how does my russian imperial stout look?

i'm shooting from the hip on this one. only my second all-grain.

i'll be pitching onto a wyeast 1028 yeast cake (london ale)


Crisp Maris Otter 12 lbs, 0 oz
Briess Victory 1 lbs, 0 oz
Briess Special Roast Malt 1 lbs, 0 oz
Weyermann Cara Munich III ® 1 lbs, 0 oz
Special B 1 lbs, 0 oz
Briess 2 Row Caramel 60 0 lbs, 8 oz
De-Bittered Black 0 lbs, 8 oz
Flaked Oats 0 lbs, 8 oz
Magnum Pellets, GR 1 oz @ 90 mins
Warrior Pellets .5 oz @ 60 mins
Chinook Pellets .5 oz @ 60 mins
Chinook Pellets .5 oz @ 20 mins
Warrior Pellets .5 oz @ 20 mins
Amarillo Pellets 1 oz @ 5 mins
Amarillo Pellets 1 oz @ 0 mins
Simcoe Pellets 1 oz @ 0 mins


og fg ibu srm abv

1.090 1.023 81.3 41.43 8.78


i've got some other malts: caramel 10, biscuit, aromatic, belgian pale, caramel vienne
i've got some other hops: halletauer, williamette, ekg, fuggles, centennial, nugget, columbus, palisades, zeus, apollo, citra


as always, i'm open to suggestions and thanks for looking.

cheers
jason

Most imperial stouts have some roasted barley for a coffee character, and/or black malt for a bit sharper roast. De-bittered black will give you some color, but it won't provide that deep dark roast that almost all imperial stouts have. You are also a bit heavy handed with the other specialty malts, victory and special roast have pretty similar toasted/bready characters, and the same goes for caramunich and crystal 60.

Something Like:
Crisp Maris Otter 14 lbs, 0 oz
Weyermann Cara Munich III ® 1 lbs, 0 oz
Special B 0 lbs, 8 oz
Roasted Barley 1 lb
Chocolate Malt 8 oz
De-Bittered Black 0 lbs, 8 oz
Flaked Oats 1 lbs, 0 oz

Magnum Pellets, GR 1 oz @ 90 mins
Warrior Pellets .5 oz @ 60 mins
Chinook Pellets .5 oz @ 60 mins
Chinook Pellets .5 oz @ 20 mins
Warrior Pellets .5 oz @ 20 mins

Then dry hop with the hops you want after the beer has a couple months to mellow in secondary, that way you'll get the age plus the fresh hop aroma. Adding aroma hops now will just leave you with oxidized hops by the time you are ready to drink it.

Hope that helps, glad to see you are pitching on a yeast cake, and the temperature this time of year will making keeping the fermentation temp in check easier.

i think i can borrow some chocolate malt from one of my buddies. thanks for the recommendations!

You don't have too many roasted grains in there. Debittered will get you the color, but RIS needs at least some roasted malt in there to offset the sweetness and give it that nice roasty stout character.

I think you may have too much crystal/character type malts. I'd go for a little more base malt, cut down on the Special B (if not cut it out) and other specialty malts.

EDIT:
Oldsock's recipe looks like what I was thinking.

my buddy does have some chocolate malt, so i guess i'm set there.

would anyone use any of those other malts i've listed, but am not using?