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rwh wrote:Anyway, crack the coconut, take the meat off of the shell in as big of pieces as possible.

Bloody hell, I just did that with one coconut... I feel like I've been to the gym. Hacksawed the friggin thing open, then chipped the flesh off the shell with a knife and a spoon. I thought I recollected from my childhood that it was a PITA to open coconuts; thought it might be easier now I'm a grown man. WRONG!

Hopefully it will be worth the effort! Sounds like a bloody good idea, I am sure it will taste yum.

Throw it on a concrete floor, but outside, it'll make a mess.

Cheers,
Greg

OK, that's the most painful racking experience I've ever had. Clogged my tap. Clogged my racking cane. The coconut also seems to leave an oily residue on everything. I would definitely recommend running this through a muslin bag or something after the boil to keep the crap out of your fermenter.

I managed to get about 17L into a keg before I lost my temper; I think I'll need to rack it again before I connect it up though; I don't want to think about what the chunks would do to my kegging system taps.

Without getting off topic. I just googled "Opening a coconut"
Hopefully This will save time on hacksawing next time.

http://www.howtodothings.com/food-and-d ... conut.html
http://www.wikihow.com/Cut-Open-a-Coconut

I actually started thinking about making a coconut stout myself a few weeks ago (before seeing it here). I have actually tackled it slightly differently.
1.7kg Stout Extract, 1kg Dark Malt (Dry), 250g Cracked Choc Grain, 2 x 50ml Coconut essence (cake decorating section of supermarket). My thought is hopefully it will come out something like a "Bounty" . Smells awesome while I was mixing it all together, and the inital fermentation bubbles make the house smell like a Thai massage parlor. mmmmmm.......coconuty.......

I have done a similar recipe once before using a handful of fresh split cherries (boiled for about 15 mins and then put in a stocking inside fermenter). Came out beautiful. Like a "Cherry Ripe" kinda .

I am excited to hear how the real coconut goes. My worry was the oil content of the coconut, so that is why I went with essence instead.

Will watch this topic closely, and will post my efforts online when it finishes.

RWH, you tasted it yet? Or does it still need a little alone time in secondary.?

Opening a coconut is easy! You don't need a hammer and nail in my experience. A meat skewer through the eye works easily.

Oh, and I'd like to hear how it is too.

It's sitting in the keg waiting for its turn in the fridge. Will post an update when it's in.

OK, this thing is in. I racked it again from keg to keg; glad I did as there was a bunch of coconut in the bottom which I really would prefer to keep out of my tap.

Having said that, it's turned out to be a beautiful clear stout (as the Coopers toucan recipe often does) and with just the slightest coconut overtone. It's really quite nice... you know how a flavour can hover on the edge of the flavour threshold? It's a trick I use with chilli in my bolognese sauces. Anyway, I can recommend the recipe; just make sure you strain the damned coconut out! Oh, and if you like coconut, then you could probably go up to 3 or 4 (I only used 1).

What about the head?

I'll have to get back to you on that one as it's still pretty under-carbonated. But I have to warn you, I don't really give a sheet about head on my beer. Especially ales and stouts, which are lower carbed and traditionally don't have much head anyway (have you seen many episodes of Inspector Morse?).

Glad it turned out a winner, rwh. Nice and easy too

rwh wrote:I'll have to get back to you on that one as it's still pretty under-carbonated. But I have to warn you, I don't really give a sheet about head on my beer. Especially ales and stouts, which are lower carbed and traditionally don't have much head anyway (have you seen many episodes of Inspector Morse?).

More curious than concerned. I mostly agree with you there...

Mine also is coming up nicely. Still fermenting, but even the missus liked smell/taste from the test i drew for the hydrometer. Maybe 1 bottle of essence would have been enough, but I REALLY like coconut.

Well, the head seems fine, perhaps even better than my regular brews. There was a bit of something that could have been oil floating on the surface of the beer when it was in the first keg, but as it got another racking after that, I suspect it didn't make it into the final beer.

The latest issue of BYO mag has an article on adding oil to beer - I'll have a read to find out why it is so!!

Cheers,
TL

Trough Lolly wrote:The latest issue of BYO mag has an article on adding oil to beer - I'll have a read to find out why it is so!!

Cheers,
TL

Is that article related to the olive oil experiments?

Olive oil contains a component that yeast can use to reproduce without oxygen being present in the wort. From what I have seen it increases the stability of the beer without any real impact to head retention or ester production, and actually produces lower levels of most of the undesirable bi-products.

Yes it is - and debate is raging over the benefits of adding the olive oil (not to mention how much to add) versus the potential downsides in adding oil to beer. Prolly best to toss this discussion in another thread though....

Cheers,
TL