Russian Imperial Stout

[Cloud Surfer]

It was my first time using roasted grains. I steeped the 500g of Roasted Barley and 250g of Chocolate in 3L of water in the fridge for 24 hours, then added it with 10 minutes left in the boil. I was chewing on grain and tasting samples. The flavour and aroma was amazing.

 

[Cloud Surfer]

I hot steeped the Light Crystal and Dark Munich at 70C for 30 minutes. More sweet, malty liquid to try. Then I bought that to the boil and started adding everything else to the mix with 10 minutes left to run.

 

[Cloud Surfer]

End of the boil with everything in the pot and the EKG hops as well.

 

[Cloud Surfer]

I chilled the wort to 30C and poured it into the fermenter. Poured cold water on top to bring it up to 21L for now. Checked temperature and it was 18C. What a guess. Pitched 4 packets of M42 yeast and then threw in the new TILT for its first run and then buttoned up the fermenter. I've got it set to 18C and will keep it cool for a while as I've heard the M42 can get a bit wild. I'll hold off on the dextrose for a while to. Otherwise it might be like throwing a bucket of chips into a school of piranha.

 

[kadmium]

Looks good, 500 grams of roast barley would give you about 8 points on it's own, so it doesn't surprise me you got extra points. But without seeing your full recipe it's hard to know? Did you not add any of your steeping grains into Brewfather?

 

[Cloud Surfer]

My recipe was in the first post and I was too lazy to re type it. For the grain I had 500g each of Light Crystal, Dark Munich and Roasted Barley and 250g of Chocolate. Interesting what you say about the Roast Barley, I thought seeing as it is not malted, you don't get any fermentables from it, only flavour/aroma/colour. I've got no idea.

I didn't put the steeped grain into Brewfather. I'll throw them in.

 

[kadmium]

I'm not an expert, but I believe roasted barley will still contribute sugar, however I have been wrong many times before. My suggestion would be to add all your ingredients into Brewfather, it knows better than I do!

 

[Cloud Surfer]

I'm not an expert

I don't know, you seem to be doing pretty well.

I'll play around with Brewfather tomorrow.

 

[kadmium]

I don't know, you seem to be doing pretty well.

I'll play around with Brewfather tomorrow.

Don't pump my ego, it's big enough already!

Haha, looks like a tasty brew. Will be good to see how it turns out!

 

[Cloud Surfer]

Haha, looks like a tasty brew. Will be good to see how it turns out!

I have high hopes for this one. I just sacrificed a bottle of RIS from my first batch which has only been in bottle two weeks. I wanted to see how that base recipe worked out. It was good, nothing offensive about it at all despite its age. I think the long primary and conditioning helped. This brew has a lot of extra additions over my first RIS recipe, so I have my fingers crossed.

I put the grains into Brewfather, but it gave a very high OG. So I fudged around with the efficiency factor and a 50% efficiency brought the OG to what I actually achieved. I see Brewfather gives points for the Roasted Barley. So yes, you are indeed an expert.

 

[Half-baked]

I am just suggesting following the recommend guide lines of Fermentis and the like, can save tears at the end of the day.
Answers about yeast and fermentation

Being a bit of a pedant here, but Fermentis don't recommend that people aerate the wort... which is not the same as recommending that people do not aerate.

From the website:
We don’t recommend aerating the wort in normal conditions. The dry yeast has been produced and dried with a specific know-how of the Lesaffre Group, in order to maximize the Ergosterols content of the cells. This allows the yeast to grow/multiply and ferment well.

However, you could aerate the wort in particular cases, for example if you recycle the yeast. There is no difference (for the O2) between Ale and Lager.

My reading of this is that aerating is not necessary, rather than being problematic.

 

[wide eyed and legless]

Being a bit of a pedant here, but Fermentis don't recommend that people aerate the wort... which is not the same as recommending that people do not aerate.

From the website:
We don’t recommend aerating the wort in normal conditions. The dry yeast has been produced and dried with a specific know-how of the Lesaffre Group, in order to maximize the Ergosterols content of the cells. This allows the yeast to grow/multiply and ferment well.

However, you could aerate the wort in particular cases, for example if you recycle the yeast. There is no difference (for the O2) between Ale and Lager.

My reading of this is that aerating is not necessary, rather than being problematic.

That's exactly what I was pointing out.

 

[Half-baked]

That's exactly what I was pointing out.

Cool, just wanted to make sure OP didn't think they did something wrong, just something unnecessary...

 

[Grmblz]

Oh dear, have to disagree, "We don’t recommend aerating the wort in normal conditions" this is a polite way of saying "don't do it"

"However, you could aerate the wort in particular cases, for example if you recycle the yeast" and this is referring to a completely different scenario than pitching their dried yeast.

That's my take on it, as always opinions will vary.

 

[wide eyed and legless]

Cool, just wanted to make sure OP didn't think they did something wrong, just something unnecessary...

Well adding oxygen into a wort where the yeast is not going to use it could be wrong, does the oxygen stay in there? Read some of the posts on Low Oxygen Brewing it isn't easy to get oxygen out of vessels beer or wort.

 

[Half-baked]

I've only seen advice that aerating is unnecessary for dry yeast... and that is consistent with what is on the Fermentis website.

It'd be good to know of any reputable sources that say aerating is detrimental when pitching dry yeast.

 

[kadmium]

Oxygen is used by the yeast during the growth phase to synthesize sterols and unsaturated fatty acids, which they need for healthy growth. Dry Yeast contains yeast that already have these stores, created during the process of making the dry yeast. Therefore, the yeast contain the presynthesised sterols / UFAs and are good for a few 'generations' of cell division.

If you pitch sufficient yeast, oxygen is not needed. Will it do harm to your beer? I don't think there is any sufficient evidence either way, but anecdotally I don't believe it's doing any harm. It's simply not needed, and as such why do it?

Once you are repitching on the old yeast, you do need to oxygenate so that the yeast can synthesise the sterols etc, so yes properly oxygenated wort is important for liquid / washed yeast.

 

[razz]

Brew day was today. That's got to be the best part of the process. Or is it drinking day? I decided to take a few photos this time.

I changed the recipe very slightly. The LHBS ran out of Medium Crystal, so I used Light Crystal instead, and I also decided to up the Roasted Barley to 500g. I decided to increase the batch to 22L, so it was a chance to use some D180 Candi Syrup I was keen to try, so I could maintain my target OG. It has a lovely complex flavour that will complement the RIS well.

Here's a question. Brewfather indicated my OG should be 1.100 without the dextrose which will get added in about 5 days. However it came in at 1.115. That's higher than I was expecting, but I didn't make an allowance for the steeped grains. Does that sound reasonable to get an extra 15 points just from steeping the grains? Anyway given that, I'm going to increase the batch to 23L now. That will get me around 1.123 OG once I add the dextrose. If I can get the FG below 1.028 I will be happy with that.

View attachment 119148

It looks like you have about 2kgs of grain there Cloud Surfer? No doubt that is what would account for the extra 15 points. What yeast are you using?
Edit. Looks like M42.

 

[Grmblz]

I've only seen advice that aerating is unnecessary for dry yeast... and that is consistent with what is on the Fermentis website.
It'd be good to know of any reputable sources that say aerating is detrimental when pitching dry yeast.

You quoted the Fermentis Q&A, which I would call a reputable source (seeing as they make the stuff)
Aerating is unnecessary is not what Fermentis asserts, they quite clearly state "we do not recommend it"

"We don’t recommend aerating the wort in normal conditions" pedant or not how in real terms is this different to
We recommend people do not aerate the wort in normal conditions.

If you want to re-hydrate and or oxygenate/aerate then by all means do it, but to interpret a statement in such a fashion as to support your inclination is fraught with danger.

This advice from Fermentis should be viewed in the context of their products only of course, as different yeast manufacturing techniques will result in different requirements for the use of their products.

 

[Cloud Surfer]

It looks like you have about 2kgs of grain there Cloud Surfer? No doubt that is what would account for the extra 15 points. What yeast are you using?
Edit. Looks like M42.

Seems you’re right. I hadn’t considered I would get so much out of the grains from just steeping.

Yes I used M42. I think it should be a good RIS yeast. I pitched 4 packets and have a spare packet which I’ll use a bit from when I bottle given it will be a couple of months or more until I get to bottling.