PDB - Sled Dog Russian Imperial Stout - Award Winning

Holter · Joined: 07 Oct 2011 Posts: 221 Location: Los Angeles, Ca

One of the most entertaining of the big styles of beer in my opinion. I think this style is really challenging because you don't want to make the beer too dry, otherwise its not nearly as drinkable. On the other side of the equation, it really needs to have a good amount of residual sugar - but too much will make the beer cloyingly sweet. Its a fine line which is made even more difficult with the inclusion of so much dark grain.

For our RIS, I wanted to make the darkest damn beer we could make. You read so much about beers like Dark Lord, Darkness, Kate the Great, etc and while I cant get any of them here in LA what I read about them is that they are all extremely dark, heavy beers. So i figured lets go big and make a beer that can sit down and age for a while.

Here is a picture of the 2012 vintage

This beer won two 3rd places, two 2nd places and one 1st place in competitions last year.

For the 2013 batch, we adjusted the IBUs a bit and split the base malt up from being 100% 2-Row to being 50/50 2row and Maris Otter. With all of the dark malts in this beer there is a lot of bitterness derived from the malts themselves. Our 2012 batch was calculated @ 118 IBUs. I make recipes based off of percentages of grains rather than pounds/oz. Looking at other RIS recipes the dark malt portion of the grain bill was always around 10-20% so I wanted this to be on the high end. Some flaked rye to add some additional mouthfeel and add some spiciness.

5 gallons of this batch is going to be kept as is, most of it bottled for aging. 5 Gallons is going into a whiskey barrel for 4-6 months. 2.5 gallons is going to get dosed with coffee and 2.5 gallons is going to be used in our blending barrel (currently a mixture of Barley Wine and Belgian Dark Strong).

Mash @ 145F for 60 minutes, Raise to 155F for 30 minutes. Mash Out @ 168 for 10 minutes. Made a huge starter for WLP-001. We tried a batch using english yeast but the malt profile goes all out of whack with that yeast - I was shocked at the different flavor profile.

PDB Sled Dog Russian Imperial Stout Batch 4 (2013 Vintage)
13-F Russian Imperial Stout

Size: 18.0 gal @ 68 °F
Efficiency: 65%
Attenuation: 70.0%
Calories: 363.44 kcal per 12.0 fl oz

Original Gravity: 1.107 (1.075 - 1.115)
|====================#===========|
Terminal Gravity: 1.032 (1.018 - 1.030)
|==========================#=====|
Color: 45.78 (30.0 - 40.0)
|================================|
Alcohol: 9.98% (8.0% - 12.0%)
|===============#================|
Bitterness: 95.1 (50.0 - 90.0)
|==========================#=====|

Ingredients:
32.0 lb (37.6%) 32.0 lb 2-Row Brewers Malt - added during mash
32.0 lb (37.6%) 32.0 lb Maris Otter - added during mash
7.5 lb (8.8%) 7.5 lb Roasted Barley - added during mash
4.5 lb (5.3%) 4.5 lb Chocolate Wheat Malt - added during mash
3.0 lb (3.5%) 3.0 lb Crystal 60 - added during mash
3.0 lb (3.5%) 3.0 lb Crystal 120 - added during mash
3.0 lb (3.5%) 3.0 lb Rye Flaked - added during mash
5.0 oz (58.8%) 5.0 oz Northern Brewer (8.0%) - added during boil, boiled 90.0 m
3.50 oz (41.2%) 3.50 oz Magnum (14.7%) - added during boil, boiled 90.0 m

Results generated by BeerTools Pro 1.5.24

**kal** · Posted: Sun Nov 03, 2013 9:11 pm Post subject:

Interesting recipe - thanks for sharing! I've actually never made a RIS, but it's been on my "todo" list for some now... this recipe sounds like a winner!

Kal

Kevin59 · Posted: Mon Nov 04, 2013 2:06 am Post subject:

Wow that's a massive grain bill - 85 lbs!!! How big is your MLT? Looks like you're doing just over a 1/2 bbl?

Looks like a great recipe. I too have never made an RIS but it's on the short list. I was going to do the KTG clone, but permission to copy? Mr. Green

Holter · Joined: 07 Oct 2011 Posts: 221 Location: Los Angeles, Ca

Well last years version was only 12 gallons, so it fit our 26 gallon kettles fine. This years batch i did two mashes. The majority of the mash was done in our electric brewery mash tun. The rest was done in our old gott cooler mash tun. When the mash was done I vorlaufed through the gott for 10 minutes (i dont miss that step...) then i just sparged the main mash tun with the first runnings from the gott cooler.

Go ahead and copy. Remember though that a beer this big will really need time to age. For the first year last years version was pretty sharp, but i opened a bottle two months ago and was blown away at how much it had mellowed.

Good luck! Post results or alterations.

Kevin59 · Posted: Mon Nov 04, 2013 2:39 am Post subject:

fireslayer · Joined: 28 Dec 2012 Posts: 9

Anyone care to scale this down to a 5.5 gal batch size. Would love to do a RIS like this and age in a barrel. Thanks!

**kal** · Posted: Wed Nov 06, 2013 4:29 pm Post subject:

You need to do that in your brewing software based on your system efficiency. (Just like any recipe). We can't do that for you since we don't know your efficiency.

Kal

Ozarks Mountain Brew · Posted: Wed Nov 06, 2013 5:30 pm Post subject:

did this kind of quick but its really close

http://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/82551/pdb-sled-dog-russian-imperial-stout#a_aid=5982783965026

fireslayer · Joined: 28 Dec 2012 Posts: 9

Thanks!

Holter · Joined: 07 Oct 2011 Posts: 221 Location: Los Angeles, Ca

Just use %'s. Also, remember this is a beer that is best after long aging. At first the high % of roast barley can be a bit sharp, but over time itll come together. If you want to drink it sooner you might think about cutting the roast barley up with some uk chocolate, or other malts. For me, i like brewing annuals that can sit and age.

Holter · Joined: 07 Oct 2011 Posts: 221 Location: Los Angeles, Ca

I dont know if any of you watch Brew Dogs out there, but two of my beers are supposedly going to be on the show tonight paired up against commercial breweries in Los Angeles. I was asked to donate beer to the show which I did. One of the two beers is this one while the other one is a sour kriek that I did with two friends called "Kryeke". I have no idea what they are going to do with the beer, but from what I heard it is going to be used during either the beer and food pairing competition or the craft beer virgins segment.

Originally they were supposed to film in the garage which would have been cool for this site, but they canceled the night before we were supposed to shoot.

**kal** · Posted: Thu Aug 28, 2014 12:22 am Post subject:

Very cool. I saw the first season and really enjoyed it!

Kal

Holter · Joined: 07 Oct 2011 Posts: 221 Location: Los Angeles, Ca

That was fun. They said that our beer was barrel aged, but it wasn't - it was actually the exact recipe above i believe. Its too bad they didnt mention our names on the first "sour" beer they paired with food at Fathers Office, but they did mention my buddies @ LA Aleworks who we brewed it with, which is cool.