INGREDIENTS

INSTRUCTIONS

Made a yeast starter 3 days before pitching. Used 2 tablespoons DME  and 1
cup water. Next time use 2 cups water. Crack all grains and steep  for 30
minutes at about 160 degrees along with the calcium carbonate. Strain out
grains and sparge into about 2-1/2 gallons pre-boiled water.  Total boil
about 5 gallons. Add dry malt and dextrin and bring to a boil.  Add 1/2
ounce  of  Eroica and 1/4 ounce of Chinook  when  boil  starts.  30 minutes
later  add  3/4  ounce Nugget hops.  Chill  with  an  immersion chiller.
Rack to a carboy, fill to 5 gallons and let sit  overnight  to allow the
trub to settle out. The next morning rack it  to  a  plastic primary,
pitched the yeast starter, and add the 1 ounce of Cascades  and Eroica
hops. I had originally planned for a single stage fermentation, with
bottling a week after pitching. However, there was no time to bottle after
a week, so I racked to a secondary glass carboy to get the beer out of the
primary, which does not seal very well. The dry hopping should have been
done  in the secondary, but at the time I had no plans for using one.  I
suspect the hops did not spend much time in contact with the beer in the
primary,  as they got pushed up by the krausen and stuck to  the  walls.
When  I bottled 2 weeks after brewing, I tried what might be called  "wet
hopping." On the suggestion of sometime brew partner Mike Fetzer, I made a
hop tea by steeping 1 ounce N. Brewer in 2 cups water after the  water had
just stopped boiling. This was kept covered for about 10 minutes.  I
bottled  half the batch, then added the hop tea and bottled  the  second
half. The bottles aged in my closet for two weeks before tasting. This
turned out to be a very nice dry stout. It is dark and thick,  with a brown
head that lasts to the end and sticks to the side of the  glass. The "no
tea" beer is not terribly aromatic, and has a noticable  bitter aftertase.
The  "hop  tea" beer is more aromatic, and  has  a  smoother finish, with
what I think is a better blend of flavors. My fiancee likes the "hop tea"
beer better as well, but a friend who  only  likes  dark beers likes the
"no tea" beer better. Original Gravity: 1.053 Final Gravity: 1.020 Primary
Ferment: 1 week Secondary Ferment: 1 week
Recipe By     : Micah Millspaw, Posted by Bob Jones
File ftp://ftp.idiscover.co.uk/pub/food/mealmaster/recipes/mmdja006.zip

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