Hello!
Before I tell you about the Autumn Leftover Stout, I guess I ought to start this off with an introduction. I’m Josh Harfoot, a 25-year-old currently working for Full Circle Brew Co., in Newcastle upon Tyne. Monday to Friday I work as a Packaging Supervisor, but just over a year ago, I embarked on my own project I called Black Café Brewing Project. My intention was to start a project where I share my own experiences in brewing, to engulf myself in the beer scene entirely and learn as much as I can by meeting those who know best and brew beer that interests me (and hopefully you, too).
A lot of my work centres around foraging, wild ales, raw ales, organic and experimental beers, inspired enormously by Belgian brewing traditions and old English styles, however, the one I’m going to be describing today focuses more on reducing waste in my brewing techniques and my day to day life. I try my best to record every step of my brews, from grain to glass, over on my Instagram, @blackcafebrewing. Let’s begin.
Fall, leaves, fall
This year, the clocks went back before I even had the chance to grasp that summer had ended, but, nevertheless, the idea of having a more ‘normal’ Halloween and Bonfire Night took the edge off how quickly the nights draw in. I, like most people I’ve spoken to, tend to struggle with brewing seasonal beers at home since it’s often hard to get the timing right. Brew too early and I find I’ve drunk the batch by the time the holiday rolls around; brew too late and I’ve completely missed the holiday and find I have to rename the batch thusly.
So this year, whilst embracing the slow, encapsulating hibernation Autumn tends to sow upon us and with eyes on the long winter ahead, I decided to brew a stout that represents the season in its entirety. It had to be something I could drink around a fire, watching fireworks, as a dessert beer or just a nightcap. I’ll start by breaking down the recipe.
The recipe
Malts and Sugars:
- Maris Otter (68%)
- Light Munich (11.3%)
- Crystal Rye (11.3%)
- Flaked Oats (2.3%)
- Roasted Barley (1.8%)
- Lactose (5.2%)
I know that stouts brewed around this time of year are often adjunct and speciality malt heavy and having planned something along those lines, I went with Maris Otter for my base malt. It’s trustworthy and subtle enough to allow the rest to take centre stage. I find Light Munich, or any Munich malt for that matter, always gives a wonderful almondy / marzipan finish to beers but should always be used sparingly as an excess of it, in my opinion, makes a beer flabby. Alongside the crystal rye, this backs up the burgundy colour this beer has when held up to a light; helped along by the roasted barley, which kills the sweetness of the brew with a slight astringent bite before it gets too cloying. Flaked oats and lactose, of course, for body, sweetness and head retention.
It’s important to add here that as my strike water was heating up, I took the seeds I saved from a pumpkin my girlfriend and I had carved a few days earlier and laid them out on a tray in the oven. About 20 – 30 minutes at 180°C left them toasted to the point of becoming brown in colour and total caramelisation of any pumpkin flesh residue they were coated in. These were added to the mash – the best smelling mash I’ve made to date.
The perks of being a brewer
Working in a brewery will always have its perks, but most of those perks tend to land on the one day a year that Yakima Chief drops its merch off at the door. If you’re not coming away with caps, t-shirts, pens or strangely familiar ‘hop’ grinders, you’ll be filling your pockets with sample sachets of hops which are like gold-dust to homebrewers. This year, I managed to get my hands on some incredibly fresh, nitrogen-sealed Pacific Crest, of which its descriptors include floral, earthy, grassy, spicy and herbal. Although admittedly, none of these really shine through. It’s a 3.3% alpha acid hop, which I used enough of to achieve 20 IBU’s in one single bittering addition. Hop flavour wasn’t what I was going for with this one, but I added just enough to balance out the beer.
Mashing in
I mashed at 66°C for 90 minutes followed by a 60-minute boil, adding kettle finings in the final 15-minute phase and really cranking up the heat to achieve a vigorous boil. The kettle felt like it was about to take off, but the result was a caramelised, burgundy-black wort that I pitched Safale S-04 into. Not to forget the addition of cinnamon, however, which also went into the boil at around the same 15-minute phase. I added one tablespoon which worked out just enough, if not slightly too much for this 10L batch.
S-04 is a strain I’ve used numerous times over the years in styles such as English pales, porters, barley wine, and even a cider which worked fantastically. I find it’s best suited to beers that don’t require a squeaky-clean yeast profile, yet need a little something from the yeast itself to show the job it’s done. S-04 really works great here.
The OG was 1.062, which was aerated vigorously to give the yeast a head start, then allowed to ferment. The lag phase lasted about 12 – 18 hours, followed by a high krausen phase of 2-3 days, then a 2 days worth of diacetyl rest. I took my time with this one and allowed another few days of general conditioning to let the ‘young’ quality of the beer to mellow out slightly before bottling into 330ml, brown bottles. I added priming sugar to the uncarbonated beer; enough to achieve 2.0 volumes of CO2 which, initially, I worried wouldn’t be enough but turned out to be perfect.
Evaluation
Starting with the aroma, this beer hits you with the cinnamon I added during the boil, followed by a subtle toasted character that comes in from the roasted barley and the toasted pumpkin seeds. There is, however, a slight ‘plasticy’ character here too, which is the only off flavour/aroma I can pick out. A quick bit of research informed me that this is likely a result of a higher than normal amount of chlorine in the water. That’s something I’ll have to tackle in my next brew. I love these hiccups and the opportunity they give me to improve what I do.
Flavour-wise, as I said before, the cinnamon comes through first. I nailed the aroma here, but the spice addition in the boil came through a little too well and leaves it slightly over-bearing once it hits the tongue. The sweetness from the lactose, coupled with the caramel/toffee flavours from the crystal malts soon see to that though. It’s rather sweet, making it a perfect dessert beer, but certainly not one you’d sit and drink bottle after bottle of. It’s left me thinking, is it worth brewing an imperial version of this? More residual sugars from the malt would definitely amp this up. Next year, perhaps.
The final result: Autumn Leftover Stout
The finish is pure cinnamon, once again, that lingers on the tongue until you take another sip and the whole thing goes around one more time. All in all, I think this beer would benefit from being stronger, definitely into the realms of imperial strengths as I just mentioned, and I come away from this brew excited to try again next year. For now, however, I’m busy with a number of things, including a Red IPA I’m hoping will get done before Christmas and a very exciting series of experimental beers I’m making to celebrate 7 years since I got into brewing. You can see more about these over on my Instagram. Until then, I’d like to thank you for getting this far and supporting what I’m doing. As always, it means the world.
Josh x
Black Café Brewing Project is a natural, organic, and raw ale project based in Newcastle upon Tyne. You can follow Josh’s journey over on Instagram and Twitter: