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My vanilla bourbon imperial porter

MikeinWA

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Here is my first attempt at this beer.  The final alc% with the Bourbon will be slightly above 12%.  The vanilla flavor took longer to impart than I thought.  This beer needs to age to really blend the flavors but at first taste while kegging this beer turned out much better than expected.  A very complex flavorfull sipping beer.

I am definitely happy enough with this beer to post the recipe.  It's gonna be the bomb when it is more mature.
 

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Very interesting beer!  Is there a commercial example? It's difficult for me to imagine the taste but sounds cool.
 
No commercial sample.  I Just wanted to make a bourbon beer for some time and the vanilla recipe has been on the web in this beer and it sounded like a good additive in a small dose.  The Porter recipe is just my coconut Porter recipe minus the coconut and doubled.

I can't stress how important the yeast nutrients and oxygen are to high gravity beers.  This beer fermented fully in 5 days.
 
Mike,
Can you please check the link on your original post.
This sounds like a very good recipe, and I would like to try it.  But when I open the link I get a list of sample recipes, but it does not contain your Vanilla Bourbon Imperial Porter.  Check to see if there is something wrong with the link, or is it something I am doing?
Thanks
  Tim
 
Hmmm it does bring up the sample recipes.  Try this one.  Oh, I did not bottle this as it would probably never get any fermentation due to the alc content.  I kegged it and will bottle off the keg.
 

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Thank you, that came through a lot better.
Does this recipe really have 18lb 12oz of grain for a 5 gallon batch?
This beer would definitely be loaded with flavor!  Lite beer drinkers should steer clear.
This would be a good brew to have on hand for those co;d winter nights.
Do you have an idea on how long it would take to mature and be at its peak?
 
TMC32

Do you have an idea on how long it would take to mature and be at its peak?

I have a Bourbon barrel porter that I made in 2007. Last year I entered it in a local contest and got second place!. I have 6 bottles left and I will enter them in the same contest this June. I hope to take 1st this year! Like good brewers it gets better with time!
 
Yes it has that much grain.  You could lower the grain a bit and add some extract if the grain does not fit in what your brewing with.  I have done that before.  

High alc beers are really like red wine.  You can drink them early and they can be good or you can wait and they get even better.  I only made 5 gal because I wanted to make sure I wasn't making paint thinner.  Wish I would have made more.

Congrats Bob!  Whats the alc on your beer? I can't see wasting good beer on judges ;)
 
Thanks to Bob & Mike for your responses.

MikeinWA said:
Yes it has that much grain.  ........ High alc beers are really like red wine.  You can drink them early and they can be good or you can wait and they get even better.

I would not want to compromise a good recipe for a special brew by making substitutions for convenience, but just wanted to verify that there wasn't a typo.  That IS a lot of grain.  What do you use for your mash tun?  I know my current Igloo would not handle the nearly 20# of grain.

BobBrews said:
I have a Bourbon barrel porter that I made in 2007. Last year I entered it in a local contest and got second place!. I have 6 bottles left and I will enter them in the same contest this June. I hope to take 1st this year! Like good brewers it gets better with time!

Good luck in taking First Place this year, Bob!
I have been brewing extracts and partials for a couple years, and have just converted to all grain this year.  However, I have been making wine for over 20 years and understand the benefit of patience, especially in complex wines and brews.  Every year I get a pack of Goose Island "Bourbon County Stout", and put it away for future enjoyment.  I have one pack that will be four years old this Christmas, and I plan on popping one for a special holiday treat, then save the rest of that batch for one more year.  Goose Island Brewery recommends a 5 year aging. 

As a side note, Goose Island "Bourbon County Stout" is a special brew, and worthy of some home brew experimentation.  I would be very interested if anyone has had experience cloning this brew, .... or drinking it.

 
 
I have a large igloo and a small one I used to use for my sparge water for the large one.  I just batch sparge now so I used both coolers.

I have made a few high alc beers where the grain bill was larger than I could handle so I substituted a few pounds of grain for extract to make it manageable.  I personally believe that a few lbs of extract is not going to effect the taste.

5 years of aging?  I had a few bottles that have lasted 2 years and they barely made that!
 
MikeinWA

Here is a link to the recipe I used. http://www.northernbrewer.com/documentation/allgrain/AG-BourbonBarrelPorter.pdf Normally I don't keep a beer that long. A fellow brewer gave me a taste of his Bourbon Barrel Beer and it was so mellow I had to try brewing it. A bottle of Makers Mark went into this so it was a expensive beer to make. Maybe that is why I dole it out so infrequently? I tried a bottle last week and it was Soooo Smooooth! I don't know it's ABV? I added Madagascar Vanilla to it by scraping the seeds from inside the bean into some Bourbon. I added the mixture into the secondary.  Good luck!
 
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