Imperial Stout Double-W Imperial Stout

Thanks for the recipe! I'll be brewing this with some washed 1028 cake in a week or two. Quick question for you R2, what temp are you mashing at? I'm guessing 155-156 to get the full body but wanted to ask before I blew through 20# of Maris Otter. My plan (with your 8 mo age suggestion) is to brew next weekend and save it for this Fall. Thanks again!

Ah! Good catch! I mash at 156F.

I'll update the recipe...

Thought you'd be interested to hear some results - I entered this in a bjcp competition and got a 33 and 35, not too bad but didnt place. It was brewed 8 months ago and I got knocked a little for some esters which I attribute to fermenting during a heatwave without a fridge.

R2, I'd be happy to scan the full scoresheets to you if you are interested since its your recipe, let me know.

Rebrew to remove some of the esters and try again!

I have entered this in a couple of comps and have received a 40 average in one, and 42 in the other.

I don't do many comps much anymore, as tastes are so subjective. I have had an IPA average 42 in the first round, and then a 35 in the second (the rounds were 1 day apart). I now mostly judge on how quickly the keg gets drained at parties and get-togethers

Most definitely I am rebrewing as soon as possible! I like entering to help make tweaks with my process.

Just wanted to say the recipe is great, people ask me to crack the few remaining bottles all the time.

I am glad you like it!

I have 3 recipes that I have to brew regularly: My IIPA (NHC second rounder), my British Porter (2 kegs are going to a Superbowl party), and this one.

Brewing right now! This is dark like a black hole! It's sucking the tastiness from every other beer in its tasty well!

I really want to do a big beer, however with my biab setup there isn't a chance in hell I can mash 20+ lbs. I can do 14 at a stretch.

Is there any easy way to swap in some lme / dme for a chunk of that pale malt? Adapting recipes is still a little beyond my skillset, and I don't really want my first attempt to be something which I only find out I've screwed up after 4+ months in secondary

1 lb grain = .75 lb LME = .6 lb DME

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f37/lme-dme-conversion-51664/

A couple things I wanted to share for anyone else who is attempting this recipe.

a 10 gallon mash tun is the absolute MINIMUM you can get away with, and that's mashing 1-1.1 liters of water per pound of grain (usually I mash 1.5L/pound)

I boiled for 90 minutes and got the approximately 8.6 gallons of collected wort down to 6 gallons in the fermenter. I used 5 drops of Fercamp-S and it was the most energetic and least foamy boil I've ever had. Highly recommend it if you have a 42Qt kettle like me.

Hoping the Fermcap-S would make it from the boil to the fermenter I didn't add any more, and surprised myself with collecting 6 gallons, thought it'd be closer to 5.5. I'd purchased an 8 gallon wine fermentation bucket knowing my Fermcap might not have been in stock at the LHBS, but at the 12 hour mark when I went to add the Fermaid-K the krausen had completely filled the 2-gallon headspace (minus a half inch or so). Perhaps adding additional Fermcap-S to the fermenter would be a good idea next time?

This is also the first time I repitched yeast (~500 mL 1028 from a cake, 1 smack pack of fresh 1028 just in case) and used oxygen instead of stirring for aeration. I had steady airlock activity within an hour and today before popping the lid to add the Fermaid-K it was going off like a machine gun.

Just keep all that in mind when brewing this beer.

For anyone who may have partigyled this, did you cap the second beer with anything? How did it turn out?

cap the second beer? like, with extract?

i didn't. i was able to pull 5g (postboil) of 1.045ish wort out of the 2nd. turned out fantastic.

Same as above. Got a great small stout out of the 2nd runnings. Bottled and drank it all quick. Nice nutty flavor. Just tapped the big stout after 9 mos. aging. Its good but will get better with time. Strong stuff so watch out!

11 days in primary and I dropped from 1.111 to 1.030 on the nose. It's great right out of the bucket but it'll be bulk aged in a keg for a bit while I figure out the best way to add the oak cubes I planned to let them sit on (but forgot until it was already running into the keg)

I made this in late December. After about a month in the keg it is delicious. last weekend I bottled up 12 22oz bottles for aging and a six pack of 12oz for submission to the IN State fair competion in June. I think it may actually show better as a cascadian dark ale than a stout. It's very hoppy for a stout. I'll see how it tastes in June before I enter it and decide what category it should be in. It may be one of those that doesn't follow style very well but tastes awesome!

Thanks again for the great recipe!

Amazing "schmutz" is always left behind from fermenting this beer, huh?

I had about 4 inches of crud on the bottom of my bucket when I racked out.

kegged my small stout partigyle. it's pretty tasty. racked the big one to a secondary. also...tasty

i haven't had a 2011 vintage in awhile. tonight seems as good as any

r2eng said:

Amazing "schmutz" is always left behind from fermenting this beer, huh?

Click to expand...

SO MUCH schmutz. The pressure during and before the blowoff tube was placed bowed the lid up like a balloon. I was more amazed that this beer has stained my wine bucket yellow! Maybe a good 24 hour super PBW soak will get it clean, but judging from my old plastic stir paddle I'm guessing it's permanent. Either way it's now my "strong/big/dark" beer bucket.

I just re-brewed this yesterday, woohoo! Efficiency sucked again, 65%, but I ended up with 6.25 gallons in the fermenter (oops) at 1.094. Should have boiled another hour it seems. I'm thinking this version will definitely get oak cubes for a few months, and possibly also cocoa nibs and a vanilla bean or two at the end. Anyone add nibs or vanilla bean to this yet?

Brewed this yesterday as a partigyle. The stout went pretty well, though I was looking a little low based on refractometer readings so I added a little extract at the end of the boil to bump it up. Came in a 1.113 which I'm happy with given the fact that I didn't do my normal sparging/process in order to leave enough to make the second beer.

I used the 2 packs of US-05 and pitched at about 9pm last night (rehydrated in some water that had been boiled then cooled a bit). It's been sitting at about 68 degrees waiting for fermentation to start so I can chill it down a bit more. I'm getting anxious though after reading about how fast some of yours started with US-05. It's been 12.5 hours now.

I brewed this up on Friday and pitched Sat morning (no chill). This is the strongest beer I've made yet. Boiled for 1 hour and used Magnums for the bittering addition and upped the IBUs a little. I ended up getting 5.75 gal into the fermenter at 1.100 (just under 65% eff) and as I sit here with a big grin on my face, I can hear it bubbling away in the background. :rockin: Absolutely can't wait till this is done, not sure if I should rack ontop of a vanilla bean or not. Ideally I would like to split the batch and do one with and one without.

I decided I am going to take a gallon and secondary it with bourbonized maple syrup, oak, cocoa slurry, fresh coffee beans before bottling, and prime with maple (cbs-esque). Another gallon will secondary with a vanilla bean and cocoa slurry. The remaining 4 or so gallons will be plain. I'll report back with pics. Hopefully I'll get this done next weekend.

my keg is almost empty but I wanted to capture a picture before that happened. Will be brewing again very soon.

I just kicked my keg of this - I used my new bowie bottler to fill 10 grolsch bottles of this fine deliciousness for long term aging - If I can hide them from myself well enough.

I will be rebrewing this tomorrow - But this time I will be adding an oak spiral to the fermenter for a few weeks then bottling half of it then adding vanilla to the other half.

Racked this after 1 month to secondary to age. Very happy to say that I nailed the FG at 1.030. I know it will completely change but this is effing delicious right now. Thank you!!

I just brewed this guy up yesterday. It pushed the limits of my system with 24.5lbs of grain but everything went great. I overshot the OG with 1.130 so this guy is going to be a beast. Hopefully 2 packs of S-05 will beable to handle it. Fermentation is just starting to ramp up this morning. Thanks for the recipe!

Just finished bottling this and drinking a sample as I type. Absolutely fantastic and smooth as silk! Mine finished out at 1.030 and it's been almost 3 months so I'm hoping in 2-3 weeks that this will be rdy to really try.

could anyone offer thoughts on doing this with denny's 50? i have some on hand but no us05

Anyone has tried to pimp this RIS with some Bourbon-Oakchips?

I put two heavy toast oak spirals in mine along with Three ounces of Columbus dry hops. You can barely taste the oak. Might be worth a try.

BayerischBier said:

Anyone has tried to pimp this RIS with some Bourbon-Oakchips?

Click to expand...

2oz oak cubes with 16oz bourbon for 2 months. Turned out great!

I am fermenting this now. Had a rough time at the LHBS.
They only had 1lb of black barley so we subbed in .5lb Victory
They had no special B so we used caramel 120.
They had no caramunich so we used caramel 40L, and I used 3.3lb of Munich LME.
They had no pale chocolate, so I used a whole pound of chocolate.

They had the hops, and I used light DME for the rest. I used a US05 yeast cake from a 1.060 rye wheat I bottled 3-4wks ago. I aerated prior to pitching and a couple hours after having airlock activity. Part of this batch I will secondary on oak, bourbon, and cherry puree.

looneybomber said:

They only had 1lb of black barley so we subbed in .5lb Victory

Click to expand...

?????????

looneybomber said:

I am fermenting this now. Had a rough time at the LHBS.
They only had 1lb of black barley so we subbed in .5lb Victory
They had no special B so we used caramel 120.
They had no caramunich so we used caramel 40L, and I used 3.3lb of Munich LME.
They had no pale chocolate, so I used a whole pound of chocolate.

Click to expand...

So you brewed a completely different beer? ; )

Yeah 1lb of black barley and a half pound of something. It had a 350L, which after looking at victory is not it at all.

sfrisby said:

So you brewed a completely different beer? ; )

Click to expand...

Well, I hope not. They said these were close substitutions.

yikes. victory is the opposite of black barley. i donno what he was thinking.

motobrewer said:

yikes. victory is the opposite of black barley. i donno what he was thinking.

Click to expand...

Well, one of two things happened, I got something with a lovibond of 350 and "thought" it was victory, or I got victory and they "thought" it was something else with a lovibond of 350. I guess I'll never really know for sure till I go back and ask what was in that bucket.

motobrewer said:

yikes. victory is the opposite of black barley. i donno what he was thinking.

Click to expand...

I wouldn't sweat it. I had to make some substitutions too and it turned out awesome! You may have created a masterpiece!