This is the first brew day of 2018 for us. This year we're going to make a better effort at having "holiday appropriate" brews on tap. Accordingly, we decided to dedicate our first homebrew sesh to crafting a Rye Irish Stout for St. Patrick's Day. We brewed the beer on January 3rd, will probably keg it on the 15th, and it'll be ready to drink by Jan. 22nd. So, we'll be waaay ahead of schedule for St. Paddy's day, which is mid-March. Hmmm, will this beer last until then!? We have 7 other beers on tap right now, so hopefully so.

Rye Irish Stout Brewing Video

If reading isn't your thing, no problem. We documented the entire brew day and have posted the video below for your viewing pleasure. Please note, however, that the nitty gritty details, such as water chemistry, grain volume, hop amounts, and more, are located further down in this article.

Equipment

This stout beer recipe can be made with standard homebrew equipment. Volumes, gravity, and the final product may vary slightly, but it'll still be delicious. We're using Clawhammer's Electric Brew in a Bag system.

Water

Beginning water volume: 7.93 gallons (30 liters). We're using Asheville, NC city water and adjusted chemistry by adding calcium sulfate (gypsum), calcium chloride, and baking soda to our water to match the water profile for Dublin, Ireland as closely as possible:

• Ca - 110 ppm
• Mg - 4 ppm
• Na - 12 ppm
• SO4 - 53 ppm
• Cl -19 ppm
• HCO3 - 280 ppm

Malts

• Marris Otter: 6 pounds 10.3 oz. (3 kg 13.55 g) (70.3%)
• Flaked Rye (unmalted): 1 pound 12.6 oz. (810.8 g) (18.9%)
• Black (Patent):  8.2 oz (232.5 grams) (5.4%)
• Chocolate Rye: 8.2 oz. (232.5 grams) (5.4%)

Mashing

We mashed at 152F (66.7C) for 60 minutes and brought it straight up to a boil after that.

Mashing in

Stirring mash to remove clumps

Boil Additions

We boiled for 60 minutes with the following additions:

• 60 minutes - 1 oz. (28.35 g) of "Northern Brewer" hops
• 15 minutes - 1 whirlfloc tablet

Cooling and Fermentation

After the boil we cooled the wort town to 64 Fahrenheit (17.8C) and pitched 2 packages of San Diego Super Yeast (White Labs #WLP090).

Thermometer showing our wort at 64 Fahrenheit (17.8C)

Pitching yeast

We didn't necessarily need 2 doses because the instructions on the package said we were in the gravity range for 1 dose to be enough, but we had 2, so we pitched them both.

We'll allow it to ferment for about 10 days at 65F (18.3C) and then will leave it sit for another 3 days while the yeast cleans up diacetyl and it clarifies. 

Benchmarks

• Pre-boil volume - 6.9 gallons (26.1 liters)
• Post-boil volume - 5.75 gallons (21.8 liters)
• Starting gravity (post-boil) - 1.040
• Final gravity - ? (still fermenting)
• Final keg volume: (still in fermenter)
• ABV - (still fermenting)