Home Stout
- 1 lb. roasted malt
- 1 lb. black malt
- 2 lb. crystal malt
- 3 lb. demerara sugar
- 1 lb. black treacle
- ½ lb. flaked maize (cornflakes)
- 4 oz. hops small level teaspoonful salt
- ½ oz. citric acid - yeast - nutrient
Bring seven quarts water to 150°F. Pour into polythene pail and add the malts and flaked maize at once. Put in the immersion heater, cover with sheet polythene and wrap vessel in blanket to conserve warmth. Switch on heater and keep mash at 145°-150°F for seven-eight hours. If you want to try the starch test, now is the time to do it.
Strain mash into boiler, add two ounces of hops and the salt. Boil rapidly for one minute and then simmer gently for forty minutes. Add remaining hops and simmer for a further ten minutes. Put sugar, acid and treacle into fermenting vessel and strain the mash on to it, stirring until all sugar is dissolved. Then make up to four gallons with boiling water.
Cover with sheet polythene as directed and leave to cool to 65°-70°F. Then add yeast and nutrient. Cover again as directed and leave in a warm place for six days.
If using hydrometer take reading after six days until 1.005 is recorded and then bottle. If not using hydrometer, allow stout to ferment on until it goes ‘flat’. Then prime - add sugar to restart fermentation as already directed - and then bottle.
If a draught stout of this sort is wanted then merely allow fermentation to go on until the stout has gone ‘flat’ and then bottle.
Keep for two to four weeks before drinking. If you must sweeten use lactose to taste as already directed, but I think you will prefer this without it being sweetened.