How to Brew Dark Beer

Premium dark beers can lead to a hefty bar tab.

Home brewing is a cost-effective, enjoyable pastime for many people learning to perfect the art. There are thousands of recipes for hundreds of different types of beers, ranging from lagers to stouts and everything in between. Creating a dark beer such as a stout or a porter can be as simple as using a dark malt extract.

Things You'll Need

• Stainless steel brewkettle
• 5 gallon (or larger) plastic bucket
• Clean beer bottles
• Bottle capper
• Bottle caps
• 2 cans unhopped, dark malt extract syrup
• 2 oz. hops
• 1 package ale yeast
• 2/3 cup dextrose
• Chlorine bleach

Instructions

1. Sanitize all equipment and areas that will come in contact with the beer or beer-making process. Use hot, soapy water for washing, and a solution made of bleach and water (1 oz. of bleach to 5 gallons water) for sanitization. Rinse with cold water. If any microorganism other than your brewer's yeast makes its way into the brew, it will ruin the batch. Sanitization plays a key role in brewing the perfect beer.

2. Fill a brewkettle about two-thirds full of water and boil it. As the water gets hot, add in two cans of unhopped dark malt extract syrup. Stir the malt extract constantly until it is completely dissolved into the water. Dark malts lead to darker beers, such as stouts and porters.

3. Add about 1 oz. of hops once the wort -- the term used for the mixture at this point -- reaches a rolling boil and the extract has fully dissolved. For a more bitter tasting beer, add a bit more than an ounce.

4. Allow the wort to boil for an hour. This will ensure that the wort is free from any living organisms, which will spoil the finished product.

5. Turn off the burner and immediately add about 1/4 oz. of the "finishing hops." Place the lid on your brew kettle and allow the wort to cool. Create an ice bath in a sanitized sink or bathtub, and place the brewkettle in it.

6. Pour the cooled wort into a completely sanitized fermenter. Add one package of ale yeast to the wort. Watch as the yeast cells begin to multiply. They will begin to consume the sugars from the malt extract and produce alcohol and CO2. This process is called fermentation, and can last anywhere from a couple of days to a couple of weeks. When the bubbles have slowed down to fewer than one per minute, it is probably time to bottle the beer. If the wort looks hazy, though, the yeast has not quite finished settling and the liquid will need more time to ferment.

7. Transfer the finished (but still unconditioned) beer from the fermenter into a five-gallon or bigger bucket containing the 2/3 cup of dextrose. Leave the thick layers of yeast and hop residue in the fermenter.

8. Use a siphon to transfer beer from the bottling bucket directly into bottles. Fill each bottle, leaving about an inch of head space below the top and cap. The remaining yeast in the beer will begin its own small-scale re-fermentation process within each individual bottle. The carbon dioxide produced in each bottle will remain dissolved because the crown cap seals the vessel, preventing the CO2 from escaping. This process "conditions" the beer, producing fine, natural bubbles.

9. Keep the bottles at room temperature for about 10 days, allowing yeast to consume the priming sugars. Transfer the bottles to a refrigerator and allow the beer to cool before serving.

References

• Brew Your Own Magazine: New to Brew
• Earth Easy: Simplest Homemade Beer