I’m not sure this is a RIS or not, but it fits the style in the Brewers Friend calculator. This started out as an Octoberfest/Marzen with the first four ingredients but then I decided to use up some of the specialty grains and hops I have laying around.
Let me know what you think.
7.5 gallon boil volume
5.5 gallon final volume
O.G. 1.090
F.G. 1.028
ABV 8.17
IBU 54.56
SRM 40.00
8lb American Vienna
2lb German Munich 10L
.5lb Belgian CaraMunich
.5lb Belgian CaraVienne
2lb Flaked Barley
1lb American Chocolate
1lb American Roast Barley
.5lb UK Brown Malt
.75lb Belgian Aromatic
1.75lb Cane Sugar
2oz Brewers Gold 6.3AA 60min Boil
2oz East Kent Golding 5.7AA 15min Boil
WLP820->2L Stir Plate Starter->4L Stir Plate Starter
Probably Mash at 154-156?
Lager yeast… but it’s what I have.
Thoughts?
Thats a lot of black malts, but I suppose it can handle it. Its kind of a kitchen sink recipe but iof using up specialty grains is your purpose then so be it. I do like the flavor of brown malt. I’d maybe back off on the aromatic malt, or even ditch it entirely. And feed your sugar into the ferment after things settle down a bit in the initial fermentation. A lager isn’t out of style for a RIS I think.
Nine grains? That’s among the most complex grain bills I’ve seen. Not saying it will be a bad beer, but with that much going on I doubt you’ll get much if any discernible benefit from each of those grains. Personally I’d simplify, starting with the base malt. In such a dark beer, I’m not sure there’s a benefit to using Vienna and Munich as base malts, unless you just have a lot on hand and nothing else to use them in.
Personally I would ditch the cane sugar and add 4lb of 2 row unless you are looking to dry it out
Is that going to be enough bitterness to balance the malt? Seems like it may be on the low-end for the style profile.
Thanks for the comments/suggestions.
The BU:GU is .60, I do have some Hersbrucker which might bring it up to .7, not looking for too much hop flavor though.
The Aromatic Malt is only 4.6% of the recipe so hopefully it’ll blend well with the rest.
The Sugar… I don’t know… it may dry it out a little but hopefully not too much especially with the roasted malts… might leave it out.
There’s only one way to find out… and that’s to make it. It can sometimes be a pain to use up old grain. What’s the worst that can happen… make an undrinkable beer?
I am sure it’ll be drinkable. I’d add the sugar, typically RIS’s come out with a fairly high FG and the extra ABV helps balance the residual sweetness.
