Brü It Yourself | Home Roasted Coconut Coffee Stout

Author: Phil Rusher

As winter comes to an end and spring approaches, my brewing focus often shifts to darker, more roast-forward beers. The cooler Upstate New York weather during this time of year lends itself nicely to styles like Porter and Stout, particularly those of a higher strength, which also happen to work well with a number of tasty adjuncts.

One commercial beer I really enjoy drinking during this season is Oskar Blues’ Death By Coconut, a limited release Porter infused with chocolate and desiccated coconut, which certainly contributes to the “dessert” experience when drinking it. While there’s no question coconut and chocolate go phenomenally well together, I find that using both in beer creates an impression of sweetness that makes it difficult to drink more than a pint.

Drawing inspiration from this delectable Oskar Blues beer, I began thinking of ways I might brew a coconut infused dark beer that was perceptibly less sweet, and thus more drinkable, while maintaining minimal hop character. The first ingredient that came to mind was coffee, which in addition to contributing some bitterness to balance the sweetness, would add depth of flavor. And since I happen to own a roaster, I figured I’d roast the beans and toast the coconut myself.

| Making Home Roasted Coconut Coffee Stout |

Modeled after some of my favorite Dessert Stouts, I designed this recipe to have a deep, rich flavor without being cloyingly sweet.

Home Roasted Coconut Coffee Stout

I started this brew day by making a vitality starter with Imperial Yeast A10 Darkness.

After adjusting the brewing water to my desired profile and getting it heating up, I weighed out and milled the grains.

With the water appropriately heated, I incorporated the grains then checked to make sure it was at my target mash temperature.

When the 60 minute mash step was complete, I removed the grains and turned the element on full power before weighing out the kettle hops.

The wort was boiled for 60 minutes with hops added as stated in the recipe.

Once the boil was finished, I quickly chilled the wort while transferring it to a sanitized Brew Bucket.

A refractometer reading showed the wort was at a respectable 1.061 OG.

The filled fermenter was connected to my glycol rig and left to finish chilling to my desired fermentation temperature of 68°F/20°C, at which point I pitched the yeast.

Two days later, I sliced 13 oz/369 g of coconut then toasted it for 20 minutes at 240˚F/115˚C in my coffee roaster.

Once the coconut was cool, I weighed it again and found 2 oz/57 g of liquid had evaporated off, leaving me with 11 oz/312 g of toasted coconut, which I added directly to the beer.

A week later, I prepared a batch of home roasted coffee, opting for a Full City roast with the hope of imparting a deeper flavor to the beer.

After a 24 hour rest period, I made a batch of cold brew with the freshly roasted coffee grounds, which would sit on my counter overnight.

The following day, I took a hydrometer measurement showing the beer was at 1.021 FG before preparing to package, which started with me filtering the cold brew coffee.

Next, I gently poured the coffee into a sanitized and CO2 purged keg before racking the coconut infused beer into it.

The filled keg was placed in my keezer and burst carbonated overnight before I reduced the gas to serving pressure. After a week of conditioning, this Coconut Coffee Stout was carbonated and ready to drink.

| IMPRESSIONS |

Adjunct-laden Sweet Stout, aka Dessert Stout, has become quite popular over the last few years, most including a good portion of lactose in addition to some blend of chocolate, coconut, candy, cereal, maple syrup, spices, fruit… you get the picture. While I’ve had a few of these types of beers that were utter messes, others have been surprisingly good, though the one thing I’ve found most have in common is their strong impression of sweetness.

Inspired by Oskar Blues’ Death By Coconut, and with the goal of making a dessert-like Stout that balanced sweetness with bitterness, I designed a recipe using coffee in place of chocolate. Unlike most commercial breweries, I possess a coffee roaster, so I also decided to roast the coffee beans and toast the coconut myself, affording me greater control over the beer’s ultimate character while also adding another hands-on component to the brew process.

The biggest challenge for me with this beer was making sure to keep the coconut, coffee, and roasted grain character balanced. While the coconut character was rather strong in samples taken at packaging, it seemed to diminish a bit once the beer was kegged and carbonated. Overall, I was very pleased with how this Home Roasted Coconut Coffee Stout turned out, though in the future, I might double the amount of coconut to ensure it comes through stronger in the finished product.

If you have thoughts about this recipe or experience making something similar, please feel free to share in the comments section below!

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