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Back when Jennie was still involved in brewing, she enjoyed coming up with beer names as much if not more than brewing or recipe development. In those early days the plan was to come up with seasonal beers like we were Sam Adams. An Irish Stout that would be ready for St. Patrick's Day named Spring Training Stout was just too perfect. Of those early seasonal brews, this is the only one that has stuck.
The first batch of Spring Training Stout was brewed back in 2013. This would have been about six months after I started brewing. I still didn't know what I didn't know. Lets take a look at that first recipe:
Recipe Specifications -------------------------- Boil Size: 5.71 gal Post Boil Volume: 5.21 gal Batch Size (fermenter): 5.00 gal Bottling Volume: 5.00 gal Estimated OG: 1.053 SG Estimated Color: 26.6 SRM Estimated IBU: 39.0 IBUs Brewhouse Efficiency: 72.00 % Est Mash Efficiency: 0.0 % Boil Time: 60 Minutes Ingredients: ------------ Amt Name Type # %/IBU Volume 1 lbs Flaked Barley [Steep] (1.0 SRM) Adjunct 1 11.6 % 0.11 gal 13.0 oz Roasted Barley [Steep] (300.0 SRM) Grain 2 9.4 % 0.06 gal 8.0 oz Stout Malt [Steep] (2.0 SRM) Grain 3 5.8 % 0.04 gal 3.0 oz Carafa I [Steep] (337.0 SRM) Grain 4 2.2 % 0.01 gal 2.0 oz Acid Malt [Steep] (3.0 SRM) Grain 5 1.4 % 0.01 gal 6 lbs Northern Brewer Gold [Boil] (4.0 SRM) Extract 6 69.6 % 0.46 gal 2.00 oz East Kent Goldings (Usa) [5.00 %] - Boil 60.0 mi Hop 7 39.0 IBUs - 0.08 oz Irish Moss (Boil) Fining 8 - - 33.8 pkg Irish Ale 1084 Yeast 9 - - 4.29 oz Dextrose (Bottling) Other 10 - -
Not horrible! If I actually mashed the Flaked Barley and Malting Company of Ireland (MCI) Stout Malt I may have converted the starches in both grains - hold that thought for later. Looking at my notes, there was supposed to be a pinch of chocolate malt, and the Acid Malt was there for the alleged Guinness twang.
The next iteration of Spring Training Stout was brewed in 2015 and was written about here. By then I had graduated to partial mash brewing on my stove top and mashed the majority of my fermentables. I topped off with Maris Otter malt extract because it was British and I felt would be closest to the MCI Stout Malt. Wanting the beer to be darker than my first batch, I chucked in a healthy amount of de-bittered Carafa III. I also soured a portion of the batch, boiled it, and blended it back in. I was quite happy with that batch until it got infected and the bottles started gushing.
When I got around to brewing Spring Training Stout again, it was five years later and I was an industry professional as the world was locked down in 2020. I had learned that less is often more when it comes to recipe development and simplified my recipe quite a bit. Since I didn't write about it at the time, let's take a look at that recipe:
Recipe Specifications -------------------------- Boil Size: 6.18 gal Post Boil Volume: 5.68 gal Batch Size (fermenter): 5.25 gal Bottling Volume: 5.00 gal Estimated OG: 1.059 SG Estimated Color: 40.2 SRM Estimated IBU: 42.5 IBUs Brewhouse Efficiency: 70.00 % Est Mash Efficiency: 72.7 % Boil Time: 45 Minutes Ingredients: ------------ Amt Name Type # %/IBU Volume 7.78 gal Salem/Beverly, MA Water 1 - - 2.85 g Chalk (Mash) Water Agent 2 - - 1.53 g Baking Soda (Mash) Water Agent 3 - - 0.42 g Epsom Salt (MgSO4) (Mash) Water Agent 4 - - 9 lbs 8.0 oz Planet Pale Malt (Muntons) (2.6 SRM) Grain 5 76.0 % 0.74 gal 1 lbs Barley, Flaked (1.7 SRM) Grain 6 8.0 % 0.08 gal 1 lbs Roasted Barley (Muntons) (634.5 SRM) Grain 7 8.0 % 0.08 gal 1 lbs Wheat Malt (Muntons) (2.5 SRM) Grain 8 8.0 % 0.08 gal 0.87 g Chalk (Sparge) Water Agent 9 - - 0.46 g Baking Soda (Sparge) Water Agent 10 - - 0.13 g Epsom Salt (MgSO4) (Sparge) Water Agent 11 - - 1.00 oz Nugget [13.00 %] - Boil 45.0 min Hop 12 42.5 IBUs - 0.25 tsp Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins) Fining 13 - - 1.0 pkg Hugh Hill (B #2) Yeast 14 - - 1.0 pkg SafAle English Ale (DCL/Fermentis #S-04) [23.66 Yeast 15 - -
This was the first all grain version of Spring Training Stout. The roasted malt was just one charge of British Roasted Barley. Darker than Briess, this gave all the color and roasted flavor I needed. Having access to Muntons base malt, I used their English Pale Malt as my base. I also replaced half of the Flaked Barley with Malted Wheat to impart the needed creaminess, while the malted wheat added some extra enzymes.
That is one of the biggest mistakes I see brewers make when brewing with British ale malts.Malts like Planet Pale, Maris Otter, Crisp Best Ale, Thomas Fawcett Pearl, Golden Promise, etc. are grown and malted for all-malt grists, or at least grists with small percentages of un-malted adjuncts. British Ale malts will usually have a diastatic power around 50-60 degress Lintner. I say usually because DP is often not tested. At Muntons, we did not have a specification and never tested for Diastatic Power in our ale malts. The reason was simple: there was no reason to. The malt had enough DP to convert itself. Where we ran into issues in the US was when brewers would use our ale malts in New England IPAs, use a huge percentage of flaked adjuncts, miss their target gravity, and blame the malt.
The malts at Muntons we did have a DP spec for and tested in every batch were Pilsner and Lager Malts. These were malts that were designed to be used with adjuncts. That is essentially what MCI Stout Malt is, a British-style Lager Malt. The DP spec on the MCI Stout Malt is 80-90 deg Lintner. While significantly less than a North American 2-row which is approx 140 deg Lintner, it is better suited to convert a healthy percentage of un-malted barley than a British ale malt. If you do use a British Pale malt with a lot of unmalted adjuncts, consider a step mash and do an iodine test to ensure full conversion. Or you can blend in a little bit of malt with a higher DP. Just make sure the DP of your grist is at least 40 deg Lintner.
No longer working for or having access to Muntons malt, I went back to the MCI Stout Malt for this batch. The RahrBSG website states MCI malts are currently available only by special order. It appears these malts will be carried by LD Carlson going forward which bodes well for their continued availability in the US. Especially for homebrewrs.
My brew day was super smooth. Even with almost 17% Flaked Barley, my runoff was as smooth as can be. My measured Original Gravity was 1.062 against a target of 1.061. Wanting to ensure a healthy fermentation, I bought a fresh pitch of Imperial Darkness. The batch finished at 1.014 compared to an estimated 1.015. This batch finished at 6.3%. Looking at previous versions, Spring Training Stout has slowly crept up in terms of ABV.
I was thrilled with how this batch had come out. I thought it was pretty damn close to Guinness Extra Stout, one of my handful favorite beers in the world. To add another variable in my commercial beer side-by-side I included a local craft example: Murray Irish Extra Stout from Granite Coast Brewing in Peabody, Mass.
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| Guinness needs a special glass just for Extra Stout. |
Aroma
Guinness Extra Stout (GES) - Roast, coffee, vanilla, quite floral
Granite Coast Murray (Murray) - Roasty to slightly burnt, almost peppery
Spring Training Stout - Kind of a blend of the two. Not as rich and complex as GES, but maltier than Murray. Lots of roast and chocolate.
Appearance
GES - Jet black, with a think and rocky tan head - darkest head of the three and not white like Guinness Draught
Murray - Jet black with a thick foamy head. Retention is ok.
Spring Training Stout - Very similar to Murray, maybe a shade lighter in color.
Flavor
GES - Bready and biscuity malt up front, hints or caramel, leads to a pronounced roasty finish. Fermentation is quite floral, like Samuel Smiths.
Murray - Compared to GES the roasted flavors are both less intense and more prominent. There is an underlying note of brown bread. Esters are fruity but much more restrained than GES
Spring Training Stout - Bready and grainy malt, with exactly the roasted character I love in stouts: strong but not harsh or astringent. Very similar fermentation profile to Murray.
Mouthfeel
GES - Full bodied with medium carbonation that prickles the tongue. Combined with the roasted malt it finishes nice and dry without being harsh.
Murray - Full bodied and creamier than GES. Carbonation is medium. Finish is dry but less so than GES.
Spring Training Stout- Full bodied and creamier than Murray, carb feels a bit lower. Feels like the smoothest of the three. Body may be highest, the carbonation is the lowest, those things may be working together to combine for the smoothness.
Overall
Before this exercise I thought my beer was closer to Guinness Extra Stout than it is. The biggest difference between Guinness Extra stout and the two other beers is the expressive yeast.
There is a lot of new research that claims the commercially available Irish Ale yeasts are not from Guinness. Guinness has over 300 strains in its yeast library. Maybe the Irish Ale yeasts on the market are used in Guinness Draught, while different yeasts are used for other beers. If I was trying to perfect a Guinness Extra Stout clone, I might try a more expressive English yeast that still attenuates well like Wyeast 1469.
I am probably overstating the difference. One of the advantages of this format is having full pours you can go back to. Spring Training Stout was so close to the Granite Coast beer, it made the GES stand out more. I’m willing to bet my recipe and Granite Coast’s recipe were pretty damn close.
I love how my beer came out. The one question I asked myself is would I want to change anything to make the beer more unique. Both Shipyard and Gritty McDuff’s have made Irish Stouts with their house Ringwood strains. As well as the MCI Irish Stout Malt worked, I may want to try a more highly-kilned base malt like Planet Pale. I remember the 2020 batch I made throwing off biscuit and vanilla notes which were quite nice. A Mild Malt would also be great to try with its even darker kilning and somewhat higher DP. I don’t think any of the English maltsters are sending Mild Malt to America, so that would leave only Briess Ashburne Mild Malt.
I’ll have to take a step back and think about what I might want to change. The one drawback of doing three full beers in a side-by-side like this is I do have a moderate buzz after finishing all three beers.
If I can find time to set up my beer gun and fill some bottles, I may enter this one in competition.
Recipe: Spring Training Stout Style: Irish Extra Stout TYPE: All Grain Recipe Specifications -------------------------- Boil Size: 6.35 gal Post Boil Volume: 5.68 gal Batch Size (fermenter): 5.25 gal Bottling Volume: 5.00 gal Estimated OG: 1.061 SG Estimated Color: 39.8 SRM Estimated IBU: 48.1 IBUs Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00 % Est Mash Efficiency: 77.9 % Boil Time: 60 Minutes Ingredients: ------------ Amt Name Type # %/IBU Volume 7.89 gal Black Full (Over 31 SRM) Water 1 - - 3.45 g Chalk (Mash) Water Agent 2 - - 2.41 g Baking Soda (Mash) Water Agent 3 - - 2.37 g Epsom Salt (MgSO4) (Mash) Water Agent 4 - - 9 lbs Irish Stout Malt (1.8 SRM) Grain 5 75.0 % 0.70 gal 2 lbs Barley, Flaked (1.7 SRM) Grain 6 16.7 % 0.16 gal 1 lbs Roasted Barley (Muntons) (634.5 SRM) Grain 7 8.3 % 0.08 gal 1.37 oz Cluster [7.80 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 8 37.1 IBUs - 0.75 oz Fuggle, U.S. [4.20 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 9 10.9 IBUs - 0.25 tsp Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins) Fining 10 - - 1.0 pkg Darkness (Imperial #A10) Yeast 11 - - Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Light Body, No Mash Out Total Grain Weight: 12 lbs ---------------------------- Name Description Step Temperat Step Time Mash In Add 3.85 gal of water at 161.9 F 148.0 F 75 min Sparge: Fly sparge with 4.04 gal water at 168.0 F
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