Brett Imperial Stout

[Warthaug]

The recipe looks good - I'm curious to see how the smoked malt turns out with the brett; should be an interesting balance.

As for the yeast amount, even though you're only doing 15L (~4 US gal) you are low. For a high-gravity ale, you need to pitch more yeast per volume, in your case about 400B cells are needed. One 11.5g packet of dry yeast contains ~70B cells when packaged, and you need to assume there will be some loss during transport/storage/rehydration. Technically, you need 5.7 packets for your beer.

That said, because you are using brett, you may be able to get away with less. 2 packets is still a little on the low side, but you may not need to add the full 6.

Bryan

 

[Nico93]

ok!

you think is better 5pack of us05 or a pack of wlp Edimburgh Ale with 10liters starter?


and prefer to use brett lambicus instead of Claussenii? too much attenuation?

 

[Osedax]

Lambicus will go a little further and produce a more assertive brett flavor. I'm not sure if clausenii will go amazingly or horrible with the peat. It has typical wet hay characteristics mixed with pineapple. It also seems to improve the perception of sweetness.

I think I will throw a dash of laphroaig 10 in my brett c CDA to test the theory.

Good luck with it!

 

[dougdecinces]

are you sure? mr malty say that for 15 liters 2 packet are enough

High gravity beers usually require a much higher pitch rate than regular gravity beers. I didn't run any calculations, but just off the top of my head, I knew a beer like that would require around 500 billion cells, give or take. You don't want to mess around with pitch rate on beers this big, lest you run the risk of a stuck fermentation. Since S-05 is so cheap, don't bother being stingy.

 

[dougdecinces]

ok!

you think is better 5pack of us05 or a pack of wlp Edimburgh Ale with 10liters starter?


and prefer to use brett lambicus instead of Claussenii? too much attenuation?

5 packs of US-05 should be fine. And might actually be cheaper than trying to make a 10 liter starter.

 

[Nico93]

ok! I'll use 5pack of US-05

the last think that i have to do before orders the material is between brett lambicus or claussenii!

i'm scared that lambicus took the gravity to low and that claussenii leave the gravity to high (considering the big og)

 

[Warthaug]

Don't forget to rehydrate the yeast first!

 

[sweetcell]

5 packs is way too much. 2 is all that is needed. per the OP's original post, he's making 19 liters (AKA 5 gallons) of 1.103 wort. plug that into MrMalty and...

 

[dougdecinces]

5 packs is way too much. 2 is all that is needed. per the OP's original post, he's making 19 liters (AKA 5 gallons) of 1.103 wort. plug that into MrMalty and...

I use Brewer's Friend's calculator and it says, if you are pitching 1.25 billion cells/ml you need 580 billion. I always pitch at that high a rate when I am dealing with high gravity worts. Even if you are pitching at the baseline recommended value of 0.75 billion cells/ml, you still need 348 billion cells, or 3 packs of yeast. US-05 is $3.80 a packet at my LHBS. I don't know why you would risk a big hassle over $7.60.

If you pitch 0.35 billion cells/ml into an imperial stout, you are doing it wrong.

 

[sweetcell]

you still need 348 billion cells, or 3 packs of yeast.

based on numerous sources, 1 gr ~ 20 B cells so a 11 gr pack is about 220 B. therefore, to get to 348 B you need a pack and a half, maybe 2 to be safe.

sources:
http://seanterrill.com/2011/04/01/dry-yeast-viability/
http://www.mrmalty.com/pitching.php (or http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/dry.html)
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/pitch-rate-lets-talk-yeast-85227/index2.html#post910443
http://forum.northernbrewer.com/vie...sid=8024ffbbbe89aae258dbf78cf25e812c#p1013473
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f163/dry-yeast-faq-441967/
etc.

 

[Nico93]

the yeast is not a big problem (only the sacc) maybe i'll make first a dry stout and after use the slurry, i used this metod with my imperial stout and works perfectly!

is strange how two calculators give very different results! mr malty say 2packet brewer friends calculator say 5 packet!

 

[Warthaug]

Safale claims >6 billion cells per gram of dried yeast; or ~70 billion per 11.5g sachet:
http://www.fermentis.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/SFA_US05.pdf

That is where most of us are getting the 3+ packet number. I would recommend using the manufacturers numbers over those provided by an on-line calculator; calculators can contain errors, or may be based on a different companies standards.

Bryan

 

[sweetcell]

Safale claims >6 billion cells per gram of dried yeast; or ~70 billion per 11.5g sachet:
http://www.fermentis.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/SFA_US05.pdf

That is where most of us are getting the 3+ packet number. I would recommend using the manufacturers numbers over those provided by an on-line calculator; calculators can contain errors, or may be based on a different companies standards.

Bryan

the 20 billion/gr number has been verified by several lab experiments, as noted in the links i provided.

maybe the difference is direct pitching vs. rehydration?

the yeast manufacturers have an interest in you buying 3 instead of 2 packets...

 

[Warthaug]

the 20 billion/gr number has been verified by several lab experiments, as noted in the links i provided.

maybe the difference is direct pitching vs. rehydration?

the yeast manufacturers have an interest in you buying 3 instead of 2 packets...

The last link you provided refutes the 20B/gm number; 20B/gm is observed in rehydrated cultures by hemocytometer (which doesn't determine viability; only net cell numbers). When plated to test for viability, 5-7B/gm is what is recovered.

IMO, with yeast being as cheap as it is, I'd go with more instead of less; even homebrew pitch rates are low compared to commercial pitch rates, meaning even if there is 20B/gm viable yeast per sachet, you should still be OK. But with a big beer, underpitching could cause some real issues.

B

 

[Nico93]

i start reading american sour beer and in the first parte of the book he said that in sour black beer is better to use dehusked malt like caraffa and also is better to use less roasted grain that in a normale beer.
i decided to use more or less 14% of roasted/chocolate grain because i used this percentage in a imperial stout and worked well but now i started asking my self is better to reduce roasted grain and to use dehusked grains...
what do you think about?

 

[Warthaug]

I had read that same claim elsewhere, before the publication of the book (I think Chad Yakobson was the first to describe the over-production of phenols by brett exposed to too much dark malt). I've (somewhat blindly) follow this advice, and generally replace about half of the dark malts with their dehusked equivalents. To date that method has worked very well - I've not once developed phenolic flavours at a level which was unpleasant. I've had beers that were upto 20% dark malts (e.g., SRM's in the 50-70 range) brewed this way that were delicious - i.e. beers containing 10% "normal" dark malts + 10% debittered. As such, I think your approach should be fine.

That said, I've also not experimented much in this area. Likewise, phenol production varies greatly between different strains of brett, so your 14% may be good with some strains but not with others. To be cautious it may be worth avoiding the more phenolic strains on your first attempt.

On a non-brett note, I've found that I enjoy the character of the 50/50 normal/debittered dark malt mix far more than 100% normal malt version - even when brewing conventional porters and stouts. You can really bring out the coffee and chocolate notes without excessive astringency or dryness that often arises when you push these aspects of your malt bill. You may want to try replacing some of the normal malts with debittered just to experience the difference it makes in your beer - with or without brett.

Bryan

 

[sweetcell]

i start reading american sour beer and in the first parte of the book he said that in sour black beer is better to use dehusked malt like caraffa and also is better to use less roasted grain that in a normale beer.

my personal experience backs this up. i've made two brett'ed dark beers, and both took a long time for the roast and astringency to fade to a point where the beer was drinkable (they eventually turned out to be very tasty but they took over a year). after the brett chews through the residual sugars, there is little left to counter the impact of the roast malts. solution: use less roast.

i decided to use more or less 14% of roasted/chocolate grain because i used this percentage in a imperial stout and worked well but now i started asking my self is better to reduce roasted grain and to use dehusked grains...
what do you think about?

i would suggest using less, and mixing regular and dehusked.

 

[dougdecinces]

I know the Tart of Darkness clone from Morebeer uses some chocolate malt. Personally, I have done two dark funky beers: a 100% brett trois porter and a dark session ale with Roselare. Both times I used Carafa II and debitterized black malt and got a lot of my color from dark crystal malts as well. Both beers turned out very well. Neither are what I would call chocolatey, but they both had good roasted malt character.

You can also try cold-steeping your grains and adding them later to reduce astringency. Maybe some cold steeped roasted barley can give you that chocolate/coffee character without much astringency. But I'm just spitballing. Your results may vary.

 

[Nico93]

thanks to all
i'm going to reduce the chocolate malt to 0,4kg instead of 0,5kg and remove the roasted barley and add 0,4kg of the dehusked version
i'll let you know when i brewed it!

 

[Warthaug]

Have fun!

 

[dimkagabber]

Can you please share the results?

 

[smokinghole]

I can share my results.

I brewed a 1.120 beer mashed at 158f and ended up at 14%abv at 1.024 finished gravity. It's awesome in my opinion. It needed force carb to bottle, but it's great. The roast of mine stood up to the increasing sweetness. I say if you try, mash high, use enough roast, and be patient. It took me 9 months to reach 1.024. The roast is important as the hops die off to prevent the beer from tasting too sweet.

 

[Nico93]

i made this test using a part of a bigger batch, i do not remember the numbers perfectly but the og was something about 1120 and the final gravity was around 1015/1020, I didn't like the combo brett + roasty so i aborted the idea to make a bigger batch