Barleywine yeast question

[lxlahr3]

Hey all,

I'll try to sum this up as concisely as possible.

A friend and I brewed a barley wine exactly 10 days ago (OG 1.12). We deviated from the recipe a bit so we don't necessarily have a target FG.

As of today, we're at 1.035, which gives us something like 11.5% abc (when checking the gravity, the krausen had been reabsorbed and there was a very thin layer of bubbles that dissipated soon after the introduction of the wine thief).

We used Wyeast 1056, which as far as I know won't tolerate ABVs above 11%. We also intend to harvest the yeast cake, wash the yeast, and reuse said yeast in the future. We're planning to dry hop in secondary so that we can harvest the yeast more easily.

So the question is this: should we rack to secondary now or later?

We don't want to rack to secondary if there is still a lot going on fermentation-wise (which doesn't seem to be the case), and generally don't mind waiting, but are concerned that leaving the already 11.5% abv barley wine on top of the yeast cake will negatively affect the viability of the yeast we plan to harvest.

What are your thoughts?

Cheers,
Alex & Stephan

 

[JonM]

If you fermented a 11ish ABV beer with 1056, that yeast is toast and I sure wouldn't try to use it again.

Leave it for a while and see how far it goes. At 11.5%, you'll be aging this for a while, so no need to rush.

 

[lxlahr3]

We kind of started figuring that out today. Thanks, John.

A quick follow up- I take it we'll have to add supplemental yeast at bottling to carbonate?

 

[KIAKillerXJ]

I would, yes, just to be safe. I've had mixed results not adding more, depending on how long you bulk condition before bottling.