I brewed a barley wine a couple years ago and it has not been aging well. It was great up until about a year, and all the bottles since then have the blood/meaty flavors of autolysis. It was 11% abv. Is there a way to avoid this in the future? I want to make more strong ales that can be aged, but not if this happens again.
Avoiding autolysis in bottle
- Thread starter Brewddah
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lowtones84
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Hmm, that's interesting. I've never had autolysis occur in the bottle, even with beers 2-3 years old. Did you add new yeast for carbonation when bottling?
The_Bishop
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If long term aging is something you're looking to do, you need to minimize the trub in the bottles. Prior to packaging, cold crash and fine. When you're racking to the bottling bucket, make sure you don't get any more trub in susension. When the bottles finish conditioning, there shouldn't be more than a light dusting of yeast in the bottom of the bottle.
lowtones84
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I was actually thinking that adding new yeast might allow more into the bottle and increase the chances/effect of autolysis. I typically don't add new yeast at bottling time either, even with strong beers.
What strain did you use? Perhaps using a highly flocculent strain as well as cold crashing and fining as The Bishop suggested would help out.
What strain did you use? Perhaps using a highly flocculent strain as well as cold crashing and fining as The Bishop suggested would help out.
It was yeast harvested from an Odell bottle, which I believe is some form of German ale. While Wyeast1007 says it's not flocculant, that has not been my experience. That yeast usually drops clear for me, as did this one. I might try finings in the future anyway.
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