Imperial Stout aging

Hello. I just made a Coffee Donut Imperial Stout with an OG of 1.093. I'd like to hear some thoughts on how long I should age this guy. Typically I do 1 wk primary, 2 wk secondary. Or longer.

I'd leave that in primary for several weeks. I would think 5 or 6 weeks minimum, right? Probably even longer.

Someone else with more experience can probably help more.

I do 2-3 weeks in primary and 2-3 months in secondary. I add a packet of wine yeast at bottling.

Sheldon said:

I do 2-3 weeks in primary and 2-3 months in secondary. I add a packet of wine yeast at bottling.

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Why add more yeast? And wine yeast at that? I pitched with 2 packs of yeast. Think I'd still need more?

The additional yeast is to help with carbonation in the bottles.

Also helps to dry out the beer.

On my RIS's I ferment in the primary for about 5 weeks and then bottle. I then age the bottles. They get really tasty at about 6 months. At 12 months they are phenomenal.

I have still yet to figure out when to add more yeast after extended aging. How do you know when you need more yeast?

I brewed an imperial stout extract kit from Midwest and the directions had me add champagne yeast when transferring to secondary. I don't know if I screwed up the priming sugar or if it's due to the champagne yeast, but these bottles are gushers. It's been almost a year since I brewed it and it's a good beer, but way overcarbonated, especially for the style. I'd like to do another, but need to figure out when to add more yeast. Right now I'm doing aging a bourbon barrel porter that I did in primary for 15 days and now it's in a bourbon barrel. I plan to taste frequently, but I'm assuming I won't go over 3 weeks in secondary, so I'm assuming I don't need to add more yeast for that, correct?

BigDaveZJ said:

The additional yeast is to help with carbonation in the bottles.

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But won't there be plenty of yeast still for bottling like all my other beers?

i have heard of people doing champagne yeast at bottling and i have always figured it was a bad idea - champagne yeast is crazy and will find sugars that ale yeast did not - presumably leading to gushers.

i've had luck with nottingham (ALE yeast) carbing a 12% beer but haven't tried higher.

I'd leave it in the fermenter for 2-3 weeks, and then bottle it. I'd let it carb up at room temperature, and then cellar it for 3-6 months or so.

Yooper, don't you think there is some difference between bulk aging and bottle aging? Or do you think it doesn't matter?

mtnagel said:

Yooper, don't you think there is some difference between bulk aging and bottle aging? Or do you think it doesn't matter?

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I think bulk aging is ideal- but it sure seems like lately I've seen a rash of infections in not-fully-topped-up carboys on this forum and that concerns me. I'd rather bottle age most beers and not have a risk like that.

I do bulk age all of my wines, though.

Interesting. Thanks for letting me know.

As Yooper mentioned, I prefer bottle aging over bulk aging. The main reason for that is the fact I don't have a lot of room for fermenters, and my house is extremely hot for at least half of the year. I don't want a secondary taking up space in my fermentation chamber for months. The only problem with bottle aging is you have to be very sure that the beer is finished. As mentioned earlier in this thread, you'll end up with gushers or bombs if you don't. For this reason I leave my big beers in the fermenter for at least 4 weeks, as compared to just 12-14 days for regular gravity beers.

As far as yeast goes, I don't have a problem with bottle conditioning, since I go straight to the bottle. If I bulk aged I would likely pitch a little high gravity ale yeast on bottling day as opposed to champagne yeast. That's just me, though...

Another thing I would reiterate is something Yooper touched on which is ensuring you don't have much if any headspace if you intend to bulk age. In that case I recommend making 6 gallon batches, so after trub loss you end up with enough beer to top off the secondary as high as possible.

Leave it up to 8 weeks in the primary then if you can bear it any longer rack into a secondary. Strong dark beer age better in bulk. I have made some experiment regarding this there is no arguments. The batch that age longer in bulk was way better.

The other advantage is that beer that aged in bulk will be ready sooner in the bottle that a beer that was bottle much sooner.

I once made a dark Quadruple Belgian. After 3 months I bottled half of it and the rest after 6 months. Now 6 months after the last bit was bottled, it is still better than the one that was bottled after 3 months.

I have done blind test with friends and they all picked the one that aged longer as the much better one.

It is a game of patience but it has it's rewards...