Attempting 40%+ ABV beer... "Barley Brandy"

Smoking... that's almost exactly what I did.

How would distiller's yeast fair in this equation?

Not very well... I tried it

Cape, I want to thank you for following up on this attempt at doing a 40%. It sounds like you have done what you can. If Dogfish head can dump a 120 on TV then a homebrewer can dump one on HBT, Thanks again for all the information I got from your experiment.

Well... Not dumping it yet.

I am finally going to break down and go the beano route. We'll see if it works. It is the last resort. On one hand, I want it to work for obvious reasons. On the other hand, it would mean Moto had one thought that wasn't ridiculous and I would to admit as much... And I would not enjoy that.

But when you factor in your time and expense being wrong once wouldn't be so bad if it worked.

So are you thinking that when you add the Beano the yeast that's been pissed off at you for the last 3 months is going to suddenly spring into action?

jeepinjeepin said:

But when you factor in your time and expense being wrong once wouldn't be so bad if it worked.

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You're theory is solid.. But... I have to weigh the effort, expense, and then having the beer against my dislike of Moto and even more disliking having to admit he was right about one small thing.

Its a tough call

bottlebomber said:

So are you thinking that when you add the Beano the yeast that's been pissed off at you for the last 3 months is going to suddenly spring into action?

Click to expand...

No, I am gonna try beano and then one last shot of nutrients, O2 and fresh distillers turbo yeast.

... and I'm torn up over whether I want it to work.

Cape Brewing said:

No, I am gonna try beano and then one last shot of nutrients, O2 and fresh distillers turbo yeast.

... and I'm torn up over whether I want it to work.

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Admit it, you want it to fail just so you don't have to say that moto was right.

Cape Brewing said:

You're theory is solid.. But... I have to weigh the effort, expense, and then having the beer against my dislike of Moto and even more disliking having to admit he was right about one small thing.

Its a tough call

Click to expand...

Cape Brewing said:

No, I am gonna try beano and then one last shot of nutrients, O2 and fresh distillers turbo yeast.

... and I'm torn up over whether I want it to work.

Click to expand...

you know you love it

Cape Brewing, I've been reading bits here and there of this thread, and I'm not going to go back and read the whole thing, but are you totally against eisbocking it?

I was thinking that you could thin the beer out with distilled water, then re-activate the yeast or add more yeast in order to make it a more habitable environment for the yeast, and then after the fermentation completes, you could eisbock the beer to remove all of that extra water.

... go back and read the very first post. The whole plan was to make a Utopias clone, and then "eisbock" THAT.

cape's had this, uh, "problem", for awhile. i think he understands his options.

his main problem is that he really likes it right now. and doesn't want to f*ck with that.

the_bird said:

... go back and read the very first post. The whole plan was to make a Utopias clone, and then "eisbock" THAT.

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Ok, so the problem now isn't that the abv is slightly too low. The problem is that there is too much residual sugar, right?

So, I would think he could totally thin it out, ferment more of the sugar out, and then eisbock until it is no longer eisbockable (is that a word?).

okay.

I'll bite. (also not going to read through 54 pages)

how exactly do you Eisbock a beer like that? I get that it's basically freeze distillation, but how to you pull the water out once it's frozen? Does freeze on bottom and you just pour the alcohol out?

also posting so I've got it subbed.

there are a few ways of freeze distillation

one is to rack it to corney keg and start to freeze it. the water will freeze on the sides like a jacket. then, when it's where you want it, start transferring out the remaining beer.

motobrewer said:

there are a few ways of freeze distillation

one is to rack it to corney keg and start to freeze it. the water will freeze on the sides like a jacket. then, when it's where you want it, start transferring out the remaining beer.

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yeah I googled it after posting that.

So you're doing like a partial freeze (waiting for the roachwings like you do with mexican beer) and then pulling from the middle.

sounds easy enough if you have a kegging setup and a freezer available.

Cape, I have 4 bottles of beano that I bought at an auction, I would be happy to send you one. That way you could say "I got this **** for free and tried it " Not because someone suggested it.

funkapottomous said:

okay.

I'll bite. (also not going to read through 54 pages)

how exactly do you Eisbock a beer like that? I get that it's basically freeze distillation, but how to you pull the water out once it's frozen? Does freeze on bottom and you just pour the alcohol out?

also posting so I've got it subbed.

Click to expand...

Go back an issue or two in BYO and they show the process for ice cider.

fkin air lock keeps burpin'.

damn it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Cape Brewing said:

fkin air lock keeps burpin'.

damn it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Click to expand...

Where's Revvy?

Cape Brewing said:

fkin air lock keeps burpin'.

damn it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Click to expand...

AZ_IPA said:

Where's Revvy?

Click to expand...

The cat bumped the carboy?

yeah yeah... I get it but... I regularly shake that fermenter for giggles and I haven't had a single bubble on that thing for weeks. I added the beano, shook it again and two-three days later, I'm getting intermitten burps.

no cats... it is in a sanke and not anywhere where it will get bumped... at least not bumped just before every time I walk by it.

Any reason you used beano instead of amylase?

I could buy Beano 30 feet outside of my office's lobby.

So you added beano and its fermenting. Thats a real downer.

I thought you step mashed up from like 100F for 24 hours or something? Where are the fermentables coming from? Maybe when it's done, again, you can pitch Brett, wait for it to finish, again, and pitch a bacterial culture. You could have it down to .990 in a couple years.

No, just a two hour single infusion at about 145. I think 24 hours would either begin to sour or probably pull a ton of tannins out of the grain.

Nah, I really don't want to do brett. I dont think it would be a good flavor for this beer at all. Same with any other bugs. If this was more "old ale-like" maybe but I think this is too different.

That's funny, when I add beano it tends to slow down the burps.

Having read all 56 pages... are we still the little beer that could... or is she finally on the ropes?

I brewed a 9% stout once, before I really knew very much, and mashed at 156 F. Yep, sweet as kool-aid. I kept it around for a year or so, pushing a half glass on folks every now and then. I finally dumped it. So, I feel yer plight, Cape Brewing.

It is both. I've tried everything to get this thing close to the ABV quitting point of the yeasts I've been using (about 23%). Frankly, I would be happy with anything over 20% and I would declare that as a victory.

I've tried everything... except the dreaded Beano solution and I only say "dreaded" because I get a kick out of pissing off Moto and he is one of a few people who've suggested it.

As stated a bunch of times, I can't imagine the fermentables being the problem but if that is what it is, in the end, great... I'll have the beer I was hoping to make (so far).

I pitched the Beano the other night and like I've been saying over the last few posts, the airlock is bubbling here or there. AZ (and Revvy) are right in that (drum roll)... aaair loccccck activityyyy does not necessarily indicate fermentation. That said, that airlock hasn't budged in a long time and it is burping here or there so I am thinking there might be SOMEthing going on.

I am probably going to add even more nutrients, O2 and some fresh turbo distillers yeast this weekend and THAT will be the last attempt. If it doesn't dry out a bit more after THAT, then... I have to decide what to do with it from there (dump it, make syrup out of it, dump it in the back of PTNs truck without telling him and let it stink to all holy hell after a week or so.... something).

So what's the current gravity on this?

1078 last time I checked

If you do have an asston of unfermentables...

Pull a sample. Dose it massively with beano. If it comes back to life, dose the main batch accordingly and then dump the active sample back in. It wouldn't be quite a 'starter', maybe just a 'bumper'.

If nothing really happens, you're still beano negative on the main batch.

He's been beano negative since Moto suggested it.

(see fourth paragraph, fifth post up)

Copy that. I'm merely suggesting that *if* major unfermentables are present, a *massive* dose of beano would reveal that, instead of a low dose producing an unauthoritative trickle of activity. By pulling a sample and massively dosing *that*, if no significant activity occurrs, then you haven't massively dosed the whole batch.

Having already given the batch a dose, you're, of course, no longer beano negative anyway, and I retract my statement as such, pleading low intelligence.

BTW, if beano *is* the problem-solver, the next problem will be how to stop it before it renders the beer too dry to enjoy. This big o beer, too dry, will have no residual sweetness to balance that wallop of octane, no? Are we entertaining the possibility of a pasteurize? If so, a flash pasteurization would be the way to go. I say: 2 CF wort chillers with some footage of vinyl tubing in between. Fill a boil vessel with hot tap water and heat it to 170 F. Use this hot water in the coolant jacket of the first CF chiller and cold tap water in the jacket of the 2nd CF chiller. The tubing in between would be sized in length to provide the seconds necessary for pasteurization. You'll need 3 pumps to do this, 1 for the 1st CF chiller, 1 for its hot tap water coolant, and 1 for the 2nd CF chiller. If done, I guarentee nobody will be able to top it. How many friends with equipment do you have that can converge on your site to do battle?

The beano is breaking down long chains sugars into short chain sugars. I am guessing that the yeast will honestly poop out due to high alcohol before they consume everything. That leaves high alcohol, simple sugars, and a lack of dextrins, but the Eisbock concentrating will increase the percentage of dextrins bringing body back up....we hope.