By May 2010 I had put 14 batches of various styles and strengths through my new Electric Brewery without any problems. I figured it was time to brew something that would really push the limits as to how much grain my setup could handle so brewing a strong (12-13% ABV) Barleywine seemed like the logical choice.
Up until then the strongest beer I had made was a 9% ABV IIPA that used 28.9 lbs of grain. This Barleywine would push that up to a whopping 39.5 lbs. It would fill my 20 gallon Mash/Lauter Tun up to the 16.5 gallon mark.
I wanted to answer the following questions:
Would the Blichmann false bottom in the Mash/Lauter Tun be able to handle the weight of nearly 40 lbs of grain and 106 lbs of water? (I had no doubts it would, and it did).
How much would the system efficency drop when brewing such a high gravity beer? With really high gravity beers efficiency drops because you're using less sparge water than usual to rinse more grain than usual and end up leaving more sugars behind. This is true of any brewing setup. My 9% ABV IIPA still achieved close to my regular 95% efficency which was nice to see. With this Barleywine the effiency dropped to 86% which is still very high. The end result was a 12% ABV beer instead of the original target of 12.5% since I had assumed my typical 95% efficiency when formulating the recipe. I like the resultant beer so the recipe below is exactly what I brewed. I now know however how efficiency is affected when making a very strong beer so I can compensate in the future (if needed).
This is an American style Barleywine as opposed to English which means using American style hops and hopping to a higher level than the English counterpart. An English style Barleywine will be hopped usually in the 35-70 IBU range while American will be around 50-120 IBU. I aimed for around 100 IBU. While this may seem crazy high (higher than an American IPA), you have to remember that an American Barleywine is considerably more malty than an American IPA. The extra maltiness offsets the increased hoppiness so that it doesn't taste as hoppy as you'd think. In fact, if you were to put a 70 IBU American IPA and this 100 IBU American Barleywine in front of someone and ask them which is more bitter, they'd probably choose the IPA.
I increased the boil time to a full two hours to allow for more caramelization. This boiled off 3.8 gallons. Since I wanted to end up with 12 gallons post boil this mean I needed a full 15.8 gallons pre-boil. That was pretty close to the top of my 20 gallon boil kettle so I'd have to watch carefully for boil overs. Another test of the limits of the system.
Big beers like this need tons of yeast. I pitched 60 grams of Fermentis Safale US-05. That's about 5-6 sachets. Do not underpitch!
Strong beers need some time to age and mellow. My intent was to keg and age this for 1-2 years before I started drinking it. It was kegged in July 2010 and kept at serving temperature. It's interesting to taste how it changed over the first year and a half. The hoppiness mellowed a bit so you want to aim high on IBU knowing this. The malt flavours took on more of a plum/raisin taste as it aged and the 'hot' taste due to the high alcohol content subsided.
A bunch of local brewers who are studying together for their Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP) exam recently got together to discuss the Barleywine / Old Ale style so I provided some of mine for them to compare against many of the commercial styles available. I'm always curious to get feedback on my beers from other brewers so here are some of their comments on this Barleywine after being aged for 17 months:
"Hands down the hoppiest presence of all the BWs - but in a good way. Hoppily assertive up front, but balanced out by the malt, and a lingering, balanced malt/bitter finish."
"It was a great tasting barleywine and probably one of the best we tried last night."
"It was awesome Kal, thanks for bringing it."
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American Barleywine (batch #117)
Size: 12.0 gal (post-boil)
Efficiency: 86.13% (lower than normal, see text above)
Attenuation: 80.3%
Calories: 374.48 kcal per 12.0 fl oz
Original Gravity: 1.112 (1.080 - 1.120)
Terminal Gravity: 1.022 (1.016 - 1.030)
Color: 15.87 (10.0 - 19.0)
Alcohol: 11.98% (8.0% - 12.0%)
Bitterness: 101.1 (50.0 - 120.0)
Notes:
Add 500mg potassium metabisulphite to 20 gallons water to remove chlorine/chloramine (as required).
Water treated with brewing salts to: Ca=109, Mg=18, Na=16, Cl=50, S04=276
(Basically Randy Mosher's ideal Pale Ale numbers with slightly less Sulphate).
1.25 qt/lb mash thickness. Single infusion mash at 149F for a long 120 mins. Mashout to 168F.
60-90 min fly sparge with ~6 pH water. Collect 15.8 gallons in the boil kettle.
Boil for 120 minutes. Lid on at flameout with 0 minute hops, start chilling immediately.
Cool wort to 66F and aerate *very* well (this is a big beer). Ferment at 66-67F for the first week or so, then raise to 70F and keep there for a week. This beer should take a good 2 weeks to ferment out.
Dry hop for 14 days. Secondary until clear. Keg and age for 1+ years.
Package as you would normally. For this beer I recommend carbonating on the very low side (around 1.6 to 1.8 volumes of C02) to minimize carbonic bite and let the hop/malt flavour come through.
If you prefer to use liquid yeast, either of these is an excellent choice as they are the same clean fermenting Chico strain as US-05:
Link Posted: Mon Apr 01, 2013 10:35 pm Post subject:
I brewed this beer two weeks ago. OG ended up being 1.100 and gravity is now 1.030. I started fermentation at 65 and slowly raised it up to 70 during the first week and maintained it at 70 for the second week. I transferred the beer from the bucket to a keg for secondary fermentation and still holding it at a temp of 70. Will I see much more fermentation in the secondary and if not should I add some more US-05 yeast or some champagne yeast or not worry about it?
Joined: 12 Dec 2010 Posts: 2798 Location: Ottawa, Canada
Drinking: Torpedo Extra IPA, Fullers ESB, English Pub Ale, Janet's Brown Ale, Czech Pils, Hopslam, Ruthless Rye IPA
Working on: Electric Hop Stand APA, Belgian Wit
Link Posted: Mon Apr 01, 2013 11:46 pm Post subject:
I do all my fermentation in the primary. With today's good yeasts there's no reason for a secondary fermentation. You end up taking the wort off most of the yeast which does more harm than good. Too late now but I would have left it until it finished. Wait another week and see what happens.
Joined: 19 Feb 2013 Posts: 28 Location: Colorado Springs
Link Posted: Tue Apr 02, 2013 12:38 am Post subject:
kal wrote:
I do all my fermentation in the primary. With today's good yeasts there's no reason for a secondary fermentation. You end up taking the wort off most of the yeast which does more harm than good. Too late now but I would have left it until it finished. Wait another week and see what happens.
Totally agree with this. You should never take it off the yeast until 1) fermentation is finished and 2) the yeast have had a chance to clean up fermentation by-products like diacetyl. After that if you want to secondary for dry hopping, clarification, etc. that's fine but don't interrupt your beer in the middle of fermentation.
Link Posted: Tue Apr 02, 2013 4:03 pm Post subject:
I don't think I should have said "secondary fermentation". The primary lasted at least 14 days and I think it was actually 16 days. There hadn't been any activity with the air lock for 4 days so I think the fermentation was pretty much done. The way I understand it, and please correct me if I'm wrong, is that the yeast falls to the bottom after they die or go dormant so racking off the yeast cake shouldn't affect the fermentation any. I racked to the secondary (keg) to dry hop and let any active yeast in suspension finish cleaning up and not get any of the off flavors from sitting on the yeast cake. That was my thinking anyway.
I guess I should have waited a couple more days and took another gravity reading to be sure fermentation was done. Assuming the two gravity readings were the same, would you have added more yeast or left it at 1.030?
Joined: 19 Feb 2013 Posts: 28 Location: Colorado Springs
Link Posted: Tue Apr 02, 2013 4:08 pm Post subject:
OK, in that case it sounds like you did everything correctly. I would not have added more yeast unless there was some evidence suggesting that the primary yeast crapped out (technical term). In your case, it doesn't sound like that happened so I'd just live with the 1.030 FG. Also, there will still be some yeast in suspension and they might slowly chew through some of the remaining sugar.
Joined: 12 Dec 2010 Posts: 2798 Location: Ottawa, Canada
Drinking: Torpedo Extra IPA, Fullers ESB, English Pub Ale, Janet's Brown Ale, Czech Pils, Hopslam, Ruthless Rye IPA
Working on: Electric Hop Stand APA, Belgian Wit
Link Posted: Tue Apr 02, 2013 4:33 pm Post subject:
Never use the air lock to gauge activity. At the end of fermentation things slow down and you'll barely see any movement and if you're using pails sometimes the c02 will leak out through cracks in the seal between the bucket and the lid. Always use a hydrometer.
You'll still get fermentation when the yeast drops down.
With today's high quality yeasts you will not get any off flavours from sitting on the yeast cake. The opposite is true. You'll get it from not letting it sit on the yeast cake long enough.
Looking at my notes for this batch:
May 27, 2010: 1.112 @ 68F
June 11, 2010: 1.028 @ 72F. Added dry hops to primary.
June 21, 2010: 1.022 @ 72F. Racked to brite tanks. Added gelatine. Kegged a few days later.
It's late now but here's what I would have done: When you measured after the ~16 days you'd have seen that the gravity is really high. This would prompt you to leave it for another 7-10 days and re-measure. The last thing you want to do if it's too high is to rack. Some highly flocculant yeasts like WY1969 will sometimes appear be helped by racking as it stirs it up but you're better just to gently stir the primary (I do this with WY1968 sometimes - with US05/WLP001/WY1056 you don't needto). If after another 7-10 days it's still 1.030 then something is wrong. If it's dropping, leave it longer still. In either case you have to question what went wrong as it probably shouldn't take this long or stalled. You have to start looking at things like:
- was the mash temp right?
- was it aerated properly?
- was enough heathly yeast pitched?
- was the temperature during fermentation right?
- was the temperature during fermentation stable? (Didn't go up/down daily). Often the temp needs to be raised as fermentation slows down as the wort/beer is no longer producing as much heat, and raising the temp slightly near the end (last 20% of gravity points) can help get to the numbers you want.
- etc.
Link Posted: Fri Apr 12, 2013 3:10 am Post subject:
Still reading 1.030. Style guideline ranges from 1.016 - 1.030 so I'm thinking I will just leave it alone and not add anymore yeast. Hoping to serve this on New year.
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