Assuming the above is for 23 litres (6 gallons) here is my take in BrewFather for 17 litres.
I’ve rounded numbers a little but the specs are very similar.
This one looks like a good place to start. Key will be using enough yeast. What do they suggest for a water profile?
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The recipe is silent on water profiles, so I don’t know what to suggest. I assume it would be recommended to add some Ph buffering minerals to keep the dark grains from mashing too acidic.
Recommendations & best practices are welcome.
Wow the grain bill is so big that I won’t be able to sparge in my Brewzilla 
It’s going to be a full capacity mash (34L) with no sparge. I’m expecting a low efficiency.
So here is where we stand with the barrel project and the proposed path forward:
The barrel:
One barrel of rhum or bourbon (to begin with. Well decide later if we go with a second barrel with mix ferm)
Eric Paré is in charge of securing the barrel with Olivier
Club pays half the cost, the rest is split between participants (expect 15-20$ each)
Eric will store the barrel in his garage
Volume : 225 litres
The recipe:
Imperial Stout. See recipe proposed by Kurt in thread.
The brewing:
Each participant will provide 15-20 litres of fermented (not carbonated) beer on agreed date
Proposed date to bring your beer at Eric’s place is Saturday march 19th
Please confirm your participation by filling this form:
Happy brewing!
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Fait un double-mash. Ce n’est pas le Brewzilla mais c’est le meme principe.
Imperial stout reiterated mash high efficiency Grainfather brew 4k - YouTube
Ceci est pour modifier le formulaire. Envoie-nous celui pour le completer.
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J’essaye, crois-moi!
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Tout fonctionne maintenant!
Fantastic, count me in! A couple questions:
- Any possibility of a group buy for the grain/hops/yeast?
- Will the fermented beer be sampled before going in the barrel? It could even be fun to assign an informal BJCP score to each contribution
Cheers,
James
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I think the group buy is a good idea, particularly for the specialty malts. I’ll need to do a Mout run for this beer one way or another.
In the last barrel project, we did sample each beer before going in the barrel. We were looking for critical flaws, particularly contaminated beers, that would impart problematic flavours to the project. Beers that were clean but not great could still go in due to the small share they took up of the whole batch.
What’s the deadline on the registration? Can we plan a zoom/teams call once it’s closed to go over the details & questions?
Kurt
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March 19 feels a bit tight. Especially if we want to give ppl time to get ingredients, make the beer, and make sure it’s fully fermented.
As for tasting we could make sure we have extra beer so we could exclude potentially bad beer. Everyone would still get an equal share.
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March 26th? If you brew next weekend feb 5-6, that leaves 7 weeks to completely ferment.
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I’m good with either of those dates. I tend to think erring on the side of more time is a good plan of action, though.
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I love the idea of a group buy. I don’t mind organizing it unless someone else wants to take it on.
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Kurt was kind enough to share a bottle of this beer with me recently and it was delicious. From my understanding barrel-aging it will tend to thin it out, though, at least as perceptions go, so a lot of brewers will aim for something a little heavier/sweeter for the base beer in the hopes the final beer comes out more balanced. With that in mind, I would offer that we might tweak the recipe a bit:
- Bump up the CaraMunich from 0.5 lb to 1lb,
- Push the mash temp closer to 158F/70C, and
- Swap about 4lb of the base malt for Munich
In the end, I think it will be Eric’s call on the final recipe with input from all of us.
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Or maybe work backwards? Decide how long you want to leave the beer in the barrel and how you’re going to deal with the finished product. That would give you a ball park date for when to fill it.
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I was fine with Kurt suggestion : Jamil Z’s Czar’s Revenge recipe.
I’m ok with the tweak you proposed. Like a mention before, this is not a style that I brew.
Regarding the recipe, I was chatting with a friend and he mentioned the following nuances that relate to the type of barrel we would be using:
"In my limited experience working with barrel chunks, rum barrel wood provides more of the sugary/spicy/fruity sort of character, while whisky and bourbon barrels contribute more oaky and vanilla-like notes.
I really like the mouthfeel of creamier stouts with vanilla, so I’d probably use a fair amount of wheat and oats in the grain bill if the beer is destined for a bourbon barrel. I haven’t really had many rum stouts with roastier/astringent notes, it’s my impression that most commercial breweries brew them on the smoother side. But in a whiskey/bourbon barrel stout the effect of barrel aging is so obvious that they seem capable of handling a lot more roasted malts and even slight astringency.
Either way, would be fun to try a mix of darker crystal malts in the recipe. I’ve really enjoyed the results when adding dark candi or date syrup too."
Food for thought.
The thing is I don’t know which type of barrel we will have in 2 months…
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Fair enough. I’m good with Sam’s proposed modification and the ambition for more residual sugars before it hits the barrel.