how many of you secondary ferment a stout? I have done it both ways now and didn't really notice a difference. I will be brewing an 11 gal batch and was thinking of letting it sit in the secondary for 2 weeks then bottling half and kegging half. It is a pretty normal stout o.g. of 1.053 and will be using wyeast irish ale 1084. Let me know your thoughts.

I like to think it cleans it up a little, less yeast and all that, but like you I think you could do either. But, I secondary them all for I dont keg, just bottle.

This is my thought: why bother to secondary a stout? After two weeks in primary any detectable haziness for the SRM should be redundant. Secondary is about clarity AFAIC. If I secondary an ale, it is to crash something that will show it. Some would say you are robbing your beer if you spend the time in secondary when it would be better spent in the primary. I'm firmly in that camp!

Those were my thought too radtek, and like I said I have done it both ways and didn't really notice a difference. Do you think 2 weeks in the primary are enough?

The last stout a made went strait to bottle from prim. That's 'cause of me listening to 'tasty brewers'. Turned out great ,saved time, and I'll do it again. This site has helped my beer and will improve on that more, I'm sure.

Probably. Then two weeks+ in the bottle and its only getting better.

You can still see clarity even in the darkest stout. I either do a secondary or an extended primary, like I do for all my beers.

I think the same is accomplished with the same time in primary. But- some sediment always seems to get kicked up when transferring. If one were disposed (I'm not) once fermentation is done they could secondary for a day or so after a good 3-4 weeks in primary to let the remaining gunk settle and stick to the bottom. I guess I really secondary without truly intending to because I'll often keg a beer and let it sit until I get around to drinking it. I get nice clear ales usually.

But (again), If I need something to drink and the ale is cloudy and young- that's the way it gets drunk.

Tru dat, Eug . . . I'm about to finish off the clearest bitter I've made yet, and it was in secondary at 55* for less than two weeks - the temp obviously helped this brew. It would have been lovely cloudy, too . . . and just as 'nearly gone'.

"You can still see clarity even in the darkest stout. I either do a secondary or an extended primary, like I do for all my beers."

Very true. Secondary is not nessicary in my opinion in a stout. However clarity is and can be accomplished through extended primary. Yeast conflicts with the 'acrid' roasted flavor of stout most of all in my experience.

If you can go straight from the primary to bottles then go for it. As long as fermentation is complete, bottling early is a great way to ensure it will carbonate. For me, despite having several hundred bottles, I never seem to have enough. The idea of tying up a batch of bottles for the 6-12 months I want to age them is painful. If I could go back I might buy more bottles instead of more glass carboys.

I hear ya, bryguy - I'm always looking to score more bottles, largely because they don't get returned