RIS with LalBrew Voss Kveik

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Stauffbier

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Have any of you fermented a big RIS with LalBrew Voss Kveik? Any info on flavor profiles, alcohol tolerance, and fermentation temps would be appreciated..
 
Bumping for interest. I'm looking to do exactly this as well. Just bought three packets.

I've heard that you can get away with half a packet for a normal grav beer (maybe less, given the sum total of the info I've seen on Kveik yeasts.) My hip shot assumption is that one pack would do fine for an imperial beer, and given how sturdy it is, you would actually have to push it upward significantly to get any lasting esters out of it. My plan is to just pitch a single pack for a 1.100 or so stout and run it at whatever ambient temperature I have and see what happens. Right now my cellar is sitting at an average of 76 degrees.
 
Only used the farmhouse but it will get up to 13%. Some have had more but 13 is easily doable. I have used a little more nutrient and for aeration i shake the living daylights out of it in a cube until its almost foam. Ferment at 35c and its done in under 3 days. Regarding flavour i find it quite neutral, at least nothing sticks out above the roasted grains. I always use a large starter (decanted) with my high gravity beers to prevent stalling. Getting between 75% and 80% attenuation using aprox 20% inverted sugar.
 
I'll be going about 1.120... I'm not sure if I can hold 95F. I may have to rig a heat source in my fermentation chamber. In El Paso, we generally don't need to heat a fermentation so much as cool one down.. I only have a single stage controller, but I figure I can use a heat pad inside, and just keep an eye on temp manually. At least for the first few days.
 
Yeah, It's weird needing to keep heat rather than cooling your wort during the ferment. The first time I used it I didn't use any heat. Pitched @95 and wrapped the fermenter well with a blanket. It only cooled down to 88* when it finished.
The Lallermand spec sheet says 95* to 104*F "optimal" with 77* min. My recommendation would be to pitch hot (say 98 - 100*F), insulate it well and let it chew. Also set it on a piece of foam or a folded towel so it doesn't lose heat there also.
At 1.120 O.G. I might use the whole pack of yeast just to be sure but that's up to you. Like I said, half a package marched right through my 1.080 wort's. It starts really fast too.
Also, depending on your head space, I would have a blow off set-up ready if you don't use one regularly. I didn't need it but it was very close with a 5gal. batch in a 6gal Fermonster. As always. YMMV. Good luck
Cheers, :mug:
Joel B.
 
I think my biggest concern has been getting fusel alcohols with a gravity that high at such high fermentation temps. I'm not even sure why I want to try making a RIS with kveik, but I'm doing it. Tomorrow is brew day. Here's to hoping I don't waste 33lbs of grain and all the time involved. Thanks for the input, everyone...
 
@Stauffbier There are several other threads about this yeast and I don't remember any body speaking of fusels. Also, "I feel" if that was a problem Lallermand wouldn't recommend the temps that they do. That's little consolation, I understand your concerns.
Best of luck and please report back if you go this route.
Cheers, :mug:
Joel B.
 
Well, brew day is done, and the voss is pitched. It's all in the yeast's hands now. I got my best efficiency ever on a beer this big. My expected gravity was 1.119, and I ended up at 1.123.. Hopefully the Voss can chew it down to a good FG, so it doesn't end up too sweet. I pitched at 93F, and I have a heating pad in the chamber right now, just to make sure it doesn't cool off too much before getting active. I also pulled a 3 gallon parti-gyle which I will also pitch Voss in. That one is still in the kettle, going no-chill.. It's already down to 110F, so I will pitch it soon.
 
I used Lalbrew Voss in a much lower OG Mango IPA and was impressed. I don't think you'll have to use your pad...lots of energy (and heat) released with the fermentation. I can only imagine what will happen with your OG. Please keep us posted...
 
Yeah, I have a blow-off rigged up, as I expect a volcano. Also, I ended up pitching 2 packs. With that gravity, I was a little nervous to go with just one. This yeast really does go against everything I have ever known or learned in 10 years of brewing!
 
I decided to go check on it.... 3 hours since I pitched, and it is already blowing off! Wow!
voss ris.jpg
 
IMG_3157.jpg
IMG_3157.jpg

This was right after pitching. On top of my chamber at 90 ambient. Like ten minutes later, the bubbling was insane. After this the fermentation was crazy....you are in for a wild ride....
 
So this bottomed out at 1.039, which isn’t bad. I was expecting 1.035, so not far off. That is most certainly recipe driven and not a yeast issue. I went heavy on roast this year. Surprisingly, it’s not overly sweet. The hop bitterness and heavy amount of roasted malts have balanced it out very nicely. It clocks in at 11%. Lots of coffee and bitter dark chocolate notes. The most impressive part is how smooth it is, considering I fermented at 95F. I don’t intend to make Kveik my new RIS “house strain”, but I don’t regret giving it a try. After 3 weeks on the yeast, today I transferred it to a freshly dumped Journeyman - Silver Cross whiskey barrel. I’ll keg it in a few weeks. The sample is tasting a treat this evening. Thanks for all the input, friends. Cheers!
 

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Very cool brew ! Keep us posted on the final results. Sometimes its hard to take the decision to make something so different... especialy with a beer involving lots of time like that one but the results can be rewarding. Good job !
 
So this bottomed out at 1.039, which isn’t bad. I was expecting 1.035, so not far off. That is most certainly recipe driven and not a yeast issue. I went heavy on roast this year. Surprisingly, it’s not overly sweet. The hop bitterness and heavy amount of roasted malts have balanced it out very nicely. It clocks in at 11%. Lots of coffee and bitter dark chocolate notes. The most impressive part is how smooth it is, considering I fermented at 95F. I don’t intend to make Kveik my new RIS “house strain”, but I don’t regret giving it a try. After 3 weeks on the yeast, today I transferred it to a freshly dumped Journeyman - Silver Cross whiskey barrel. I’ll keg it in a few weeks. The sample is tasting a treat this evening. Thanks for all the input, friends. Cheers!
Nice to see another El Pasoan here brewing, thats a huge grain bill man, 33 lbs is a monster, did you use any sugar to drive the abv up and slim it down a little?
 
Nice to see another El Pasoan here brewing, thats a huge grain bill man, 33 lbs is a monster, did you use any sugar to drive the abv up and slim it down a little?

Funny, I have met a few El Paso brewers on this forum over the years. One guy, who became a close friend, ended up opening Ode brewing, which is unfortunately now closed.

Yeah, this beer is called Mystical Beast, because of the grain bill and all the work involved with brewing it. I have brewed it every year for about 7 years now, with exception of last year.

In the past I have always used brown sugar to help dry it out a little, but this year I opted for DME, just to see how it performed in comparison. I imagine that is part of the reason my FG is higher than typical. In spite of it finishing so high, it is surprisingly not overly sweet. Thankfully!

It has been in a whiskey barrel for a couple weeks now. I will likely keg it in a week or so.
 
Very cool brew ! Keep us posted on the final results. Sometimes its hard to take the decision to make something so different... especialy with a beer involving lots of time like that one but the results can be rewarding. Good job !

Thanks!

I have done my fair share of experimenting in years passed, and I have dumped a lot of beer over the years, too. I am not in the mindset that I should drink my failures. Life is too short to drink beer I don't enjoy. I have no reservations about dumping if needed. I usually don't take chances with a beer like this one, but for some reason I really wanted to see what the kveik could do with it. The good news is, it tastes pretty darn good. So no loss.
 
You won’t be disappointed, it does it all. I have brewed 9 beers from a barley wine to stout to a fake lager (actualy Krispy not Voss) it has preformed amazingly for all. I am actually planing a utopia style extreme beer using it as the base then super high gravity for anything that is left.
 
You won’t be disappointed, it does it all. I have brewed 9 beers from a barley wine to stout to a fake lager (actualy Krispy not Voss) it has preformed amazingly for all. I am actually planing a utopia style extreme beer using it as the base then super high gravity for anything that is left.
It did a fantastic job. Very clean. No hot alcohol. Just tapped the keg a few days ago.
 
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