Big Ideas for Small-Scale Craft Brewing: Don’t Miss a Full-Day of 10 Live Online Seminars at the 2026 NanoCon. Register now and Save 25%!

recipe

Bitter Chocolate Imperial Stout

Bitter Chocolate Imperial Stout

(5 gallons/19 L, extract with grains)
OG = 1.071  FG = 1.022 IBU = 33  SRM = 35  ABV = 6.8%

Ingredients

8 lbs. (3.6 kg) Briess traditional dark dried malt extract
4 oz. (113 g) black malt
4 oz. (113 g) chocolate malt
4 oz. (113 g) roasted barley 8 AAU Target hops (60 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 8% alpha acids)
4 AAUs Fuggles hops (15 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 4% alpha acids)
2 oz. (57 g) unsweetened baker’s chocolate, broken (15 min.)
White Labs WLP002 (English Ale) or Wyeast 1968 (London ESB Ale) or Lallemand Windsor Ale yeast
3/4 cup corn sugar (if priming)

Step by Step

Steep the black and chocolate malts and the roasted barley in 3 gallons (11 L) of cold water. Gradually raise heat to 170 °F (77 °C). Remove grains and rinse them back into the pot with hot water. Stir in dried malt extract, bring to boil, and add Target hops. Boil 45 minutes, add Fuggles hops and the baker’s chocolate. Boil 15 minutes, remove from heat, cool 15 minutes. Add to fermenter along with enough water to make 5.25 gallons (20 L). Cool to 70 °F (21 °C), pitch yeast. Seal and ferment for ten days at this temperature. If you would like, rack to secondary and age in a cool dark place for a month. Keg or bottle condition as normal.

You might also like…

recipe

Oakshire Brewing Co.’s Tmavé Pivo Clone

Tmavé pivo is the overlying style of Czech dark lager. We use an extensive malt bill to add depth to the final beer while eliminating as mu

recipe

Classic American Pilsner

Nothing says summer quite like enjoying a crisp CAP on a hot afternoon. Here is a CAP recipe from Fermenter’s Supply and Equipment based out

recipe

Gordon Strong’s Bière de Garde

An amber bière de garde in the style of Jenlain using (mostly) malts from the area.

recipe

The Other Michael Jackson (Black Witbier)

According to recipe author Gordon Strong, “This is my normal witbier recipe with darker malts and a slight tweak in spicing. Darker malts we