http://byo.com/mead/item/1336-russian-imperial-stout-style-profile
https://byo.com/stout/item/1337-russian-imperial-stout-tips-from-the-pros
https://byo.com/stories/issue/item/3128-stone-imperial-russian-stout-clone
http://www.themadfermentationist.com/2007/11/courage-russian-imperial-stout.html
This is it: http://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2012/02/1909-beer-style-guide-courage-imperial.html
Note that what looks like "lb" numbers are actually "kg" numbers! So, multiply by
2.2 and you're set. Stone tried to make something similar and used amber malt, so maybe
include some of that
https://byo.com/mead/item/1721-brewing-in-the-stone-age (scroll down.)
Carbonation information http://byo.com/cider/item/1132-master-the-action-carbonation
Grist (combined my preferences from the Stone recipe and the Kris England recipe):
7 lbs Maris Otter (Crisp)
3.0lbs Brown Malt (Crisp)
1.0lbs Amber Malt (Munton's)
1lb 13oz Black Patent (Munton's; seems like *way* too much!)
5 lbs Pilsen Malt Extract
Mash for 120 min @153F using 0.8qt/lb (11 qt water.) Strike with 170F water. Using this water
profile 31/10/59/15/25/50 suggests that I need to add 1.5t chalk (to 5 gallons of water)
to get the alkalinity high enough and a dash of salt.
Will put it back on the stove every half hour to make sure that the temp stays up. Mashout
with 1.5 gallons boiling water. Recirculate most of the wort. Batch sparge with 3 gallons
of 170F water. Expect to gather 7gal wort
70% attenuation would give SG = 1.044.
Boil for 120 min
WLP 013 (or Wyeast 1028) (London Ale)
3oz Fuggle (120 min 5% alpha) (will sub 3 oz NB Leaf, 6.8% alpha but 2014 crop)
2oz Hallertauer (30 min German, Hop union leaf 4.5% alpha, 4.9% beta)
2oz Fuggle (dry hop 5% Hop union pellet)
10/21/15 6:47pm boiled 4 qt double filtered water with 1/2C Briess pilsen DME and healthy pinch of
wyeast beer yeast nutrient for 15 minutes. Pitched WLP013.
10:37pm Some foam has formed already.
10/22/15 7:36am a little more foam
7:19pm Made more starter wort with 4C water, 1/2C DME and 1/2t beer yeast nutrient
10/23/15 7:15pm Made more starter wort, a little more concentrated this time with 4C water, 1C DME,
1/2t nutrient. Starter fermenter isn't terribly active but does smell bready and there is quite a
bit of sediment.
10/24/15 12:00pm began heating 5 gal double filtered water to 170F for mashing. Added 1.5t calcium
carbonate and a dash of pickling salt to adjust minerals.
1:08pm After slowly adding 11qt of 170F water quart by quart and stirring a lot, I began the mash.
Temp read 152F, close enough. Will stir and add heat every 30 minutes. Smells like grape nuts, as
usual, but also smells a bit more "toasty" and even a bit "spicy". It is very very interesting, very
similar to other mashes I've done but also somehow very different.
1:23pm Measured a mash temp in the 140s, so I started adding heat. Bad idea. Got the temp up near
170F! Added 1qt colder water, got the temp down to 156F, hoping for the best. Will stir in 30 min.
2:15pm Stirred a lot, temp reads 162F. This is a problem.
3:20pm Finished mash, temp was down to 152F. Hopefully everything worked.
3:27pm Began mashout with 1.5Gal of boiling water.
3:45pm Began recirculation.
4:00pm began sparge, added 1.5Gal of 175F water.
4:25pm continued sparge with an additional 1.5Gal of 175F water. Used a total of 7Gal of water.
4:56pm Finished sparge, collected a total of 6Gal + 1/2Qt of wort. SG = 1.055! Tastes "oily" and not
very sweet.
5:21pm Added 1 1/2qt water to bring total pre-boil volume to 6.5 gal.
5:55pm added 5 lbs briess pilsen DME
6:08pm Added 3 oz Northern Brewer hops, began 120 minute boil
7:40pm Added 2 oz Hallertauer leaf hops.
7:55pm Added 1 whirlfloc tablet, wyeast beer yeast nutrient, put chiller in kettle
8:11pm finished boil
8:17pm temp at 187F
8:20pm temp at 170F
8:22pm temp at 160F
8:32pm temp at 138F
8:40pm put kettle in cold water (50F) bath to speed cooling. I WAS RUNNING HOT WATER
THROUGH THE CHILLER!
8:52pm Thermometer still reading 90F
9:06pm Transferred wort to fermenter (bottling bucket.) It is as thick and black as motor oil.
9:20pm Got just about 4 gal from kettle. Added 2qt + 2C water, measured OG of 1.10, started
aerating. Wort is so very good. It starts off bitter yet sweet, then evolves to roasty and finishes with
a coffee "dryness". I can't believe how smooth it is. What is amazing is how many layers it
has. Despite all the dark malt and tremendous sugar content, I could taste a hint of hop flavor
way in the back, along with a touch of something that tastes like minerality. It is incredible.
9:45pm Pitched entirety of yeast starter into wort, temp of wort was 74F. Put fermenter in "medium"
temp
room where the ambient temp is 67F. Starter wort smells very yeasty, bready and slightly sour, but
it tastes like nothing I have ever had before. A slight hint of fruit behind an enormous bready
maltiness, along with some bright citrus sourness. It is spectacular.
10/25/15 6:58am Tons of messy foam already, fermentation has begun. Temp is 73F.
2:01pm Foam has started coming out of fermenter! I scooped out the foam and let it subside; it seems
to be beer, not yeasty krausen. I'm not sure why this is happening, but I think I should try to recover
this foam rather than letting it go to waste. Skimming off all the foam in the headspace of the
fermenter (7.8 gallon bucket filled to about 4.8 gallons, so it would be about 3 gallons of foam)
produced about 8oz of beer in a glass. As soon as I was done scooping the foam, more was forming.
Temp is up to 75F. I really wished I had cooled the fermenter further. I will seal the top of the
fermenter and put a blowoff tube that goes into a carboy to collect all the foam and hopefully return
it to the fermenter.
3:00pm Well, the blowoff tube into the carboy didn't work, too much pressure built up and I almost
blew the lid off. Now I am just skimming every 20 minutes but I might try to put the blowoff tube into
the bucket that I am using to collect the foam. This is so bizarre.
3:15pm Skimmed some foam, it was probably 1/3 of the way up into the headspace. Will check again
in 15 minutes to see how the foam has grown. It is starting to look thicker, more like krausen.
4:25pm Foam builds up and starts escaping in about 30 minutes. I tried sealing fermenter again and
attaching a
blowoff tube that I have going into an open bucket. If the pressure in the fermenter isn't so high that
I risk blowing off the top, I will just let the foam accumulate. Temp is up to 76F
8:40pm There is significant pressure pushing up on the bucket cover, but it doesn't seem in danger of
blowing
off. There is less foam coming out of blow off tube than before, but significant carbon dioxide blowoff.
Temperature is up to 77F.
10/26/15 6:45am I fear fermentation has crashed. Temp was down to 72F and when I opened the bucket,
there was very little krausen on top of the fermenter. I skimmed what I could (which was almost
nothing) and then roused the yeast.
6:54pm Not sure that the rousing did much, but fermentation is still very active. There was a lot of
pressure
on the cover of the bottling bucket and the bubbles coming out of the blowoff tube came out with
more violence than I've seen. There was a thin layer of foam on the top of the fermenter,
which presumably is the "krausen" for this yeast strain. The foam that I skimmed yielded a little bit of
yeast in the ball jar, but far more than the foam that I skimmed yesterday. I'm really not sure
what is going on. The temperature has fallen to 69F, but it still is above the 66.5F ambient temp.
I removed the cover to allow oxygen across the barrier, I will see if that improves the vigor of the
fermentation. If this truly is a stalled fermentation, I'll pitch some US-05 to "finish it off".
10:48pm Opening the fermenter didn't really change anything, there is very little foam, really nothing to
crop, but fermentation still seems active. Temp is 69F.
10/27/15 7:54am Temp is 68F, ambient is 66F so the temperature is still a little above ambient. Replaced
the blowoff tube with an airlock, there was 12s between bubbles. Fermentation must be stuck.
5:32pm Temp is 68F, ambient is 66F, 12s between bubbles.
10/28/15 7:05am I got nervous about the slow fermentation to I took a gravity sample. SG = 1.036 after
just 3.5 days of
fermentation! I would be surprised if it got much lower because of the incredibly high mashing temp.
Beer tastes surprisingly smooth already, but it tastes *very* thick and rich, like a brownie. Definitely
shows chocolate notes, but is not nearly as astringent or bitter as I expected, and not as "hot" as
as I would have thought at this stage. There is definitely a sour edge, possibly because of a
rapid pH drop since the water doesn't naturally have enough buffering capacity. I will have to
be careful as I carbonate because of the large amount of dextrines that will probably cause a lot
of foam.
8:01pm 34s between bubbles, temp 67F, ambient is 66.5F
10/29/15 7:45pm 51s between bubbles, temp 66.5F, same as ambient.
11/09/15 6:45pm Racked to secondary, got about 4.5 gal beer. Put carboy in cooler part of basement
where temp is
64.5F. Measured SG=1.033, I was hoping it would be under 1.03 by now, but with the high mashing
temp I'm not surprised. Beer is incredibly thick and dark, it is strongly alcoholic and bitter
with a slightly tart edge, but the tartness isn't overwhelming like it is in some stouts.
It has a touch of fruit on top of the very thick coffee-cocoa-fudge-brownie flavor and a hint of
something
vegetal way in the background. Not as astringent or over-roasted as I expected. It is a
lot smoother than I would expect at this stage, and with some time should be excellent.
1/22/2016 7:05pm Dry hop with 2oz Fuggle pellets (Hop Union)
1/28/2016 7:42pm Bottled today. Got 12 24oz bottles and 21 12oz bottles (which was a pretty good yield
considering all the hop material floating around caused a clogged siphon.
Probably left a bottle or two behind because of all the vegetation floating
around. Should have cold crashed. FG=1.027, SG = 1.10, which is 9.6% and 71%
attenuation, which is perfect. Beer was about 62F when I bottled. Used 16oz
water and 2oz corn sugar. Put bottles in warm room (about 68F), will leave
them there for a week or two. Beer is tremendously thick and jet black. Tastes a little
rough or hot from the high alcohol. Still has some of the thick fudge brownie flavor
and the black malt bitterness doesn't come out until the finish, and oh what a finish.
It lingers on your tongue like a fine whiskey. Anna thinks it has a bit too much
"cherry cola", but I don't really get the cherry flavor. Maybe cola, but it is
subtle. Surprisingly I don't taste (or even smell) any of the 2oz of Fuggles.
This is really an amazing beer. It was so good that I decided to take the half bottle
that was sort of "leftover" and capped it. I will drink it in about a month or so (I
didn't sanitize the cap.)
2/18/2016 7:10pm Moved the bottled beer to the cooler part of the basement.
https://byo.com/stout/item/1337-russian-imperial-stout-tips-from-the-pros
https://byo.com/stories/issue/item/3128-stone-imperial-russian-stout-clone
http://www.themadfermentationist.com/2007/11/courage-russian-imperial-stout.html
This is it: http://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2012/02/1909-beer-style-guide-courage-imperial.html
Note that what looks like "lb" numbers are actually "kg" numbers! So, multiply by
2.2 and you're set. Stone tried to make something similar and used amber malt, so maybe
include some of that
https://byo.com/mead/item/1721-brewing-in-the-stone-age (scroll down.)
Carbonation information http://byo.com/cider/item/1132-master-the-action-carbonation
Grist (combined my preferences from the Stone recipe and the Kris England recipe):
7 lbs Maris Otter (Crisp)
3.0lbs Brown Malt (Crisp)
1.0lbs Amber Malt (Munton's)
1lb 13oz Black Patent (Munton's; seems like *way* too much!)
5 lbs Pilsen Malt Extract
Mash for 120 min @153F using 0.8qt/lb (11 qt water.) Strike with 170F water. Using this water
profile 31/10/59/15/25/50 suggests that I need to add 1.5t chalk (to 5 gallons of water)
to get the alkalinity high enough and a dash of salt.
Will put it back on the stove every half hour to make sure that the temp stays up. Mashout
with 1.5 gallons boiling water. Recirculate most of the wort. Batch sparge with 3 gallons
of 170F water. Expect to gather 7gal wort
70% attenuation would give SG = 1.044.
Boil for 120 min
WLP 013 (or Wyeast 1028) (London Ale)
3oz Fuggle (120 min 5% alpha) (will sub 3 oz NB Leaf, 6.8% alpha but 2014 crop)
2oz Hallertauer (30 min German, Hop union leaf 4.5% alpha, 4.9% beta)
2oz Fuggle (dry hop 5% Hop union pellet)
10/21/15 6:47pm boiled 4 qt double filtered water with 1/2C Briess pilsen DME and healthy pinch of
wyeast beer yeast nutrient for 15 minutes. Pitched WLP013.
10:37pm Some foam has formed already.
10/22/15 7:36am a little more foam
7:19pm Made more starter wort with 4C water, 1/2C DME and 1/2t beer yeast nutrient
10/23/15 7:15pm Made more starter wort, a little more concentrated this time with 4C water, 1C DME,
1/2t nutrient. Starter fermenter isn't terribly active but does smell bready and there is quite a
bit of sediment.
10/24/15 12:00pm began heating 5 gal double filtered water to 170F for mashing. Added 1.5t calcium
carbonate and a dash of pickling salt to adjust minerals.
1:08pm After slowly adding 11qt of 170F water quart by quart and stirring a lot, I began the mash.
Temp read 152F, close enough. Will stir and add heat every 30 minutes. Smells like grape nuts, as
usual, but also smells a bit more "toasty" and even a bit "spicy". It is very very interesting, very
similar to other mashes I've done but also somehow very different.
1:23pm Measured a mash temp in the 140s, so I started adding heat. Bad idea. Got the temp up near
170F! Added 1qt colder water, got the temp down to 156F, hoping for the best. Will stir in 30 min.
2:15pm Stirred a lot, temp reads 162F. This is a problem.
3:20pm Finished mash, temp was down to 152F. Hopefully everything worked.
3:27pm Began mashout with 1.5Gal of boiling water.
3:45pm Began recirculation.
4:00pm began sparge, added 1.5Gal of 175F water.
4:25pm continued sparge with an additional 1.5Gal of 175F water. Used a total of 7Gal of water.
4:56pm Finished sparge, collected a total of 6Gal + 1/2Qt of wort. SG = 1.055! Tastes "oily" and not
very sweet.
5:21pm Added 1 1/2qt water to bring total pre-boil volume to 6.5 gal.
5:55pm added 5 lbs briess pilsen DME
6:08pm Added 3 oz Northern Brewer hops, began 120 minute boil
7:40pm Added 2 oz Hallertauer leaf hops.
7:55pm Added 1 whirlfloc tablet, wyeast beer yeast nutrient, put chiller in kettle
8:11pm finished boil
8:17pm temp at 187F
8:20pm temp at 170F
8:22pm temp at 160F
8:32pm temp at 138F
8:40pm put kettle in cold water (50F) bath to speed cooling. I WAS RUNNING HOT WATER
THROUGH THE CHILLER!
8:52pm Thermometer still reading 90F
9:06pm Transferred wort to fermenter (bottling bucket.) It is as thick and black as motor oil.
9:20pm Got just about 4 gal from kettle. Added 2qt + 2C water, measured OG of 1.10, started
aerating. Wort is so very good. It starts off bitter yet sweet, then evolves to roasty and finishes with
a coffee "dryness". I can't believe how smooth it is. What is amazing is how many layers it
has. Despite all the dark malt and tremendous sugar content, I could taste a hint of hop flavor
way in the back, along with a touch of something that tastes like minerality. It is incredible.
9:45pm Pitched entirety of yeast starter into wort, temp of wort was 74F. Put fermenter in "medium"
temp
room where the ambient temp is 67F. Starter wort smells very yeasty, bready and slightly sour, but
it tastes like nothing I have ever had before. A slight hint of fruit behind an enormous bready
maltiness, along with some bright citrus sourness. It is spectacular.
10/25/15 6:58am Tons of messy foam already, fermentation has begun. Temp is 73F.
2:01pm Foam has started coming out of fermenter! I scooped out the foam and let it subside; it seems
to be beer, not yeasty krausen. I'm not sure why this is happening, but I think I should try to recover
this foam rather than letting it go to waste. Skimming off all the foam in the headspace of the
fermenter (7.8 gallon bucket filled to about 4.8 gallons, so it would be about 3 gallons of foam)
produced about 8oz of beer in a glass. As soon as I was done scooping the foam, more was forming.
Temp is up to 75F. I really wished I had cooled the fermenter further. I will seal the top of the
fermenter and put a blowoff tube that goes into a carboy to collect all the foam and hopefully return
it to the fermenter.
3:00pm Well, the blowoff tube into the carboy didn't work, too much pressure built up and I almost
blew the lid off. Now I am just skimming every 20 minutes but I might try to put the blowoff tube into
the bucket that I am using to collect the foam. This is so bizarre.
3:15pm Skimmed some foam, it was probably 1/3 of the way up into the headspace. Will check again
in 15 minutes to see how the foam has grown. It is starting to look thicker, more like krausen.
4:25pm Foam builds up and starts escaping in about 30 minutes. I tried sealing fermenter again and
attaching a
blowoff tube that I have going into an open bucket. If the pressure in the fermenter isn't so high that
I risk blowing off the top, I will just let the foam accumulate. Temp is up to 76F
8:40pm There is significant pressure pushing up on the bucket cover, but it doesn't seem in danger of
blowing
off. There is less foam coming out of blow off tube than before, but significant carbon dioxide blowoff.
Temperature is up to 77F.
10/26/15 6:45am I fear fermentation has crashed. Temp was down to 72F and when I opened the bucket,
there was very little krausen on top of the fermenter. I skimmed what I could (which was almost
nothing) and then roused the yeast.
6:54pm Not sure that the rousing did much, but fermentation is still very active. There was a lot of
pressure
on the cover of the bottling bucket and the bubbles coming out of the blowoff tube came out with
more violence than I've seen. There was a thin layer of foam on the top of the fermenter,
which presumably is the "krausen" for this yeast strain. The foam that I skimmed yielded a little bit of
yeast in the ball jar, but far more than the foam that I skimmed yesterday. I'm really not sure
what is going on. The temperature has fallen to 69F, but it still is above the 66.5F ambient temp.
I removed the cover to allow oxygen across the barrier, I will see if that improves the vigor of the
fermentation. If this truly is a stalled fermentation, I'll pitch some US-05 to "finish it off".
10:48pm Opening the fermenter didn't really change anything, there is very little foam, really nothing to
crop, but fermentation still seems active. Temp is 69F.
10/27/15 7:54am Temp is 68F, ambient is 66F so the temperature is still a little above ambient. Replaced
the blowoff tube with an airlock, there was 12s between bubbles. Fermentation must be stuck.
5:32pm Temp is 68F, ambient is 66F, 12s between bubbles.
10/28/15 7:05am I got nervous about the slow fermentation to I took a gravity sample. SG = 1.036 after
just 3.5 days of
fermentation! I would be surprised if it got much lower because of the incredibly high mashing temp.
Beer tastes surprisingly smooth already, but it tastes *very* thick and rich, like a brownie. Definitely
shows chocolate notes, but is not nearly as astringent or bitter as I expected, and not as "hot" as
as I would have thought at this stage. There is definitely a sour edge, possibly because of a
rapid pH drop since the water doesn't naturally have enough buffering capacity. I will have to
be careful as I carbonate because of the large amount of dextrines that will probably cause a lot
of foam.
8:01pm 34s between bubbles, temp 67F, ambient is 66.5F
10/29/15 7:45pm 51s between bubbles, temp 66.5F, same as ambient.
11/09/15 6:45pm Racked to secondary, got about 4.5 gal beer. Put carboy in cooler part of basement
where temp is
64.5F. Measured SG=1.033, I was hoping it would be under 1.03 by now, but with the high mashing
temp I'm not surprised. Beer is incredibly thick and dark, it is strongly alcoholic and bitter
with a slightly tart edge, but the tartness isn't overwhelming like it is in some stouts.
It has a touch of fruit on top of the very thick coffee-cocoa-fudge-brownie flavor and a hint of
something
vegetal way in the background. Not as astringent or over-roasted as I expected. It is a
lot smoother than I would expect at this stage, and with some time should be excellent.
1/22/2016 7:05pm Dry hop with 2oz Fuggle pellets (Hop Union)
1/28/2016 7:42pm Bottled today. Got 12 24oz bottles and 21 12oz bottles (which was a pretty good yield
considering all the hop material floating around caused a clogged siphon.
Probably left a bottle or two behind because of all the vegetation floating
around. Should have cold crashed. FG=1.027, SG = 1.10, which is 9.6% and 71%
attenuation, which is perfect. Beer was about 62F when I bottled. Used 16oz
water and 2oz corn sugar. Put bottles in warm room (about 68F), will leave
them there for a week or two. Beer is tremendously thick and jet black. Tastes a little
rough or hot from the high alcohol. Still has some of the thick fudge brownie flavor
and the black malt bitterness doesn't come out until the finish, and oh what a finish.
It lingers on your tongue like a fine whiskey. Anna thinks it has a bit too much
"cherry cola", but I don't really get the cherry flavor. Maybe cola, but it is
subtle. Surprisingly I don't taste (or even smell) any of the 2oz of Fuggles.
This is really an amazing beer. It was so good that I decided to take the half bottle
that was sort of "leftover" and capped it. I will drink it in about a month or so (I
didn't sanitize the cap.)
2/18/2016 7:10pm Moved the bottled beer to the cooler part of the basement.
