First time brewing a russian imperial stout and I did not pitch some irish moss during the boil. I figured that clarity was not an issue with a RIS. Any thoughts or opinion? Was wondering if it would have any adverse effects on my beer?
I don't believe you will have any adverse affects without pitching Irish Moss in an RIS...did you use a chiller of some sort to cool down the wort quickly?? As an aside, did you also oxygenate thoroughly???
I did use a wort chiller. I funneled the wort into the carboy and shook it up for about 10 minutes. I think I got a decent amount of O2 in there. I also used yeast nutrient at the 15 minute mark of boil.
I regularly use Whirlfoc tablets, which are derived from Irish moss. I didn't use on my first RIS and I ended up with a lot of sediment at the bottom of my bottles. I expect less this time. I plan to bottle my second RIS tomorrow. But, then again, my racking technique has improved, so I don't know how much difference the Whirlfoc plays in the final beer.
How long did you leave your RIS in the secondary? I was planning on 4-6 months for mine. Wonder if longer time will cut sediment in bottle?
There will be no adverse effects. It may be cloudier,but who would know on a oil black imperial stout. I am sure it will turn out great.
4 weeks in secondary this time. I think I reached final gravity before I racked to secondary. I will bottle now and hope I have the discipline to allow this to condition for several months in the bottle. Actually, I hope to drink this batch mostly in the fall and winter.
I am going to experiment with bourbon and oak in the secondary. I too am hoping to have it ready by fall/winter. I wish you luck, good sir.
Kettle finnings like Irish moss and whirlfloc do more than just clarify the beer, they also help increase shelf stability, that said your beer will be fine without it.
on a related note, I brewed an ESB today thinking I had plenty of irish moss left over. somewhere between last week's brew session and today, it got lost. is there anything we can do to help clear it up once it's gone into fermentation? extra-long secondary maybe?
Cold crashing in the 30s for a few days works pretty well, but i think that's mainly for dropping out the yeast, rather than proteins and such. EDIT Some people add gelatin to the secondary, but I cannot attest as I have not yet been inclined to try it.
After cold crashing the secondary for three days in the mid 30s there was a nice 1/2" cake at the bottom of the carboy, but still plenty in suspension to carbonate my double ipa. For this big beer, however, I pitched two packets of US-05, a medium floccing yeast, so I wasn't really worried about it not carbing up. Again, I have not tried the gelatin, as I'm not entering competitions yet, but have read of some people repitching a bit of yeast for bottle carbing following an intense gelatin/cold crash/filtering/fining stage.
our OG is at 1.050 and we used one white labs vial of high-floccing english yeast so I'm a little worried about cold-crashing it, but we'll see if we really even need to at the end of fermentation...
