Malt Backbone help

To increase malt flavor use a more flavorful base malt and a yeast that highlights malt characteristics. To increase body increase your mash temperature and/or add some more dextrinous malts.

 

Marris Otter malt and/or WLP007 yeast.

 

Often over looked are the proteins from oats, unmalted grains, wheat, etc. I just got some spelt that I'm looking to try.

OP, I'm curious, what's your typical mash efficiency? What are your carbination levels?

 

What is your typical mash temp and yeast?

 

For starters stop using US-05, it does nothing to accentuate malt flavor and it drains beer of body. WLP007/WY1098 is a good suggestion, I also like WLP013/WY1028 and WLP002/WY1968.

If you know the temperature of your beer and the amount of pressure you're putting on it then this chart will tell you how many volumes of CO2 you're pushing in:

http://sdcollins.home.mindspring.com/ForceCarbonation.html

 

On the body problem... how long are you mashing? And are you doing a mashout step, or at least getting your runnings above 170F pretty quickly?

 

Are you using American 2-row as a base malt ?

 

This idea will work (and I would call it a mashout if you leave it in the tun for a few minutes before draining), but 170F water will not raise the wort to 170F. To do that, you'll need to go higher, depending on the amount of grain and water already in the tun, its temperature, and the amount af water you're adding. You can find the sweet spot for a given recipe by trial and error, or better yet, use math. I think the formulae are in 'How to Brew.'

Edit: For this to truly mash out all of the wort, you'd need to add hot water before draining the first runnings.

 

Then I suggest substituting in a portion of more flavorful base malt.

 

Yes. That's an approach that would add some body. Your mash efficiency will be a bit lower, because the wort you're leaving behind in the grains and deadspace won't be as diluted. FWIW, I do most styles this way now.

 

Bottom line: If you want more malt flavor, use more flavorful malt. Try subbing some or all of your domestic 2-row for maris otter, golden promise, munich, vienna, or some other more intensly flavored base malt.

 

I think taking a good look at your water profile will work better than anything else suggested in this thread, no offense.

 

While water chemistry certainly does have an impact on malt flavor, to say that it has more impact than the flavor of the malt you're using seems a bit overstated, no offense.

 

None taken.
But the OP is talking about Imperial Stout where I dare say there is plenty of flavorful malts and mashing at 155. And he is already getting 2nd place in competitions. Time to look at the water.

 

I would also shorten your mash to 30 min at 155F. Also, when you start draining the tun, fire the kettle as soon as you feel comfortable to keep the run off at a high temp. By doing this you will be favoring the alpha enzymes and limiting the beta enzymes activity, which will give you a less fermentable wort.