Brewed my First Barleywine

[brewpool]

Just got done brewing two 5.5 gal batches. An English Barleywine (recipe below) and a White IPA. I read up on typical issues encountered with brewing a barleywine so I felt pretty prepared. I lowered my typical efficiency by about 10% and purposely targeted a higher gravity than desired so I could dilute it worst case. I prepared a big old 2L yeast starter last night and that bad boy went nuts!

I use a 52 qt Coleman Xtreme as a mash tun and that sucker was full with about 25 lbs of grain and 7.5 gallons of strike water. Decided to mash at 149 F and mashed for 75 mins to try to extract as much sugar as I could from the grain.

My preboil gravity came in about 5 points low at 1.088 which I was pretty thrilled with. I then recalculated my targets off my preboil measurement. Got the boil going but never really got a vigorous boil. As a result my starting gravity came in about 5-6 points low. I was still thrilled with this as it got me close to my actual desired ABV target. After brewing so many batches and hitting my targets dead on, this felt weird having to adjust on the fly and over compensate to hit desired targets.

Definitely a bit unpredictable but researching ahead of time really helped limit mistakes. Felt I learned a lot from this batch and really enjoyed the process. All things considered, I'd call it a successful brew evening.

English Barleywine
5.5 gal
OG 1.112
IBU 65
ABV 12.5%
SRM 21

Mash @ 149 F for 75 minutes
60 minute boil

Maris Otter (2-Row) 21.5 lb
Crystal 80L 1.5 lb
Carapils 15 oz
Victory Malt 15 oz
60 min Progress 3.75 oz
15 min Irish Moss 0.5 tsp
15 min East Kent Goldings 1 oz
15 min Maple Syrup 1.55 lb
5 min East Kent Goldings 1 oz
Dry English Ale WLP007 2.0 L starter
Dry Hop East Kent Goldings 1 oz

 

[doug293cz]

Actually, you did amazingly well on your efficiency. Your "mistake" was not lowering your efficiency assumption enough. For a single batch sparge with equal runnings, 6.7 gal pre-boil volume (5.5 gal post-boil), 0.12 gal/lb grain absorption, and 0.25 gal MLT undrainable volume, the lauter efficiencies (simulated) are:

• 85.3% for a 10 lb grain bill (1.053 - 1.057 OG)
• 64.7% for a 25 lb grain bill (1.100 - 1.107 OG)

So, lauter efficiency (and mash & brewhouse efficiency) drops by ~20% vs. a more "normal" grain bill.

You pretty much got everything you could out of that mash.

The mash/sparge simulator I wrote has been incorporated into @pricelessbrewing 's calculator (find it here.) You can use this calculator to get predictions for efficiency and SG's for various grain bill sizes, and your equipment/process specifics.

Brew on

 

[brewpool]

Awesome info to see. I figured I'd mash the additional time just to make sure I could extract as much as possible. I'm guessing that gained a couple efficiency points. I tried to stir a bit more often than usual too just to make sure all the grains were soaked. This is the first all grain brew I've done where I saw dough balls form that I needed to break up. Still amazed at how much grain was in that tun...

 

[brewpool]

This batch is fermenting like crazy! Even with a blowoff tube the bucket was pressurized and some beer was leaking out from under the lid.

 

[BlueHouseBrewhaus]

Estimating efficiency for a high gravity brew is a bit of a crap shoot. Sounds like you did pretty well. One tip (learned the hard way) is to add some yeast at bottling for the barleywine. The fermentation yeast tend to get really spent and need some reinforcements for carbonation.

 

[brewpool]

Estimating efficiency for a high gravity brew is a bit of a crap shoot. Sounds like you did pretty well. One tip (learned the hard way) is to add some yeast at bottling for the barleywine. The fermentation yeast tend to get really spent and need some reinforcements for carbonation.

Did you happen to use a yeast starter in yours? Curious if it would make any difference. How much and what type of yeast would you recommend I add at bottling? I fermented with White Labs Dry English Ale, WLP007. I plan to give it about four weeks in the bucket before I divert about 1.25 gallons to a small oak barrel and then will bottle up the remaining ~4 gallons or so.

 

[BlueHouseBrewhaus]

I did do a sizable starter but the yeast still pooped out. Some folks use Danstar CBC-1 at bottling with good results. Or you could harvest some of your 007 and make a small starter from it to wake it back up and make some bottling yeast.

 

[Mer-man]

This batch is fermenting like crazy! Even with a blowoff tube the bucket was pressurized and some beer was leaking out from under the lid.

From my limited experience making barleywine, I can heartily endorse active fermentation control a few degrees lower than you would normally do with the same yeast at an "average" OG.
As you noted, the fermentation was furious -- on mine I have never seen a krausen (before or since) that was almost the height of the beer itself.

I will be interested to hear if the finished product has any harsh (fusel) alcohols. They would mellow with time.

But great work!

 

[brewpool]

Gave this four weeks in primary where it hit a FG of 1.021. Pretty spot on to my target of 1.019. I transferred 1.3 gallons to my new oak barrel and bottled the remaining 4 gallons. I sampled it and no off flavors or fusels which was great.

I also rehydrated 1.5g of CBC-1 conditioning yeast and added to the bottling bucket. It made bottling a bit of a pain and was clogging the bottling wand. Can't wait to crack some of these open in a few months and I'm looking forward to sampling the barrel aged ones.

 

[Hoppybeav]

The very first BIG brew I ever did was an AG Barleywine w/ a similarly sized grain bill as yours. As a matter of fact, a lot of your notes sound like mine did, including a crazy (and long) fermentation. The one thing I can say of value is be patient. My barleywine was good early on... and only got better as it aged... and I'm not talking weeks or months. I still had a few bottles after several years and they were the best ones. Enjoy!

 

[brewpool]

Just tasted a sample after a week in the oak barrel and it's fantastic! Will likely give it a second week and then bottle.