Barleywine Recipe Critique

So I am brewing my first Barleywine for an upcoming competition for my homebrew club. I have been putting together a recipe and looking to get a little feedback. It is an extract recipe. I want it to be more on the hoppy side.

10 lbs Light DME
1 lb. 8 oz. Crystal 100
1 lb. Table Sugar
8 oz. Honey

Was going to add the sugar and honey late so it does not get too dry.

4oz. Chinook 60 min
1oz. Cascade 20 min
1oz. Centennial flameout
2oz. Centennial dry hop
2oz. Cascade dry hop

Yeast:
California Ale (WLP001)

Mmmmm....love me a good Barleywine.

What OG are you aiming for with this recipe? Big enough yeast starter is key depending on how big the OG.

I just did a 1.100OG / 1.021FG with 99 IBUs. Primary for 18 days and secondary for a month before cold crashing and kegging before it aged for another month.

Not to throw your direction off, but I love making Barleywine's with a little bit of Rye in them to add some unique character (about 10% of an AG batch).

If you have access to it, "Designing Great Beers" by Ray Daniels has a great write up on Barleywine.

I am aiming for an OG of around 1.088ish. Can I use Rye in an extract brew? If so, would I steep it like I would the crystal? I am planning on making a big starter as well. The competition is not until December and I am probably not going to brew it until mid-summer but just trying to get the recipe together. I want to hold of on brewing it so I don't loose the hoppy characteristics.

Yes, it could be added as a specialty grain along with the crystal. If you have a LHBS nearby, ask if you can taste a couple Rye kernels of grain...yum.

Check out BrewPastor's "Water Into Barleywine" recipe on this site...maybe you could PM him for ideas. He'd be able to help you much more than me.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f74/ag-water-into-barleywine-26724/

I just made a barleywine that after 3 weeks in the bottle is excellent. OG 1.086, FG 1.015, 5 gallon batch. Calulated 87 IBU with this hops schedule:

2.00 oz Chinook [10.90%] (60 min) Hops 57.7 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00%] (15 min) Hops 13.1 IBU
1.00 oz Cascade [5.90%] (15 min) Hops 7.7 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00%] (5 min) Hops 5.3 IBU
1.00 oz Cascade [5.90%] (5 min) Hops 3.1 IBU
1.00 oz Cascade [5.90%] (Dry Hop 7 days) Hops -
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00%] (Dry Hop 7 days) Hops -

I'm not sure if you need a full 4 oz of 60 min chinook since that alone might put you over 100 IBU. The other thing is that seems like an awful lot of dry hops compared to kettle hops. I'm curious to see what some more experienced brewers here think of that.

The main reason I am using the 4oz. for 60 minutes is to get the IBU's up before it sits in the carboy for 5 months.

Dnolan36 said:

Was going to add the sugar and honey late so it does not get too dry.

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doesnt matter when you add sugar, it's always 100% fermentable and will always dry out the beer.

Dnolan36 said:

I am aiming for an OG of around 1.088ish. Can I use Rye in an extract brew? If so, would I steep it like I would the crystal?

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You're at 1.088 without the sugar, as is you're around 1.106. If you're shooting for 1.088ish, cut out 2lbs of DME. Also, rye needs to be mashed, so while you could steep it if you wanted, you won't get any fermentables from it.

dcp27 said:

Also, rye needs to be mashed, so while you could steep it if you wanted, you won't get any fermentables from it.

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In regards to the rye, i'm assuming you'd still get a flavor/color profile from the rye through steeping it? I've been doing AG so long, I can't remember!

surferdrew said:

In regards to the rye, i'm assuming you'd still get a flavor/color profile from the rye through steeping it? I've been doing AG so long, I can't remember!

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As far as I know, yes. it should have the same effect as it would if mashed, just you'll wind up with some starch haze since they won't be converted to sugars. however, rye malt can convert itself so as long as its not steeped too thin, you'll essentially be mashing

What do you use for recipe calculations?

dcp27 said:

doesnt matter when you add sugar, it's always 100% fermentable and will always dry out the beer.



You're at 1.088 without the sugar, as is you're around 1.106. If you're shooting for 1.088ish, cut out 2lbs of DME. Also, rye needs to be mashed, so while you could steep it if you wanted, you won't get any fermentables from it.

Click to expand...

What do you use for calculating recipes

I do most of it in my head, but I have my own spreadsheet and occassionally use brewsmith to double-check things. It seems like you calculated the DME as LME.