First AG rejoicing + a few questions:

[dwarven_stout]

First off, thanks HBT for being a great resource! I know a few homebrewers, but they've never ventured beyond extract brewing and I had no one to lean on. Made my first AG the other night with BIAB- it's a Belgian Golden Ale that is happily spitting up yeast in my closet right now.

My next brew is going to be a Russian Imperial Stout, patterned mostly after Avery's Mephistopheles (I drew on Evan!'s clone recipe a lot, modifying as needed for my situation). It will go right onto the yeast cake left by the Belgian (after I siphon off a bit to wash for my next belgian ) I'm going to do BIAB again, splitting the grain bill in 2 and boiling down. My pots can handle ~8lbs of grain, so I'm limited to a 16lb bill unless I split it in 3 (which I'd rather not).

1) I got 74% eff on the Belgian, and 78% on the BIAB PM Wit I did before. I'm planning for 70% on the RIS. Has anyone who has done BIAB with a big beer have insight on whether that is realistic, or should I pick up more DME?

2) I'm aware of the effect of wort gravity on hop utilization- do extra fermentables added post-boil lessen perceived bitterness when they add alcohol? My gut says "not noticeably", but my recipe is calculated for 110 IBU without considering late sugar/DME additions. Is my gut wrong?

3) Any generic tips for brewing a big beer? I plan to keep temps low, stage additional sugar additions to keep the yeasts happy and in love, and age for 6 months before starting to judge. Anything else? Am I crazy for trying this as BIAB?

4) If I get less than 70% efficiency, I'll do a parti-gyle to squeeze a little more sugar out. A black ale would be nice, and I'm also partial to black IPAs. Any other suggestions?


Thanks a lot!


Here's the recipe:

Grain bill:
11.50lb Pale 2-row
1.5lb Aromatic
1.5lb Roasted Barley
1lb Special B
0.5lb Black Patent
2tsp Gypsum in mash

Mashed at 152 for 60m (or until conversion) and "sparged" with a 20m soak and teabagging at 175.
Add DME as needed to hit 1.090 OG at 5 gal (estimate 1lb if I hit 70% eff)

Hop bill:
2oz Northern Brewer (8.4% AA) @ 90m
1oz Warrior (18.4% AA) @ 90m
0.5oz Willamette (4.8% AA) @ 20m
0.5oz Willamette (4.8% AA) @ 10m
0.5oz Willamette (4.8% AA) @ 5m

Late sugar additions:
2lb Extra-Light DME
3lb Sucanat Sugar
2lb homemade Belgian candy syrup (280 degree - estimated 200 SRM)

Late additions boiled with 0.5gal water and split into 3 additions to be added at 3, 6 and 9 days in primary.
Targeting a 1.130 composite OG here.

Misc:
0.25 oz star anise @ 5m boil
2oz medium toast oak chips in secondary

Yeast:
White Labs WLP530 yeast cake

 

[patrck17]

Wow this is a big beer indeed. I've got close to 25 all grain batches under my belt and I don't think I want to touch this. It sounds like you have done your homework though.

When I made my first batch I pulled off about 78% efficiency which I was thrilled about. I got a little overconfident and tried to make an IPA which called for about 18lbs of grain and a 1.090 or so OG. Unfortunately I came way short of this at around 1.065. I later tried another high gravity beer with similar results. I have since given up on the heavy beers but my efficencies are fine when I make beers around 1.050 or so. I don't know what my problem is but I couldn't justify throwing the money away on extra grain and the low efficencies were causing the hop utilization to be way off making my beer super bitter.

I guess that isn't very encouraging but I think you will do much better, hopefully others will offer some good info on this. If you could keep us updated on how you do with this beer I will probably be picking your brain if it turns out good (the OG that is).

 

[dwarven_stout]

Thanks for the comments. I do annotate my brewing process pretty extensively, and I'll be happy to provide feedback once the beer is on its way.