Imperial Stout Russian Imperial Stout (2011 HBT Competition Category Winner)

[SeeRoe]

Been brewing a lot of 1.5 gallon batches, thinking of doing the same here.

Figured I could primary for a month and then bottle? They won't be opened for another year after that. What's the benefit of secondary over bottling?

 

[bowserm]

Been brewing a lot of 1.5 gallon batches, thinking of doing the same here.

Figured I could primary for a month and then bottle? They won't be opened for another year after that. What's the benefit of secondary over bottling?

They say it ages better in bulk rather than bottles. I only left mine ijn secondary for a month after 3 weeks in fermewntation. After 3 months in bottles they are really great.

If you are not using any oak or vanilla, you could leave it in primary and transfer directly to bottles

 

[SeeRoe]

They say it ages better in bulk rather than bottles. I only left mine ijn secondary for a month after 3 weeks in fermewntation. After 3 months in bottles they are really great.

If you are not using any oak or vanilla, you could leave it in primary and transfer directly to bottles

The only issue I'm encountering is really no way to ensure 60F for 6-8 months with only a swamp cooler and many other brews in the pipeline. But, I could easily allow for it to sit at room temp (60-68F) for 8 months no problem. Will that cause any issue?

 

[bowserm]

The only issue I'm encountering is really no way to ensure 60F for 6-8 months with only a swamp cooler and many other brews in the pipeline. But, I could easily allow for it to sit at room temp (60-68F) for 8 months no problem. Will that cause any issue?

No issues at all. Mostly just preference. Some will say otherwise though.

 

[TxBigHops]

The only issue I'm encountering is really no way to ensure 60F for 6-8 months with only a swamp cooler and many other brews in the pipeline. But, I could easily allow for it to sit at room temp (60-68F) for 8 months no problem. Will that cause any issue?

I agree with bowserm. Main reason to secondary is to age on wood or add other flavors, while also some claim bulk aging is preferable to bottle aging. But you gotta do what your system resources allow. Aging for 6 months or more in the bottle at room temperature should still produce a vey nice beer. Good luck!

 

[SeeRoe]

I should have asked a better question, sitting at room temp is it better in a bottle or in a secondary?

 

[TxBigHops]

I should have asked a better question, sitting at room temp is it better in a bottle or in a secondary?

As far as I know, 60-68 is an excellent temp range for aging, either in bulk or bottle. Once primary fermentation is complete, I don't see much reason to keep the beer at fermentation temps.

Where do you live? My room temp rarely if ever drops below 72. I'm jealous!

 

[bowserm]

I should have asked a better question, sitting at room temp is it better in a bottle or in a secondary?

I bottle condition all my beer at 68 for 2 and a half weeks, then take them down to my basement where it normally 58-64 degrees

 

[mux11]

This is super dark!!! - got a batch going now and never reached max capacity on my mash tun till this batch!
with this being a 'big' beer would second runnings be good for a lighter beer? or would that not turn out good?

 

[mgr_stl]

I'm going to be adding some vodka that has been soaking with vanilla beans into half of my 5 gallon batch of RIS. Will just be adding it to the bottling bucket. Any suggestions as to how much I should add?

 

[mgr_stl]

I took a gravity reading tonight to see how things were going three weeks into my variation of this recipe. I'm at 1.034 from an OG of 1.102. That puts me at about 8.9% ABV. I was expecting it to finish a little lower. Is this a pretty normal FG, or is it high like I'm suspecting?

I mashed (BIAB) at 153-154 despite my target of 151, which I'm thinking might have something to do with it.

I used Wyeast 1318 and fermented at 64.5F for the first five days and then bumped up to 68F for the rest of the time.

The sample tasted great, but definitely on the sweeter end of things.

Would you guys do anything to try to get it a bit lower, or just call it a day? Was planning on bottling next Saturday (4 weeks after brewing) to bottle age for a few months.

 

[abbysdad2006]

Bottled this last week and added 1/2 pack of safale-05 along with priming sugar, after a week it's ready!! It's amazing!! Thank you for all the help.

 

[bowserm]

I took a gravity reading tonight to see how things were going three weeks into my variation of this recipe. I'm at 1.034 from an OG of 1.102. That puts me at about 8.9% ABV. I was expecting it to finish a little lower. Is this a pretty normal FG, or is it high like I'm suspecting?

I mashed (BIAB) at 153-154 despite my target of 151, which I'm thinking might have something to do with it.

I used Wyeast 1318 and fermented at 64.5F for the first five days and then bumped up to 68F for the rest of the time.

The sample tasted great, but definitely on the sweeter end of things.

Would you guys do anything to try to get it a bit lower, or just call it a day? Was planning on bottling next Saturday (4 weeks after brewing) to bottle age for a few months.

When I did mine, the first month was quite sweet. Originally mine stopped at 1.024 and it was really sweet. It's been 5 months now and it tastes really good. The sweetness kind of goes away.

I have a feeling because yours had a higher OG and FG than mine, yours should do the same. If you're concerned about the FG let it sit a bit if you have the space and an available carboy/fermenter

 

[mgr_stl]

Thanks for the advice, bowserm.

I'm considering pitching some US-05 I have around to get that 1.034 gravity a bit lower. Would anyone advise for or against doing this? If I do, should I just maintain the current 70 degree temperature? Would I want to pitch all of it or just half?

 

[ja09]

Thanks for the advice, bowserm.

I'm considering pitching some US-05 I have around to get that 1.034 gravity a bit lower. Would anyone advise for or against doing this? If I do, should I just maintain the current 70 degree temperature? Would I want to pitch all of it or just half?

You can, but personally I'd let it ride. How does it taste? 1.030 is a good finishing gravity for this recipe, and your og was higher. It has enough roast and bitterness to balance it out and there's a good chance 05 won't do anything.

Remember Imperial stouts should be thick and sweet, but a good recipe is balanced. Most of the highest rated ones finish above 1.040.

 

[D_Nyholm]

This is super dark!!! - got a batch going now and never reached max capacity on my mash tun till this batch!
with this being a 'big' beer would second runnings be good for a lighter beer? or would that not turn out good?

I made a honey brown ale from this recipe. I capped it with a few pounds of 2 row and I believe that was it. Came out above 1.040 but it was a long time ago. Totally worth it to do it if you can.

 

[dergolem]

Hello,

I would like to use this for my first post and say hello to everyone. We are two brewers from Germany, brewed around 30 batches until now and decided to go for this nice receipe two weeks ago.

We directly did a 50l batch (must be something like 10gal) and just substituted 1kg of pale ale palt for 1kg of oats and carafa 2 instead of special b. Regarding hops we used Perle and Hellertauer Blanc as substitute, with exactly the same final IBU.

The mash was ... hard. Hard to stir and hard to lauter, but worked out quite well. We finished with a little bit low on 1.088 (post boil gravity), but just because we first reached 1.110 and diluted with a bit too much water.

While lautering the "foam" on top was absolutely delicious (see pictures). Tasted like sweet, roasty chocolate. We couldn't stop dipping our fingers into it to taste it .

Finally we decided to use a yeast we had on hand, so we went with Safale 05 (with many doubts). But after 4 days of medium activity and 4 more days, we reached a FG of 1.032 today ... should be ok.

Bottling is next week and then aging for 1 or 2 month. So looking forward to post a tasting note in quite a while.

 

[JBone120]

Brewing this today. Heating strike water now. Hooray beer!

Edit - Yeast pitched and in the ferm chamber. A bit too much on the sparge volume, and a long boil lead to an OG of 1.116. this is going to be a huge beer, so looking forward to it.

 

[Brewski_59]

Made this today. Missed my og. At 1.088. I anticipated more boil off, so we ended up with close to 8 gallons instead of 6 at the end. More beer, how could that be bad?

 

[RepealProhibition]

I'm only able to do extract brews with specialty grains for now but I'm going to give this recipe a try this weekend.

I plan on using 10 pounds of light DME and 1 pound of D180. Any tips on the following?

1. Steep specialty grains in two gallons of water at 158F in two separate muslin bags at the same time for 30 minutes. Use two separate bags to increase surface area. At the end of the 30 minutes dip and redip the bags a few times to extract everything possible.
2. Bring water to a boil and add 5 pounds of DME. No additional water added since this is a partial boil.
3. Boil for 60 minutes following hop schedule.
4. Add remaining DME and yeast nutrient for last 10 minutes of boil.
5. Cool to 70F and move to primary fermenter.
6. Top off to a little over 5 gallons and add two packages of rehydrated US-05 yeast.
7. Oxygenate using pure oxygen and my oxygen wand.
8. After 5-7 days add 1 pound of candi syrup to fermenter.
9. Wait 3-4 weeks and move to secondary for 3-4 months of bulk aging.

Any thoughts or comments on changing anything listed above? Would the D-180 be useful? I generally like a fuller body on my stouts but it seems tough with extract.

 

[jevidl]

Marubozo, just wanted to say thank you for sharing this recipe. I pulled out a bottle of it that I made in August of 2012 and it tastes fantastic!

I fermented at a bit high of a temp, my notes from the batch indicate that the porter I made from second runnings as in the mid-70s. The stout was in a water bath, and I think maintained in the low 70s. There's plenty of body to stand up to the extra esters, and 3+ years later I did not notice anything out of balance. This is definitely a recipe to make again.

 

[Wreck99]

I continue to make this brew every year or so. It's a favorite!

 

[ameadrat]

doubled the recipe and made 9 gallons last June. APV10 percent. I am a cooler brewer. Since I'm cheap, I have 2 black canning kettles. a 30 quart and a 20 quart for boiling. Which means, I always am doing a second running. I doubled this recipe to just do 9 gallons instead of 5,
I could have done the recipe straight and did a true party-quile(second running. I would add 2lbs sugar to get the OG up to 1.060 appx. Without the sugar, I would expect around 1.040. I will be making this again in June, I did not record the split kettle OG last time. I would suggest adding 2 lbs of sugar rack it into carboy and add a couple handfuls of your favorite coffee bean(DO NOT GRIND). Will make a nice coffee porter. I already have a pint jar with dark toasted French Oak and Cheap brandy soaking drain brandy off and add the oak with the beans. I did this to the recipe last year, Better than KBS. So I know it will make nice second running.

 

[Brett3rThanU]

I brewed this last year and aged it for about 4 months before starting to drink it. It came out about 10% ABV and it's quite mild for being that high of an ABV. Don't get me wrong, it is delicious, but it seems kind of mild. There's not a lot of roasted malt or coffee flavors I noticed in a lot of RIS. That just simply the way the recipe is designed or did I possibly do something wrong? My FG was 1.020.

 

[ameadrat]

I used this recipe as a base for my Gentleman's Coffee Stout. As hinted at in my last in my last post, I added a 1/2 a cup of Starbucks Verona Coffee and a halve a pint dark toasted French Oak that was soaked for 6 months in cheap brandy and drained brandy back into bottle. I bottled early November and started drinking in December. For me, I loved it but I never tasted it as a RIS. Looking at my notes, the judges quote said:"some coffee and alcohol notes". That would lead me to think your in the ballpark. You could try increasing the roasted or adding some black barley. Either would increase the coffee. The Black Barley changes color. Or throw some coffee beans in it. You could open a bottle of beer put some coffee beans in the bottle then reseal and let sit for a while and see how it changes the flavor.

 

[Brewski_59]

I made this recipe on new years day, with the addition of some flaked oats and barley I forgot to use on a previous batch of milk stout. My final volume was higher than planned resulting in lower OG of 1.088. After 25 days fermenting it's at 1.044. Yesterday I took it out of the fermentation chamber to let it warm up to 70 and roused the yeast.
I'm considering adding some sugar at this point to boost the abv, after all it is supposed to be a RIS. Has anyone done this? My concerns are, it would be too dry, or drastically alter the flavor. Or the yeast (1450) won't restart and I'm stuck with a sweeter beer.

 

[ameadrat]

Thank you I was just measuring a brew and it was stuck at 1.043. I moved the Car boy to my sink area in the cave and measured the area where my CB was sitting. 58 degrees below where it should be. I wrapped the CB in a heating pad and am monitoring the temp.

As for the 1.088, if your final Gravity gets down to 1.020 that still 9 % APPX.

again THANKS FOR THE POST

 

[Brewski_59]

I miss spoke. It was 1.041. But that's only 6%abv😕 so I did add 2lbs of sugar and it's actively fermenting. Let's see how it finishes out.

 

[ameadrat]

My OG was 1.113. I'm stuck at 1.040appx. I'm trying to force it down to 1.020. I don't need more alcohol. So I am using a heating pad to activate the yeast. It is bubbling slowly. I have time on my side. I do not plan to bottle until August or when I need a carboy. Drink December. The yeasts low temp tolerance was 60 and I was at 58 so I am hoping it works down.

you added 2 lbs that should add 20 to 30 points to your OG and make it a big one

 

[Brewski_59]

After a week at 70 deg. Its now at 1.036 tastes like its every bit of the 9% ABV right now. This one will age nicely.