Imperial Stout - How long in Primary? Should I secondary?

[rjstew]

So I ended up brewing this beer this past weekend. My OG was low, 1.094 vs the predicted 1.140. I've determined this is due to the grain crush since I've been crushing all my grains at my LHBS and all of my beers are 5% lower efficiency than calculated. My fermentation was also insanely active. CO2 was erupting out of blowoff tube within 4 hours and the entire lid of the 7.9 gallon bucket (with only 6 gallons inside, 6-8" of headspace) blew off after about 12 hours. I had some bad luck and broke my airlock that didn't have a debris filter when I was pressing it into the gromet so I had to use one with a debris filter. Last time I'll make that mistake.

I poured 8oz of the wort into a sanitized mason jar, put tinfoil over and let it ferment by itself. I tasted it yesterday and it tastes AMAZING. I'm surprised how quickly the sugars were consumed. I'd be happy drinking this right now, tastes better than 90% of the commercial Imperial Stouts I've had. Super roasty, chocolaty and rich. I'm sure after I hit my FG I'll need to age to mellow out the 10% booziness.

Which brings me to my question......How long should I go in primary and secondary? Should I even do a secondary? I know there's an ongoing debate about it. Although there is the chance of infection and oxidation from siphoning when moving to secondary, if I want to age this for 3 months I think I'm better off moving to a 5 gallon carboy with zero headspace than letting it sit in the 7.9 gallon plastic bucket that is permeable to O2 and with air on top of the beer. It's also in my 5 gallon carboy and 7.9 gallon bucket (I split it into two vessels once the lid blew off) and I want to free up the 7.9G bucket for a new batch.

I was thinking 4 weeks in primary, 3 months in secondary. Should I let it go even longer in primary since it's such a big beer and want to make sure I eek out all the points I can get?

Thoughts?

 

[Yooper]

I'm not a fan of long primaries, but I know others do like the yeast character imparted by the long contact time on the yeast cake.

I think four weeks in primary is already overkill by a couple of weeks. If the beer is finished fermenting, and it's clearing, I'd either rack to the carboy and age it or wait until it's a bit clearer and bottle it. I see no advantage to a month or longer in one fermenter, just to move it to another one. If it's done, it's not going to get "doner" sitting on the yeast cake.

I'd probably go with two weeks in the fermenter, and then age in the carboy or keg. If I didn't want to bulk age it, I"d bottle when clear and age in the bottle. Either way is fine.

 

[Homercidal]

Exactly what Yooper says. IF you are using a secondary (Which I would, for a beer this big) let it ferment to completion, then rack to secondary for whatever time you want. It will probably have done everything it needs to do by the time it clears, so when it's clear to your liking, feel free to bottle or keg.

I don't think that careful transfers are dangerous to a beer, but of course, depending on your method, there is some risk of some amount of oxidation. It's best to use Co2 to push, but a lot of people aren't equipped to do that. So the best option is to be gentle and to leave as little headspace as you can in the secondary.

With this style of beer, clarity is great, but not nearly as important to people's perceptions as with a pale beer.

 

[Teromous]

Treat it just like you would any other beer. If it's done fermenting, give it a couple of days to clean up and then move it. Aging in a keg is ideal because you can fill the keg with water, then push it out with CO2 to remove as much O2 as possible which helps fight off oxidation (I never tried this with a carboy). Any leftover yeast will be knocked out of suspension and after you chill the keg and it will come out in your first couple of pours (give or take).

Using a carboy to secondary is purely up to your preference. I find that in higher gravity beers there is a lot of residual yeast that drops out in a secondary over a month or so, which means less dropping out in a keg or bottle. Some will say to just cold crash the primary, which you could also do if you have the means. Again, as you've read on the forums, there is no "best way" to do it...you just find what works and do that.

If you bottle, you could be looking at some additional bottling time if you end up with a high final gravity (osmotic pressure) and higher ethanol content. If you decide not to secondary, just make sure you have a complete fermentation before you bottle. Really you can't plan a fermentation in advance. It just does what it does and you follow along. I have done aging in carboys and aging in bottles, and in the end it comes down to which ever is more convenient for you. Probably the hardest up front is to bottle, but then you don't have to worry about adding yeast back into the beer six months or a year down the line. You also don't have to mess around with purging a carboy, sanitizing an extra carboy, etc.

 

[rjstew]

Thank you all for the feedback. I should have mentioned, I don't have a kegging setup (yet) so unfortunately that's not an option.

Hmm, now I need to decide if I want to bulk age in the carboy or go straight to bottles. I would prefer to not have to add yeast in 3 months when bottling so I may let this go until fermentation is complete in a few weeks and then bottle. I honestly don't care about cloudy beers, I don't cold crash any of my pale's or IPA's anyway, doesn't bother me one bit. Bottling instead of secondary will also free up my carboy for yet another beer instead of having it occupied for 3 months.

 

[Homercidal]

I think big dark beers are the easiest. You don't have to worry about cloudy, they have a wide range of acceptability (IMO) and look awesome in the glass.

I do try to make every beer I know I'm going to give to people as nice looking as possible. Even my black beers. That means a bit more time to clear and/or cold crashing.

I wouldn't worry about not having enough yeast in 1-2 months. The beer won't clear so much you won't get carbonation.