Carbonating RIS

[josh18t]

Hey guys,

A few weeks ago I brewed my first Imperial Stout (OG 1.113) it reached its FG of 1.036 after a week and a week or so later after dumping the trub I added rum barrel chunks and lot of Maple Syrup which fermented out over about 5 days. After that I also added a small mix of vodka with Cacao nibs that I had been steeping for a few months beforehand.

I’m very happy with the taste at the moment, it’s a bit thick but I do like that in an imperial so I plan on leaving it over the Christmas period to get a bit more from the rum barrel chunks before I bottle.

The only thing is, this is my first Big Beer and I’d like to get some low-medium carbonation from bottle conditioning (I don’t keg currently) and I know that I should probably add some yeast to do this properly.

I have bought some T58 yeast and plan to use either dextrose of maple syrup to carb.

What would you recommend as the best practise to add the yeast or calculate how much to use for this?


Any advice would be ace.

 

[IainM]

If it's only a month or two then the yeast should still be viable.

 

[josh18t]

Ah ok that’d be easier.

Is that still true of yeasts like WLP007? It’s defiantly one of the most focculant yeasts I’ve used and I dumped a lot of it out already.

I guess it would be better not to cold crash this beer as well then?

 

[Slid]

Why not get a 250ml pop bottle and put some of the beer and a quarter spoonful of sugar somewhere warm for 10-14 days and see what happens?

If it is still as squeezy as it was on bottling, you need more yeast. If it carbs up, you will OK 2 wks later.

 

[IainM]

Ah ok that’d be easier.

Is that still true of yeasts like WLP007? It’s defiantly one of the most focculant yeasts I’ve used and I dumped a lot of it out already.

I guess it would be better not to cold crash this beer as well then?

I *think* so. I've certainly had no problem with long cold crashes even on flocculent yeasts, but you could do as Slid suggests to be sure. If you really want to, you can pitch some dry yeast for bottling and the pitching rate is well explained in this link (0.2g/gallon, which is more than sufficient). You don't need much - I've got a 20g packet of Safbrew F2 yeast for carbonation after long conditioning, and the packet says it's enough for up to 1,000 litres.

 

[Zephyr259]

I've used lalmand CBC-1 bottling yeast to good effect in a Belgian dark strong and a Barleywine. I'd be wary adding a second strain of beer yeast as it could easily attenuate the beer more than the first strain which would lead to over carbonation. This beer is still young, I only bothered with the cbc-1 after 5 and 10 months ageing in a carboy.

 

[josh18t]

Thanks for the tips.

It looks like it should be reasonably safe to bottle as normal. Hopefully using the maple to bottle won’t cause any additional issues.