Bourbon County Stout clone attempt

[BrewCityBaller]

My thoughts aligned with this guy here. He makes great beer. A very informative read. I could not have said it better myself:

http://www.bertusbrewery.com/2015/12/barrel-aged-stouts-and-charred- oak.html?m=1

This is super interesting. I am gonna have to keep an eye on his page to see what happens. I only have 2 oz. of oak soaking right now, maybe I'll get another 2 oz. and char it.

I watched an episode of Moonshiners this weekend where the group quickly aged corn whisky into 'scotch' by soaking the product w/oak cubes then heating and cooling to expand/contract the oak like it would naturally.

Another novel idea! I am not sure if I have the equipment for that, but it's worth looking into.

 

[Sleepyemt]

This is super interesting. I am gonna have to keep an eye on his page to see what happens. I only have 2 oz. of oak soaking right now, maybe I'll get another 2 oz. and char it.







Another novel idea! I am not sure if I have the equipment for that, but it's worth looking into.

I think just bulk aging it where you'd have some temps swings would do that naturally. Also, you can buy charred spirals at farmhouse brewing supply... Just an FYI

 

[BrewCityBaller]

I think just bulk aging it where you'd have some temps swings would do that naturally. Also, you can buy charred spirals at farmhouse brewing supply... Just an FYI

That's actually really good to know, I have become a fan of Farmhouse Brewing lately. And would also save me from charring myself. Thanks for the heads up!

 

[Sleepyemt]

That's actually really good to know, I have become a fan of Farmhouse Brewing lately. And would also save me from charring myself. Thanks for the heads up!

Absolutely! I have a single spiral in a carboy for my Black Tuesday clone, so I can't tell you much yet. But it is coming along and seems promising

 

[Schumed]

Here was my take on BCBS
http://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/295381/schubrew-ris-ii

Its not exactly what Goose Island does...I used what I had on hand. I used Vienna Malt instead of Munich...and used CaraFa II instead of De-bittered black...I also was low on roasted malt and used some brown malt to make up the difference.

I used the cold steep method with all the dark malt. Really like this method. Grind all the dark malt finely soak overnight in a quart of water for every pound...then filter. Add the extract at flameout. Allows the chocolate and roasty flavors to really shine without all the unwanted bitterness.

I did a 90 Minute mash at 154 and a 90 minute boil

After fermentation I split up my 5 gallon batch....2 - 1 gallon jugs and a 3 gallon carboy. The 3 gallon carboy got a honeycomb barrel aged alternative soaked in bourbon for a week...one gallon got 4 madgascar vanilla beans...the other got some coffee...

Did some taste test last night...all 3 are awesome and are very inspired by BCBS...boozy, rich, great mouthful...a little sweet. Really love how it turned out

We did a different RIS to fill our BCBS barrel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0Sg1YvdPlI

Little follow up

My club had our annual RIS competition and my vanilla version of BCBS easily won against 14 other entries.

 

[syd138]

The grain % that GI uses is:

64% 2 Row
21% Bolander Munich Malt
4% Chocolate Malt
4% Caramel 60
4% Roasted barley
3% Debittered Black Malt

Those % are from GI brew log sheets for this years BCBS, however, I would wager that is the % every year and the slight differences are crop differences, efficiency and aging.

Hey thanks for posting this. I looked on their website and they had the exact same ingredients posted in the same order. Planning on brewing something similar next weekend. The only thing I was going to do is to add 0.5 lbs of dark brown sugar.

 

[SpottedDogBrewing]

How much oak is everyone using? I've been putting in about 5oz per 5 gallons. Anyone been putting in more than 5oz per 5 gallons?

 

[BigPerm]

How much oak is everyone using? I've been putting in about 5oz per 5 gallons. Anyone been putting in more than 5oz per 5 gallons?

What format of oak and for how long? That seems high to me, especially if using chips.

 

[SpottedDogBrewing]

What format of oak and for how long? That seems high to me, especially if using chips.

I use Medium+ oak cubes for about 3 months! I was thinking of adding more oak. Just trying to find out if anyone has done more. Plus my batch size is 15 gallons.

 

[syd138]

Several posters were trying to create the GI recipe in Beersmith. I created one to get your started. Note that it's for a 10-gal batch at 74.4% efficiency with a 2-hr boil. Scale it to your system and adjust accordingly.


ETA: here it is in text

BeerSmith 2 Recipe Printout - http://www.beersmith.com
Recipe: Bourbon County Brand Stout
Brewer: Goose Island
Asst Brewer:
Style: Imperial Stout
TYPE: All Grain
Taste: (30.0)

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 15.44 gal
Post Boil Volume: 11.44 gal
Batch Size (fermenter): 10.00 gal
Bottling Volume: 9.25 gal
Estimated OG: 1.129 SG
Estimated Color: 63.5 SRM
Estimated IBU: 58.6 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 74.40 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 81.8 %
Boil Time: 120 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt Name Type # %/IBU
31 lbs Pale Ale Malt 2-Row (Briess) (3.5 SRM) Grain 1 63.5 %
10 lbs Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 2 20.5 %
2 lbs Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 3 4.1 %
2 lbs Chocolate Malt (350.0 SRM) Grain 4 4.1 %
2 lbs Roasted Barley (300.0 SRM) Grain 5 4.1 %
1 lbs 12.8 oz Debittered Black Malt (550.0 SRM) Grain 6 3.7 %
9.00 oz Willamette [5.50 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 7 58.6 IBUs
4.0 pkg Safale American (DCL/Fermentis #US-05) Yeast 8 -
1.0 pkg Super High Gravity Ale (White Labs #WLP0 Yeast 9 -

mbbransc.. did you brew this yet? If so, how did it turn out?

 

[mbbransc]

mbbransc.. did you brew this yet? If so, how did it turn out?

No, I just created the file for the brewers here. I usually only do one HUGE imperial stout a year and in NOV I did a Black Tuesday-esque beer.

I probably will take a stab at this one one day though.

 

[McUbermensch]

Anyone having luck bottle conditioning this beer?

 

[Schumed]

Anyone having luck bottle conditioning this beer?

just add fresh yeast with your priming solution .... carbs fine

 

[MadHomebrewer]

Thinking about brewing this soon but letting it sit a keg and condition for a while. Anyone like to share their process? I was thinking once out of primary and into my keg, purge with co2 and add enough pressure to seal the keg. Then let it sit till the end of the year. Should it sit at room temp 70 degrees or in a keezer till the end of the year? Also thinking about add one or two of these bourbon barrel staves while in the keg. http://www.homebrewing.org/product....ium=shopping&gclid=CNS1sY_KsssCFQmRaQodqlMBpA

 

[Schumed]

Thinking about brewing this soon but letting it sit a keg and condition for a while. Anyone like to share their process? I was thinking once out of primary and into my keg, purge with co2 and add enough pressure to seal the keg. Then let it sit till the end of the year. Should it sit at room temp 70 degrees or in a keezer till the end of the year? Also thinking about add one or two of these bourbon barrel staves while in the keg. http://www.homebrewing.org/product....ium=shopping&gclid=CNS1sY_KsssCFQmRaQodqlMBpA

I personally thought mine didn't need any age. I thought it was great after 6 weeks. I'm not a huge fan of the whole aging thing especially the whole batch...my recommendation would be carb up your keg like normal. Bottle up some from the keg for aging...and enjoy the rest....take notes so you have something to compare against when you taste the aged beer.

 

[mbbransc]

Contrarily, I tend to bulk age all my 10%+ beers in a keg under pressure, much like you described. I do throw a picnic tap on it from time to time to see how it's doing.

 

[pandamonium]

Brewed my attempt at Bourbon County Stout 2 days ago. I read every thread I could find and watch the whole grain and grit series. This is what I came up.

I can only fit about 20 lbs of grain in my mash tun (10 Gallon igloo) with a fairly tight mash (1.25 qt/gallon). Mashed at 156 for 90 min, sparged with another 4.5 gallons, for a total of about 8 gallons of wort at about 1.070. Effiecency around 60% I think, which I attribute to thick mash.
Boiled for 3 hours, ended up with 4.5 gallons of 1.13 wort! This was a bit of an over boil because I was hoping to end up with 5.5 gallons of 1.15 (or thereabouts) and then add LME to bring it up to target OG (1.13). So I added a gallon of water and 3 lbs of LME and I was right on target at 1.135. Cooled and racked to carboy with all trub.
Aerated 120 seconds with pure O2. Pitched a 2 liter starter with 2 pouches of 1056.
It's been bubbling vigorously for 36 hours now with no signs of slowing down! Can't wait to check gravity after a week, hoping for FG around 1.038. I will primary for a month then rack to a keg and age in there with 2 or 3 oz of bourbon-soaked charred oak cubes for a year. My plan is to keep it carbed at around 13 psi (which is what my kegerator is usually set at), and once a month or so I'll vent it and re carb, so make sure I'm not creating a keg bomb or something. Probably unnecessary but couldn't hurt.

Recipe
8 lbs 2 row
7.5 lbs Munich
1 lb crystal 69
1.25 lb roasted barley
1.25 lb black patent
1.25 lb chocolate malt
3 lbs LME (was prepared to add up to 8 lbs to get to target OG but only had to do 3 lbs due to vigorous boil)
1 tsp Irish moss at 5 min
1 tsp yeast nutrient at 5 min

1 oz nugget at 60
1 oz nugget at 10

2 packets 1056 in a 2 liter starter

I will post updates as I go but not planning to really drink this until Christmas!

 

[jleiii]

Y'all are killing me with this thread. I picked up a 5 gallon bourbon barrel a couple months ago with plans to do a BCBS clone, and one thing after another keeps forcing me to put it off.
The first distraction was a club competition where the brew was a random selection in a face off. Both my competitor and I were hoping for a big stout, and we came damn close, Foreign Extra Stout, but not close enough. I did get a 3rd place in another competition, so I'm stoked over that, and looking to amp up that recipe now.
Then life, work, random other stuff got in the way, then a garganuan head cold. Can seem to get there......

So, not to derail this thread too much, any advice on keeping my barrel 'conditioned' another month or so? I starsaned the plug so I could peek in and huff some fumes, but that's it so far. It's been in the basement at around 55-60 the whole time. I'm afraid I rapidly loosing the bourbon character it started with.

 

[mbbransc]

Sorry, I have no experience with barrels. I generally have some oak soaking in bourbon but when needed, I usually toss the whole lot in.

 

[Schumed]

Y'all are killing me with this thread. I picked up a 5 gallon bourbon barrel a couple months ago with plans to do a BCBS clone, and one thing after another keeps forcing me to put it off.
The first distraction was a club competition where the brew was a random selection in a face off. Both my competitor and I were hoping for a big stout, and we came damn close, Foreign Extra Stout, but not close enough. I did get a 3rd place in another competition, so I'm stoked over that, and looking to amp up that recipe now.
Then life, work, random other stuff got in the way, then a garganuan head cold. Can seem to get there......

So, not to derail this thread too much, any advice on keeping my barrel 'conditioned' another month or so? I starsaned the plug so I could peek in and huff some fumes, but that's it so far. It's been in the basement at around 55-60 the whole time. I'm afraid I rapidly loosing the bourbon character it started with.

Keeping the barrel empty for long periods of time isnt good...because the staves will start to shrink and barrel will get leaks. I keep mine filed with a solution of water, citric acid and metabasulfate to keep the barrel full and sterile.

Bourbon character should be fine the first round if it was fresh

 

[pandamonium]

Buy 5 gallons of bourbon! Then invite me over when it's time to empty that and put the beer in.

 

[jleiii]

Buy 5 gallons of bourbon! Then invite me over when it's time to empty that and put the beer in.

Now that's not something that had occurred to me... I could start with the half a fifth of Jim Beam my son found under the seat of his car the other day. Not a good place to keep it, but he's a responsible driver & drinker, just not at the same time.

 

[ziggy13]

So far everything I have seen seems to indicate either 001 or 1056 as the yeast. I am curious if you guys really think that's the yeast they use? According to the Grit & Grain series the fermentation of BCBS is complete in 4 days. I can't imagine 001 getting it done that quickly. It's a fairly slow starter as compared to other yeasts and every Imperial Stout I've made with it has taken well over a week to complete. Any thoughts or am I missing something?

 

[Schumed]

So far everything I have seen seems to indicate either 001 or 1056 as the yeast. I am curious if you guys really think that's the yeast they use? According to the Grit & Grain series the fermentation of BCBS is complete in 4 days. I can't imagine 001 getting it done that quickly. It's a fairly slow starter as compared to other yeasts and every Imperial Stout I've made with it has taken well over a week to complete. Any thoughts or am I missing something?

I find it pretty fast actually just have to pitch enough at optimal temps...yeast I dont think matters for this as long is it can handle the alcohol and attenuate properly

 

[pandamonium]

Need some advice. After 1 week my gravity is sitting at 1.046. Was hoping to hit target fg of around 1.038-1.040 by this point. It was sitting at 65 degrees and bubbles strong for a good 3 days.
What can I do to help it attenuate a bit more? I obviously have a ton of unfermentables with all that specialty grain and the mash at 156 degrees but I tried to stay pretty true to the original (goose island) percentages.

Options:
1) stir the beer and raise temp to 72 for a week
2) re-pitch with another starter, in which case would I want to use 1056 again? Or something different?
3) re-oxygenate which I am extremely reluctant to do for obvious reasons.

Bottom line is, I'd prefer not to do anything drastic... It's pretty damn close to target and it honestly tastes pretty good... But a few more points of attenuation would make me very very happy.

Thanks for any advice you can give me!!

Brewed my attempt at Bourbon County Stout 2 days ago. I read every thread I could find and watch the whole grain and grit series. This is what I came up.

I can only fit about 20 lbs of grain in my mash tun (10 Gallon igloo) with a fairly tight mash (1.25 qt/gallon). Mashed at 156 for 90 min, sparged with another 4.5 gallons, for a total of about 8 gallons of wort at about 1.070. Effiecency around 60% I think, which I attribute to thick mash.
Boiled for 3 hours, ended up with 4.5 gallons of 1.13 wort! This was a bit of an over boil because I was hoping to end up with 5.5 gallons of 1.15 (or thereabouts) and then add LME to bring it up to target OG (1.13). So I added a gallon of water and 3 lbs of LME and I was right on target at 1.135. Cooled and racked to carboy with all trub.
Aerated 120 seconds with pure O2. Pitched a 2 liter starter with 2 pouches of 1056.
It's been bubbling vigorously for 36 hours now with no signs of slowing down! Can't wait to check gravity after a week, hoping for FG around 1.038. I will primary for a month then rack to a keg and age in there with 2 or 3 oz of bourbon-soaked charred oak cubes for a year. My plan is to keep it carbed at around 13 psi (which is what my kegerator is usually set at), and once a month or so I'll vent it and re carb, so make sure I'm not creating a keg bomb or something. Probably unnecessary but couldn't hurt.

Recipe
8 lbs 2 row
7.5 lbs Munich
1 lb crystal 69
1.25 lb roasted barley
1.25 lb black patent
1.25 lb chocolate malt
3 lbs LME (was prepared to add up to 8 lbs to get to target OG but only had to do 3 lbs due to vigorous boil)
1 tsp Irish moss at 5 min
1 tsp yeast nutrient at 5 min

1 oz nugget at 60
1 oz nugget at 10

2 packets 1056 in a 2 liter starter

I will post updates as I go but not planning to really drink this until Christmas!

 

[Mx750ktm]

Thought I would post here been browsing this recipe for quite some time and finally pulled the trigger this past Saturday. This was my first big beer (over 1.090) and everything went remotely smoothly

I loosely used the recipe in the byo magazine, but rounded some things off. I brewed the following.
Batch size 5 gallons
I choose to use WLP004 with a massive starter
Mashed @ 155
18lbs 2Row
2Lbs Crystal 60L
2lbs Roasted Barley
1Lbs9.9oz Munich Malt 10L
1Lbs5.6oz Chocolate Malt
1lb Carafa II Dehusked
1lb 8oz Light Dry Extract
1.60 oz of CTZ @60 for 50.7IBU
1.00 oz of Williamette @30 for 7.4 IBU

Before Pitching Yeast I took a gravity reading at 68 degrees and OG was 1.150
which should put me right on track with the 14.2% that goose islands website lists or I may be slightly over.
I also have some medium toast oak and 1 vanilla bean soaking in Bourbon, I'm very excited for the outcome of this beer.

Everything is going good so far I hit the wort with 2 mins of oxygen and pitched my yeast and its happily fermenting right now. Glad I choose the blow off for this beer. Ill keep everyone up to date on how my batch turns out.
Here are a few pictures

 

[mbbransc]

Definitely raise the temp and rock the beer. I'd consider pitch in some 099 as well. You aren't far off. I wouldn't do anything drastic. Worse case, drink it! Don't oxygenate it.

 

[pandamonium]

Okay I rocked it and raised the temp to 72 for over a week and it was still 1.048ish. So yesterday I made a milk stout with a 2 liter starter of 099 and I've never seen a beer ferment like this... A constant stream or bubbles in the airlock. Lol. My plan was to rack by bourbon county beer into the yeast cake from the milk stout. But now I'm thinkin about it, do you guys think I'd risk drying out my beer too much? This yeast seems ridiculous. there's a ton of "unfermentables" in my bourbon county... I guess my question is, do you think the 099 will actually eat all those complex sugars and dry this out and turn it into jet fuel?

By the way the reason I chose a milk stout is because even the 099 won't eat all that lactose so it won't get too dry.

 

[Mx750ktm]

Okay I rocked it and raised the temp to 72 for over a week and it was still 1.048ish. So yesterday I made a milk stout with a 2 liter starter of 099 and I've never seen a beer ferment like this... A constant stream or bubbles in the airlock. Lol. My plan was to rack by bourbon county beer into the yeast cake from the milk stout. But now I'm thinkin about it, do you guys think I'd risk drying out my beer too much? This yeast seems ridiculous. there's a ton of "unfermentables" in my bourbon county... I guess my question is, do you think the 099 will actually eat all those complex sugars and dry this out and turn it into jet fuel?

By the way the reason I chose a milk stout is because even the 099 won't eat all that lactose so it won't get too dry.

We have slightly different situations here but I just wanted to share my situation. I Brewed a version of this with the grain bill posted a few posts up, I mashed at 155 for 60 mins, I pitched two vials of wlp004 with a large starter and oxygenated before pitching for a good length of time. When all was said and done I was at 1.050 but I wanted another 10 points or so to Come as close to the original. So I decided to make a huge starter of the super San Diego yeast and pitched that two days ago, I have had little to no activity, I know visual signs aren't a true sign, so I checked today and exact same fg reading of 1.050. I'm
Not discouraging pitching on a cake maybe it will work better than the starter, but if your mash was similar In temperature i would say let it be, maybe there's just nothing left that's fermentable, By no means am I an expert with big beers either this was actually my first beer over 1.090 but just wanted to share my experience with this beast. Ps- my samples taste phenomenal just wish it was a tad bit less sweet but I could knit pick any of my beers!!' Cheers let us know how yours comes out man.

 

[mbbransc]

I think WLP099 would be more apt to throw into a bad situation. Seems more resilient to me than WLP090. That said, I've never had luck secondarily pitching to squeak out a few more points. One idea I've had though is pitching 099 on Day 3 of fermentation. Hopefully conditions aren't so terrible yet that they can adapt and help out but still get some yeast characteristics from my primary yeast.

@pandamonium - you aren't going to dry that beer out. Promise.

 

[pandamonium]

Thanks for the advice guys! I have this enormous yeast cake (WLP099) from the Milk Stout which went from 1.072 to goal FG of 1.024 in 36 hours flat. Very impressive yeast, but Im worried about off flavors in the milk stout because it crept up to 71 degrees during the "robust" fermentation. I hope it turns out okay and if it doesn't, well, I'll just consider it a 5 gallon starter and dump it. But my plan is to to cold crash the Milk Stout, and then rack that off to a keg in a couple days. Ill let the yeast cake come back to room temp, purge the carboy with CO2 somehow (thoughts on how to do that?), and then rack the BCS straight onto that yeast cake with my sterile siphon starter. I'll give it a good mixing to re-suspend the yeast and then keep that at 68 degrees or so. I'll let you know how that turns out.

Also going to get my 2 oz of oak cubes (which I will char with a torch) soaking in a pint of good bourbon today, give them a good 3 week soak before racking the beer into a secondary (tertiary?) along with the oak cubes (as well as the pint of bourbon).

 

[mbbransc]

So I finally took at stab at this on Saturday. I tinkered with the recipe just a bit; ended up with 38# of grain. I sparged enough to get 12gal for a 6gal batch, split the wort between (2) kettles and boiled 3hrs before combining them into a single kettle and tossing in the 60' additions (so, 4hr total boil, but 3 of those hours were (2) kettles; effectively a 7hr boil to get the volume from 12gals to 6gals).

I split the wort between (2) fermenters too in order to allow for as much headspace as needed. I pitched a pack of S-04, US-05 and 100B cells of WY3787 into each fermenter. The gravity was literally off the scale; my refractometer only goes to 32°P and this was higher. I did take some pre-boil readings and believe the OG to be about 1.145. While oxygenating the fermenters, I ran out of O2. We'll see how much it hinders things. I'm hoping to get to at least 1.040. Anything lower would be a bonus.

Cheers!

 

[pandamonium]

Dude that's a monster brew day, congrats on that. Interesting pitch, let us know how that turns out.

 

[alanburtonwells]

So I finally took at stab at this on Saturday. I tinkered with the recipe just a bit; ended up with 38# of grain. I sparged enough to get 12gal for a 6gal batch, split the wort between (2) kettles and boiled 3hrs before combining them into a single kettle and tossing in the 60' additions (so, 4hr total boil, but 3 of those hours were (2) kettles; effectively a 7hr boil to get the volume from 12gals to 6gals).

I split the wort between (2) fermenters too in order to allow for as much headspace as needed. I pitched a pack of S-04, US-05 and 100B cells of WY3787 into each fermenter. The gravity was literally off the scale; my refractometer only goes to 32°P and this was higher. I did take some pre-boil readings and believe the OG to be about 1.145. While oxygenating the fermenters, I ran out of O2. We'll see how much it hinders things. I'm hoping to get to at least 1.040. Anything lower would be a bonus.

Cheers!

Can you go into a little more regarding your recipe? I'm a little surprised your OG was not higher with that much grain in a 6 gallon batch.

 

[Sleepyemt]

Can you go into a little more regarding your recipe? I'm a little surprised your OG was not higher with that much grain in a 6 gallon batch.

That's about right, the higher the OG the lower the effeciency....

 

[mbbransc]

My mash efficiency came out at 64.7%, not too bad for a beer this size.

27# 2-Row
5# Munich
1.5# Roasted Barley
1# C120
1# C60
1#Chocolate
1# Black Prinz

So, 37.5# actually.

 

[alanburtonwells]

That's about right, the higher the OG the lower the effeciency....

But he didn't build this recipe to be a super big beer. He said be boiled down from 12 to 6 gallons so the wort that would've resulted from a 1-1.5hr boil wouldn't have been nearly as big and wouldn't have gotten such bad efficiency I figured.

 

[geoffey]

But he didn't build this recipe to be a super big beer. He said be boiled down from 12 to 6 gallons so the wort that would've resulted from a 1-1.5hr boil wouldn't have been nearly as big and wouldn't have gotten such bad efficiency I figured.

For a beer that big your already starting out with a pretty high sugar content, even if you are boiling down. So you'd still have lower efficiency.

When I made this I boiled off for 2 or three hours and even then added a few pounds of DME to get the desired OG. And my efficiency was probably 55%.

 

[Sleepyemt]

But he didn't build this recipe to be a super big beer. He said be boiled down from 12 to 6 gallons so the wort that would've resulted from a 1-1.5hr boil wouldn't have been nearly as big and wouldn't have gotten such bad efficiency I figured.

He did, 40 lbs is big for a 6gallon beer... for a 12 galling beer, it's still high. So let's say for a 1.065 (6gal recipe) beer you typically sparge with 6 gallons of water to get 70 to 75 % efficiency? It's typically 10-11 lbs of grain so for almost 40 lbs of grain to keep that efficiency you'd need to sparge with 24 gallons and boil down for high efficiency... that doesn't include mashing water... his 64% is good. I know my numbers aren't perfect, I'm on my phone... but see it as an example

Edited for clarification

 

[Sleepyemt]

And probably explained better here...

http://beerandwinejournal.com/efficiency-gravity/