Ajt012

Recipes 

I want to brew a nice bourbon oaked barleywine but am having some trouble coming up with a recipe. Is the basic equation a ton of base malt and small amounts of specialty malts?
I've been thinking of using marris otter, because i believe it to be slightly more flavorful than 2-row (without any justification may i add). And then i'd like some caramel notes, so i was thinking of going with some crystal/caramel 40L/60L. And some Biscuit malt and Aromatic malt for ****s n giggles.
No idea on the hop bill yet, and was thinking White labs WLP002.
Also not sure how to go about the oaking stage.
Any thoughts?
Thanks in advanced.

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slowbie

Recipes 

You can go 100% base malt if you want. Also, choosing between an American-style or English-style barleywine will determine your hop schedule. American style will have more late additions. Do a long boil though.

My last barleywine was a ton of base malt and a bit whatever non-roasted specialty malts I had on hand (which I think was just crystal 60L, 120L, and maybe Special B. It turned out great. I split off one gallon for bourbon oaking as well, and what I did was cover .4 ounces (or 2 oz if scaled up to 5 gal) of oak chips with bourbon for a couple days and just racked on top of that. Jury is still out as I haven't tried one in a while since there's only 10 of them.

bourgeoisbee

Recipes 

If you're going to do bourbon and oak I'd go with a darker barley wine, so throw in some C60 and maybe a little C120. I'd do the aromatic, but not sure about the biscuit. I'm a huge fan of marris otter in barley wines; regardless of American or English style. For a beer this big you can do 1.5-2oz of oak for a week or so. I usually do 1oz for a week, but to help mellow out the bourbon and alcohol heat I'd add more. Taste it after a few days to be sure you aren't making an oak monster, but oak fades in time if it's a bit too much. I always over hop my barley wines too since I plan to age them for a few years, although I'll start sipping one here and there after 6 months or so.

terrapinj

Recipes 

here's a great podcast from the brewing network on american barleywines

http://s125483039.onlinehome.us/archive/Jamil01-15-07.mp3

bmick

Recipes 

You've got the right idea, lots of base malt, marris otter will be nice, and some small additions of specialty malts. My personal preference is nothing too roasty on the specialty malts, I think my last BW was mainly crystal and some biscuit. If you're looking to use WLP002 there are a few things to keep in mind, one is that you need to make an enormous starter, as it's a low attenuating, highly flocculant strain, and second, it's an English ale yeast, so you're going to want to let it's malty notes shine with a less aggressive hop bill. Maybe some fuggles and some east kent goldings? I like my British BWs in the 30's range for IBUs. Happy Brewing!