bullfrog wrote:You'll want to flush the keg with CO2 and then burp it (release the pressure-relief valve a few times in quick bursts whilst the CO2 is pumping in) to remove any oxygen from the environment that could cause your brew grief with age.
I'm going to guess, however, that you don't have gas lines, disconnects, bottle or regulator, so unless you can borrow these you may want to consider bottling.
The other option is to prime the keg with maybe 100g dex and allow a secondary fermentation. This will create the CO2 you'd need and then you can just burp the excess pressure off after a week or two.
Hope it turns out a cracker!
Surely there is always a degree of oxidation (detectable by taste or not), in any homebrew (and probably commercial) situation whenever the finished beer is exposed to the atmosphere.
However, I am curious to know others' thoughts on this: when beer is conditioning in a sealed container (keg or bottle) and carbonating naturally, unless the head space is purged with CO2, wouldn't the pressure build-up in the vessel force not only CO2, but any other gasses present, into solution? I suppose in the case of bottles, those expensive oxygen-eating caps should alleviate this. With a keg, a blow-off tube connected to the gas-out would allow the head space to fill with CO2, expelling oxygen without forcing it into solution due to the pressure build-up. After the residual sugars are consumed, the keg is sealed and would have to be force carbonated at the end of the aging period.
Or is the effect likely to be negligible, especially in a big beer like a RIS?