)

2015-06-23

[6/10] Ruby red color, hazy. White head that leaves a thin layer of small bubbles. Some lacing. Vanilla forward aroma. Possibly a tiny bit of chocolate aroma, although that could just be the vanilla. Absolutely no body. Also astringent. The vanilla in tis is very good and something I'd do again. This needs more chocolate, lactose, and specialty malts to add body. Probably need to control pH to remove astringency during sparging. Easy to drink, but not great. Kind of a vanilla cream ale.

2015-07-29

[6/10] Last pour. Cleared up pretty well. Copper/red/brown. Most of the haze is gone. This beer was pretty easy to drink, but by now the bright vanilla notes are gone. Decent mouthfeel, maybe a bit of drying astringency.