Using peanut butter and/or peanuts

[LadyLupulin]

Because I am an addict , I am trying to incorporate more chocolate and new peanut flavor into my basic stout recipe. The chocolate part is not too difficult to figure out. I even add a shot of coffee in the secondary to help bring it out. However, including peanuts and/or peanut butter is new to me.

If I threw 1 cup (5 gal extract boil) of organic unsalted PB into my wort in the last 15 mins or so, would that work? What would happen? Would the oils get nasty after boiling for 15 mins? My second thought was to try and dry hop with peanut butter somehow. Maybe crush the peanuts, or maybe dilute the peanut butter in a "starter"? Holy !@#$, I have no clue. I don't think the shells alone would do anything for a beer, other than make great compost to spread over the hops I'm growing in the garden.

I have searched here for wisdom, have found much but not on this topic. Enlightenment requested. Thank you so much. Namaste.

Barb

[Legman]

Welcome to the forum LadyLupulin! This is a great place to hang out with us beer geeks.

As far as peanut butter goes, I'm not real sure about that. You have to watch out because peanuts contain a lot of oil. These oil will destroy head retention and could possibly go rancid over time. If your trying to infuse some flavor, I'd probably say add it to the secondary not the boil.

Also if you insist on trying it, I'd probably use all natural peanut butter and let the oils separate and pour it off several times. Another alternative is to use peanut meal where the fats have been taken out. Usually can find this in some health food stores.
Good luck!

[LadyLupulin]

Kay. I kind of figured that is how it was. I appreciate you sharing your wisdom. I think I will try for more of a "toasty" flavor for the recipe. It's not peanut butter, but if I can get some sort of nutty flavor in there it will be close to my vision. Thanks.

[Legman]

Try using a bit of chocolate malt and/or a healthy does of Munich malt. These both add a "nutty" type of quality to the beer.