Bottling barleywine

[h-bar]

I have an 11% American barleywine that's been bulk aging for a little over two months. Today I tasted it, and it's really good! It's smooth and has very little alcohol bite. I know the typical aging time is 3+ months, but it tastes great and I was wondering if I could dry hop and bottle it soon. Thoughts?

 

[Yreval]

Follow your tastebuds, friend.

 

[SeeMont]

Good question. I just bottled a Barley Wine that I have been sitting on in a keg since February. Bottled it last week after force carbonating and chilling for a week. It turned out great and the bottling process with a Beer Gun went smooth. Good Luck.

 

[Slenderman]

this whole thing we do is more of an art than a science, and as such there is no one way to go about this. Do what feels right.

 

[TimelessCynic]

11% you will want to wait longer than 2 months to get it awesome. But it is probably close to amazing now. Short answer is yes and no. Yes dry hop now and bottle and drink if you REALLY want to drink it soon. No if you can hold off for a better product.

My most technical and arguably greatest beer i have made was a 10.7% doppelbock i aged for 5 months. It was like ambrosia. I tapped the keg at a party and people were downing pints of it like nothing. Needless to say, lotsa fun stories about not remembering anything from all of them.

As to dry hopping. You can do it whenever and however.

Keep in mind also that the aging/conditioning process is decelerated in the bottle vs in a batch. To what extent i don't know.

Happy trails.


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[Slenderman]

It should be noted that the level of flavor imparted by dry hopping is not linear, it's more of a sinusoidal curve. If you're going to dry hop and let it sit for 2 months you may as well not do it at all.

 

[Yreval]

It should be noted that the level of flavor imparted by dry hopping is not linear, it's more of a sinusoidal curve. If you're going to dry hop and let it sit for 2 months you may as well not do it at all.

I hope I'm not being too pedantic here, but I'm a little confused. Sinusoidal curves are periodic—surely you don't mean that the "hoppiness" goes through cycles as it ages? Or maybe you meant that the flavor follows the shape of a half-period of a sine wave?

 

[TimelessCynic]

You guys are sinusoidal!


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[JonM]

If an 11% ABV beer is good at 2 months, it will be freakin' godlike at 12 months. Patience.

 

[h-bar]

Alright, I guess I'll wait. But I'm still going to dry hop when the time comes. I've had several commercial dry hopped barleywines, and I've also read that dry hopping isn't a waste of time, even if the beer is going to be bottle aged.

 

[SeeMont]

This is what makes home brewing fun. We can do what ever we want to do. Experiment, Play, Enjoy and Learn. We get to then share our craft here with like minded people. What a joy to do what we do. Cheers.

 

[Slenderman]

I hope I'm not being too pedantic here, but I'm a little confused. Sinusoidal curves are periodic—surely you don't mean that the "hoppiness" goes through cycles as it ages? Or maybe you meant that the flavor follows the shape of a half-period of a sine wave?

yes, that.