new yeast at bottling for barleywine

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JLem

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I'm probably going to bottle a barleywine at the end of the month - I was going to wait until the end of October, but I am getting antsy and also thinking I could use the 3-gallon carboy the BW is currently aging in for another brew.

Anyways, I've got three gallons of BW that I brewed in May. It's been racked a couple of times. I am thinking I should pitch some new yeast at bottling, but really have no idea about how to go about doing it. I assume any cheap, dry yeast would be OK, right? But how much? The whole pack? Does it matter? Also, do I add it to the bottling bucket with the priming sugar and then rack on top?

The OG was 1.102 and current SG is 1.025. This works out to ~10% ABV.

Thanks for any advice/suggestions! :mug:
 
Yes dry yeast is fine.

You may not need to add yeast, but I would to be safe. I would add about 1/2 a package. A whole package is fine too, but it will just result in more sediment. Very little yeast is needed for carbonation.

Just rehydrate it and mix it in with the sugar and rack on top as you described. Someone might have another method they prefer, but this will work fine.
 
Or you could use something like a steel turkey baster and put a small squirt into each bottle of a rehydrated dry yeast. That is the route I took, but either will work.
 
^^^^ what they said.

Something else I have found helps especially with higher grav. brews is to riddle the bottles (pick them up, invert them, and gently rock back and forth) every couple of days. Do this for a couple of weeks. Keeps the yeast in suspension so it doesn't just cake to the bottom of the bottle prematurely without carbonating your tasty beverage.
 
Thanks for the replies...and for the tip about riddling the bottles. I'll be sure to do that.

Any recommendations of level of carbonation for a BW? I know they're supposed to be low, but how low?
 
I assume any cheap, dry yeast would be OK, right?

Would a pack of Munton's Dry ale yeast work ok? I found a pack of it left over from an extract kit that never got brewed. The yeast has been kept in the fridge and the "use by" date is still good. I've heard not so good things about this yeast, so I'm not sure about using it to carb up a 10% ABV barleywine.
 
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