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Advice for a spiced Imperial Stout.
http://www.byo.com/stories/recipeindex/ … nise-stout
What do you think about this? One whole ounce but toasted and in the secondary? If you have experience with it, and it sounds like you do. I'll follow your suggestion. Thought that BYO recipe was interesting though.
It has been a long time since I've used it and when I did it was in a stout. The medicinal comment I made was from others experience. I have only used it once, so I am by no means an expert when it comes to Star Anise. I just researched it prior to using it and was happy with the results.
I'm sure the BYO recipe would make a fine beer.
So if I set my mash rest temp to 150 BeerSmith expects this to come out to 12.1%. If I set the temp to 154 it predicts 11.3%. Bump it up to 157, where I was originally going to mash and it comes up with 10.7... All seems normal, right?
Well if I set the mast temp to 160, where I am now thinking of mashing (I want this to pour like mud), It predicts a 11.4%. I changed the temp by one degree to see where it starts to look strange and from 150-159 it looks as expected. Is there a reason why its telling me at 160 I can expect more fermentables? Or perhaps this is a glitch.
Any ideas?
Im just bumping this thread because the site seemed to be down last night, and I'm sure people didn't see that I posted.
Did you get this behemoth brewed? And if so how did your brewday go? I was kind of wondering how the mash and sparge went and how close you came to hitting your numbers with this large of a grain bill.
I did in fact get this brewed. The brew day was... well.... long. I still don't have my grain absorption figured out and I usually under shoot sparging volumes. So after getting maybe 5 gallons of first runnings I sparged with 2 gallons of water + 1 gallon of the first runnings (I read somewhere that doing this will make sure you have an enzyme presence in case more conversion can be done. I don't really know what to think of it, but it can't hurt). Then I sparged with 2 gallons an additional time but was shy on my volume so I sparged a third time with another 2 gallons. Then hit my volume dead on. If I remember correctly from the time my mash timer ran out to the time I had my volume it was 2 hours.. haha.
Another issue I ran into is i must have calculated my mash volume wrong, or perhaps thought my tun was bigger than it actually is. I needed about an extra gallon of space. Thats a tricky little problem when you already filled your mash tun with water and are doughing in. I had to drain a little of my new born wort to make room, unfortunately. My first runnings were 1.090 so by the end of my sparge to hit my pre boil gravity of 1.090 I needed to add 3lbs of DME. Other than all of that everything went smoothly.
I ended up rounding my special b up to one pound and the wheat up to 2 lbs. I added 2 broken up cinnamon sticks at 10 min, and .5oz of crushed star anise at 5min.
I used an aquarium pump and stone for the first time on this one and I like the results. I also only put about 4 gallons in my bucket fermenter and the rest in 2 separate 1 gallon glass jugs so I didn't have any messy disasters. One of the one gallons had a little over flow coming out of the airlock but nothing too bad. It was sitting in a garbage bag anyways. The fermenter smells like Christmas cookies so I think I did something right haha.
Also just to feed my curiosity I only aerated one of my 1 gallon jugs and left the other alone. The one that I aerated had a much more vigorous ferment, it was the one that over flowed slightly. Also I didn't aerate it for more than 2 or 3 minutes.
I'm considering this one a success. Thanks everyone for the help.
Good to hear things went well and no major problems were encountered. With my 5 gallon mash tun I have lots of experience with being short on volume. I have been looking for a keg to turn into a mash tun, but not many around, at least that I can find. I have been looking at oxygenating systems. The little oxygen bottles are cheap enough, I am just reluctant (too cheap) to spend what they are asking for the regulator. I have been looking for a hardware store solution, but no luck so far.
Keep us updated on how this one turns out.
The aquarium pump tubing and stone from Walmart is under $10 for everything. Put a hepa filter in line and you're good to go. That's ok in my book. No it's not pure oxygen but it's much better and cleaner than shaking or stirring.
If you ever find yourself near Chicago I've got a keg with the top cut off with your name on it. I bought 2 with hopes to convert one into a keggle and sell it to fund the second one.... I got as far as cutting the top off...
Next time I am at Walmart I will take a look at the aquarium pump setup. I try to avoid it as much as possible(not for any philosophical reasons, it is just such a pain to get in and out of), although it is a wonderful place for people watching. 
Thanks for your offer on the keg, but the chance of me getting to Chicago is about the same as going to the moon. Not that I wouldn't like to make it back to Chicago and play tourist, I just find ti hard to get motivated to go most anywhere these days. Making it to the local homebrew shop in Eau Claire seems to be a major accomplishment. I guess if you burn the candle on both ends long enough eventually you end up short on wick.......
I have been thinking about the Aquarium Pump idea -- where did you get the inline filter though? Is that also at Walmart or a Specialty item.
and Ruralbrew - I know what you mean. There are those that hate Walmart for many reasons but mine is just plain hate how crowded and congested it is. But you are almost always rewarded with a laugh - look up 'people of walmart' on the web if you want to laugh or cry or maybe feel slightly grossed out.
I just picked up a Purox torch set on Craigslist. I don't have the tanks yet, but when I do I will have a big oxygen tank. Dual purpose tool! Going to see if I can learn to gas weld stainless. So I can fabricate some brewing equipment.
And yea, "People of WalMart" is ............... special.
Mmm_Beer wrote:
I have been thinking about the Aquarium Pump idea -- where did you get the inline filter though?
http://www.williamsbrewing.com/IN-LINE- … 0C106.aspx
Ah - cool from the Brew shop...
I found one on Midwest and my Local Homebrew shop that is actually half the price and filters down to .023 Micron instead of just .2 (99.99 vs 99.97!?)
Does it really make a difference? I mean I usually just pick up my carboy and shake it like a giant baby bottle (good exercise) and I usually get good, solid ferment.
I had two 1 gallon jugs with the wort that I didn't want to over flow my primary. I aerated one with the pump and fermentation started in a couple of hours. the one I did not aerate started the next morning.
Not proof but, good evidence.
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