user 38649
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This is my second attempt at making the RIS kit from Brewer's Best. I brewed it true-to-recipe the first time, but have recently been intrigued by other massive Russian Imperials and thought I'd attempt a few tweaks to see what I can come up with.
Just put this in the primary (* is what I added):
6.6lb Dark LME
2lb Dark DME
8oz Crushed Roasted Barley
8oz Crushed Black Patent
1lb Crushed Crystal 60L
*8oz Briess 2 row pale malt
*8oz flaked oats
*8oz molasses
*2 shots of espresso <- Left the coffee out
*2 vanilla beans
*1/2 cup burbon
1oz Columbus Hops (bittering)
OG: 1.080
Mashed the Briess and oats in 1.3 L of water at 154F for 60 min. I had a hard time keeping the temperature with this. Mashed in a pot, wrapped it in towels and put it in a cooler. Took it out and heated it up when the probe indicated less than 150F. Filtered the resulting liquor through cheese cloth, set aside until I finished steeping the included specialty grains. The lovely stuff from the mash was VERY opaque and viscous. Delicious, very sweet.
I added the molasses with 10 minutes left in the boil.
Chilled to 75, poured the wort through a strainer a couple times to remove the hot break and to aerate.
If the bucket doesn't completely explode, I'm going to leave it on the primary for 5-7 days. I'm planning on splitting/scraping the vanilla beans and soaking in burbon for at least a day before adding them to the beer when transferring to secondary, along with the espresso. I was thinking about making sure the vanilla beans stay in contact with the beer (and out of the yeast cake) by dangling them from the stopper with fishing line....seem like an ok thing to do?
I plan on leaving it in the secondary anywhere between 2-4 weeks, then bottling and making an honest attempt at keeping them unopened until Xmas (6mos.)!
I'm hoping to get some nice silky mouth-feel from the oats, and enough coffee/vanilla/molasses to add some complexity to the taste. BTW, the reason I mashed the oats with the 2-row is because oats don't contain the amylase needed to break down the starches to get the most out of their fermentability. I don't want any of the additions to overpower the original flavor profile..(this is my second time brewing this kit) I'm not so sure about the molasses, hope I didn't add too much.
Just put this in the primary (* is what I added):
6.6lb Dark LME
2lb Dark DME
8oz Crushed Roasted Barley
8oz Crushed Black Patent
1lb Crushed Crystal 60L
*8oz Briess 2 row pale malt
*8oz flaked oats
*8oz molasses
*2 shots of espresso <- Left the coffee out
*2 vanilla beans
*1/2 cup burbon
1oz Columbus Hops (bittering)
OG: 1.080
Mashed the Briess and oats in 1.3 L of water at 154F for 60 min. I had a hard time keeping the temperature with this. Mashed in a pot, wrapped it in towels and put it in a cooler. Took it out and heated it up when the probe indicated less than 150F. Filtered the resulting liquor through cheese cloth, set aside until I finished steeping the included specialty grains. The lovely stuff from the mash was VERY opaque and viscous. Delicious, very sweet.
I added the molasses with 10 minutes left in the boil.
Chilled to 75, poured the wort through a strainer a couple times to remove the hot break and to aerate.
If the bucket doesn't completely explode, I'm going to leave it on the primary for 5-7 days. I'm planning on splitting/scraping the vanilla beans and soaking in burbon for at least a day before adding them to the beer when transferring to secondary, along with the espresso. I was thinking about making sure the vanilla beans stay in contact with the beer (and out of the yeast cake) by dangling them from the stopper with fishing line....seem like an ok thing to do?
I plan on leaving it in the secondary anywhere between 2-4 weeks, then bottling and making an honest attempt at keeping them unopened until Xmas (6mos.)!
I'm hoping to get some nice silky mouth-feel from the oats, and enough coffee/vanilla/molasses to add some complexity to the taste. BTW, the reason I mashed the oats with the 2-row is because oats don't contain the amylase needed to break down the starches to get the most out of their fermentability. I don't want any of the additions to overpower the original flavor profile..(this is my second time brewing this kit) I'm not so sure about the molasses, hope I didn't add too much.