First Homebrew. Imperial Stout. A Few Questions

Wait three days and check the gravity again. There's no other way to know if fermentation has ceased. BTW, Did you make a yeast starter?

 

um, isn't the gravity supposed to go down? did you miss a zero? otherwise, your wort is getting more dense.

 

Okay. One vial is really not enough yeast for optimal fermentation of a 1.094 wort. You still made beer, and it may still be fermenting (airlock bubbles are not a good quantitative indicator), but under-attenuation (if that's what's happening) is a potential symptom of underpitching. Again, you'll really just need to wait a couple days and see. What was your expected FG, per the kit's instructions?

 

bummer. i was hoping you just invented some sort of new beer "cheese" like substance.

 

If it's at 1.030 and you started at 1.094 it sounds reasonably finished at 8.4% ABV. In the future, get yourself a erlenmeyer flask and some DME and do a starter.

 

Stop. Put down the hydrometer and back slowly away from the fermentation bucket. Do not attempt to reach for any more equipment. Do not attempt to open the lid on this beer again.

1 week isn't enough for ANY beer in my book, let alone a first batch 1.094 imperial stout. Never open your fermenter till at least two weeks have passed. Then at best do a gravity check with a sanitized wine thief, checking it again in three days. Better yet, for a high gravity stout, two weeks is still too short of a time. Beer is about patience, and noobs don't have any. While the beer may have reached FG, the yeast are still cleaning up the by-products of fermentation (and they're still probably busy, since you probably under-pitched).

You must learn patience, Luke, you must feel the force around you.

 

No. All of the sugars in honey are fermentable. Molasses also contains fermentable sugars.

 

I think for someone doing their first beer, it's good advice, but if you pitch the right amount of yeast, aerate properly, and have temperature control, waiting 2 weeks to check your beer, and then another 3 days is kind of a waste. Most of my brews are in the 5% range, and at 3 days fermentation noticeably slows down, and is done at 4 days. Depending on how much time I have, I'll check the gravity and taste it at 5-6 days, then cool it for a week or so and package when I have the free time. I like to go open up the fermenter as little as possible, so I guess I don't see the point of making multiple gravity measurements (I'll make a final one during bottling as well).

As far as the OP goes, I would say that doing an imperial stout (or imperial anything) as your first brew is kind of bold. On the one hand, off-flavors may be masked, which will be good. On the other hand, if the beer turns out not so well, drinking a batch of bad high gravity beer is a lot harder than drinking a bad batch of a 5% porter, brown ale or pale ale. If you want to do a really good big beer, you should probably make sure you have a good grasp on fermentation and sanitation; listening to the Jamil show on the brewing network is a good place to get a lot of info on it relatively quickly and painlessly.

 

I agree that an Imperial Stout isn't really a newbie beer. But at least he didn't put a pumpkin pie in it.

 

Or attempt spontaneous fermentation on a used turkey basting pan.

 

Leave it as mentioned, also that yeast can take a while to finish on a more normal gravity beer, let alone a big one like that

 

In the future, if you brew a beer over 1.08 OG it helps a lot to aerate it again 12-18 hours after pitching for about 30 sec with pure O2. Thicker wort puts more stress on your yeast and they will use up almost all the available oxygen in the initial growth phase.