Imperial Blonde Ale

On my second batch, made a nut brown ale the first time and it turned out well. Now im on to Imperial Blonde ale and im confused, i let the nut brown ferment about 10 days to 2 weeks. I have seen other sites and you tubes that say the imperial blonde ale should ferment to about 3-4 weeks. Is that correct? Im not doing secondary fermentation, going from the "true brew" bucket to the bottling bucket. Thanks, Alan

I did one about a month ago and fermented for 2 weeks and secondary for a week. Beer turned out really great. Your beer will turn out really clear if you secondary it, just my thoughts. I don't think you would need it in the primary for 3-4 weeks, might pick up too much off-flavors from the yeast.

I disagree about it picking up off-flavors from the yeast after such a short time period. I think you would do fine to leave it in primary for 3-4 weeks, and you avoid the risk of oxidizing your beer doing a transfer. If you are planning to do a secondary because you are adding additional fermentables or something to that effect, it would make more sense to me.

shaffera, there is a lot of debate on when/whether to use a secondary and it really just comes down to a personal preference. You'll find lots of threads about this all over the forum. There is VERY little chance that you'll get any off-flavors due to yeast autolysis by leaving it in primary (Chris White and Jamil Z have done a good job explaining why this used to be an issue and why it is no longer), and the yeast is very good at cleaning up other off-flavors from diacetyl, acetaldehyde, etc with adequate conditioning time.

The best way to know when it is done fermenting is to use a hydrometer. Once it has reached a steady final gravity (gravity doesn't change for 3+ days), then give it another 2 weeks to finish cleaning up and then prime/bottle or keg it.

Secondary is totally a personal choice. I secondary, but I do it to free up my primary and to keep trub out of my bottling bucket.

There is zero way that you are going to get off flavors from the yeast in any sort of reasonable timeframe. I just did a nine week primary and two week secondary on a Belgian golden strong, and it tasted amazing. I've seen six month primaries with similar reports.

The "get the beer off the yeast" is old, outdated advice.

Thank you so much for your quick responses. I really enjoyed my first brew experience and i want to keep it up and make it a hobby that i can consistently do. I kind of understand the secondary fermentaion process but i am just using the standard kit(6 gallon fermentation,6 gallon bottling) i would love to advance if time allows but thats where i am right now. So it sounds like i will let it go a couple more weeks. Do I have to worry about any issue's if I open the lid to take FG measurements?

There should be a good CO2 blanket to protect your beer, so you should be fine. Do you have a spigot at the bottom of the bucket? If so, you could just pour your sample from the spigot while leaving the cover on the fermenter.

the reason it will take longer is the "imperial" part of it. the stronger the beer, the longer it needs to ferment. i did an imperial blonde once. i primaried a month, cold-crashed for a few days, then kegged and lagered for a month or so

Yep, the higher the gravity, the longer it will typically take. Also note that fermentation itself may not take much longer, but a 9% beer will need a lot of age before it tastes good, whereas a 5% beer maybe ready to drink as soon as it is carbed up.