Imperial Stout Recipe Critique

Discussion in 'Homebrewing' started by Blootster, Jun 7, 2019.

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  1. Blootster

    Blootster Initiate (0) Dec 3, 2015 Kentucky

    I've been tinkering with a new stout recipe for months, and can't seem to decide on the grain bill and wanted to get your thoughts.

    The inspiration for this beer comes from Side Project's barrel aged stouts (Derivation, BBT, OWK, etc), and the goal for this beer is to be large at 15+ % ABV, with the intent to be aged on multiple types of oak. It should be smooth and velvety, and have layered and intense chocolate (dark and milk chocolate) flavors, with hints of char/coconut/vanilla while being decadent and full. My hope is to build something large enough to withstand long aging periods on oak cubes and possible adjuncts down the road. One of my main concerns is with mash PH and other adverse mash conditions due to the amount of dark grains, and I am starting to lean towards using roasted barley instead of prinz for fear of lacking roast in the grain bill..

    Recipe: LINK

    Batch Size: 5.5 G
    Boil: 180 minutes
    Target OG: 1.145+
    Target FG: 1.045+
    IBU: 70+
    ABV: 15%
    Efficiency: 60%

    Malt Bill:
    25.0 lbs Golden Promise
    8.0 lbs Munich 20L
    2.12 lbs Flaked Oats
    1.7 lbs UK Pale Chocolate 207L
    1.0 lbs American Chocolate 350L
    2.2 lbs Crystal 80L
    0.75 lbs Blackprinz 500L

    Hops:
    Single bittering addition @ 60 minutes - 70 ibu

    Yeast:
    WLP001 step starter

    Water Profile:
    Black Full from Bru'n Water - built from RO/Distilled water
    Calcium: 50
    Magnesium: 5
    Sodium: 33
    Sulfate: 35
    Chloride: 45
    Bicarb: 150+

    Mash:
    (split into 2 x 10 gallon igloo coolers)
    Single Infusion @ 152 degrees - this will be first runnings only, and I feel that fermentability is the primary concerns as plenty of body/sugars should be left after fermentation.

    Secondary:
    Based on the resulting flavor, I plan to combine 1-2 bourbons, multiple types of oak, and possibly vanilla, cinnamon, or other adjuncts
     
    #1 Blootster, Jun 7, 2019
  2. GormBrewhouse

    GormBrewhouse Pooh-Bah (2,111) Jun 24, 2015 Vermont
    Pooh-Bah

    The Munich and oats seem high to me. I have never used Munich 20l but if it is a crystal type malt, I think your beer will b way to heavy. Oats,,,, I use up to 1.5 lbs and often wonder if it's overkill.

    I prefer roasted barley over print any day!
     
    #2 GormBrewhouse, Jun 7, 2019
  3. premierpro

    premierpro Savant (1,060) Mar 21, 2009 Michigan

    Roasted Barley is the signature malt in an RIS. In my recipe I use 1.5lbs along with 1lb chocolate. I spend an hour running off 7.5 gallons to boil down. In this recipe I steep my dark grains in a paint strainer while sparging. 15% is pretty big I hope your yeast can do its job! Good luck!
     
    #3 premierpro, Jun 7, 2019
  4. telejunkie

    telejunkie Savant (1,107) Sep 14, 2007 Vermont

    for mash pH...reasons, unless your water is really hard, I'd leave the crystal and roasted grains out of the mash until the final 15 minutes or so (usually when I start lautering/mashout). You planning to parti-gyle this beast? I mean, you're going to be boiling for 3 hours...may as well have a side boil going if you have, or can get, a second burner going...
     
    #4 telejunkie, Jun 7, 2019
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  5. Push_the_limits

    Push_the_limits Initiate (0) Feb 8, 2018 Antarctica

    I think you should wonder if you want a traditional imperial stout and if you want to add roasted barley, as mentioned. Have you already decided against it?

    Additionally, if you hit your target gravities, that would be an attentuation around 69% resulting in a calculated ABV of about 13%. Not sure where you are getting the 15% from, but I certainly have doubts that wlp001 will be willing to take it down from 1.145 to an ABV of 15%.

    Otherwise looks good to me. I don't see how you could go wrong if you have an open mind.
     
    #5 Push_the_limits, Jun 7, 2019
  6. Blootster

    Blootster Initiate (0) Dec 3, 2015 Kentucky

    I am actually HEAVILY considering the move to Roasted Barley, because it is classic, and I worry without it the stout may lack the roast to cut the edge of sweetness.

    Using Brewer's Friend attenuation calculator, 1.145 OG, 1.045 FG, alternate calc (consider much more accurate in high ABV beer, result is actually 15.89%. I suspect the stout would finish at 1.050, but based on performance in my barley wines (not quite this high OG) I average 69% attenuation so I went around that number.
     
    #6 Blootster, Jun 7, 2019
  7. Blootster

    Blootster Initiate (0) Dec 3, 2015 Kentucky

    I think i'm moving to roasted barley. I may reduce the oats, but at <5% I didn't think it was a huge addition. This Munich is not a crystal as far as I know, just a kilned malt, and is supposed to add depth and richness to the malt complexity.
     
    #7 Blootster, Jun 7, 2019
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  8. Blootster

    Blootster Initiate (0) Dec 3, 2015 Kentucky


    I have never tried cold steeping dark grains. Do you treat your water, or use a specific water source? What temp and time do you target?

    4-5 liters of super yeast will hopefully do the trick :slight_smile:
     
    #8 Blootster, Jun 7, 2019
  9. Blootster

    Blootster Initiate (0) Dec 3, 2015 Kentucky

    Thanks for the tips. I plan to build from RO/Distilled water, and can target (relatively) whatever I need. I am just worried with the sheer amount of dark grain if PH will even be possible to get in range. When you leave those grains out, do you do anything special before/after adding? How do you treat your water in this case?

    And yes we definitely want to partigyle - would be a first time, and I figured with the remaining we could easily get a 5-6 % porter/stout out of it. Any suggestions?
     
    #9 Blootster, Jun 7, 2019
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  10. premierpro

    premierpro Savant (1,060) Mar 21, 2009 Michigan

    Not sure if it is exactly cold steeping as my sparge runoff is around 150 degrees. I do not treat my water. I use my city water run through a charcoal filter.I usually mash my big beers around 151 degrees for 60 min. Take care!
     
    #10 premierpro, Jun 10, 2019
  11. pweis909

    pweis909 Grand Pooh-Bah (3,250) Aug 13, 2005 Wisconsin
    Pooh-Bah

    The second runnings would be imperial enough for me.
     
    #11 pweis909, Jun 12, 2019
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  12. NiceFly

    NiceFly Initiate (0) Dec 22, 2011 Tajikistan

    Looks alright except there is no roasted barley. Your dark kilned malts are close to 20% so I think that is good. Sub the .75 printz with 1lb of roast barley.

    Munich at about 20% looks good to me. I think the highest L I have ever used was 15L at 20%.

    I like a little more chloride in a malty beer so if I brewed it I would up that close to 100ppm. May be overkill but I have definitely noticed enhanced malt flavors with "more" chloride.

    An idea for the 2nd runnings would be to throw a belgian yeast at it. I have done this with wy3787 on the 2nd runnings and you may be surprised some of the flavors that develop in the darker wort.

    good luck
     
    #12 NiceFly, Jun 15, 2019
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  13. Blootster

    Blootster Initiate (0) Dec 3, 2015 Kentucky

    Thanks for the details. I updated the recipe to sub in roasted barley, reduce Munich quantity and lovibond, and increase golden promise.

    How do you go about increasing chloride in your water? I use gypsum, calcium chloride, and baking soda. Finding it hard to increase hardness and maintain my other minerals correctly
     
    #13 Blootster, Jun 18, 2019
  14. warchez

    warchez Zealot (545) Oct 19, 2004 Massachusetts

    You need to sub some of the gypsum with the CaCl to increase total chloride without upsetting total hardness (i.e calcium).
     
    #14 warchez, Jun 18, 2019
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  15. telejunkie

    telejunkie Savant (1,107) Sep 14, 2007 Vermont

    Don't use the Brewer's Friend alternate ABV calculator...it's got a flaw with it. I can't remember exactly now, but went through this routine a few years ago and found it's error (think same with their color calculator as well). Actual ABV of the beer with those OG/FG would be more like 13.4%. @VikeMan maybe able to better speak to this...but I remember with color calculation (I'm pretty sure it was BF's color calculation) that is per grain calculated, then added together when you're suppose to add together then calculate.
     
    #15 telejunkie, Jun 18, 2019
  16. VikeMan

    VikeMan Grand Pooh-Bah (3,067) Jul 12, 2009 Pennsylvania
    Pooh-Bah

    BrewCipher has two ABV calculations in it. One "standard," and one that is (I think) essentially the same as the alternate calculation at Brewer's Friend. I have been contacted by two different pro brewers who have sent their high ABV beers for lab analysis, and in both cases the standard calculation was much closer to reality than the alternate calculation (which is supposed to be especially good for big beers). As a result, I grayed out the alternate calculation in BrewCipher. It's still there for users who want it, but it's grayed to make users stop and think, and the mouse-over pop-up help has a caveat similar to what I just wrote.

    I don't know anything about Brewer's Friend's color calcs, and haven't compared, so I can't speak to that.
     
    #16 VikeMan, Jun 18, 2019
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  17. telejunkie

    telejunkie Savant (1,107) Sep 14, 2007 Vermont

    I think I remember now...the Plato to SG conversion calculation that was used was flawed...iirc. So believe the calculation is fine if you stick in Plato, but when you convert to SG, those numbers were off the further the beer deviates from 1.040....something like that.

    Correction...if there were any color calculation errors on BF, it has since been corrected, so disregard that statement. But let's say if you input a basic porter recipe to a calculator and it spits out like 50 SRM, then it's most likely an error as I described where Morey's equation is done on a grain-by-grain basis instead of an entire grain bill calculation...order of operations problems
     
    #17 telejunkie, Jun 18, 2019
    Last edited: Jun 18, 2019
  18. NiceFly

    NiceFly Initiate (0) Dec 22, 2011 Tajikistan

    What warchez said, use some CaCl2.
     
    #18 NiceFly, Jun 18, 2019
  19. BeerDunson

    BeerDunson Zealot (516) Jul 20, 2012 Ohio
    Trader

    Did you brew yet? If so how did it turn out? Looking to do something similar
     
    #19 BeerDunson, Aug 21, 2019
  20. hoptualBrew

    hoptualBrew Initiate (0) May 29, 2011 Florida


    Did you brew the tweaked recipe?


    Some things I've had success with:

    Double Mash but use runnings of 1st mash as strike liquor for the 2nd mash. Sparge both mashes to rinse sugars. I just did a 1.132 stout like this and got 78% efficiency for the amount of wort produced with the amount of grain I used.
    Use WLP090 (a lot of yeast)
    Gravity going into barrels should be 1.060+

    Also, you can feed the fermenting beer daily with dextrose additions to get alcohol up. Bertus Brewery blog has a post on this with his Dogfish Head 120 min clone recipe.

    Would be interested to hear how this came out. Cheers!
     
    #20 hoptualBrew, Sep 19, 2019
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