us-05

[B8A_AMYLASE]

Eight weeks ago I found out that my wife is pregnant with our first baby! A pact was finalized years ago that if she did get pregnant I would not drink any alcohol and share dry months with her (chivalry at its finest!). What I did do though was order a stupid brain barley wine kit from jasper's brewing supply ( i do not work for them!). I figured I could brew and age this beer, and by time my baby is born I can sip at a nice strong beer as I am sure I will need to. When I ordered this beer I was nervous of making a strong ale ( I have never gone above a 1.050 ). Home brew talk members really educated me on fermenting strong ales and what to expect from us-05 dry packets. Brew day went relatively flawless except that my gravity far exceeded the 1.112-16 OG and hit 1.130. After calming my self I cooled the mash down to about 70F and pitched the two packets of us-05 that I had REHYDRATED and set it in my cold room at 62 degrees. Today is day six of primary and the beer is still going strong but slowed a little. Bored, I decided to take a gravity reading and it came out 1.030! according to beer smith that's 13.26 already! The beer is already tasty and a little hop forward at this point. Going to leave it on the cake another week and rack to secondary for a few months. Fill you in later!

 

[BigFloppy]

CONGRATS!

Enjoy the Barley Wine, you'll need it

 

[GluStick]

Good plan, and congratulations on the great news!

 

[aStoutObserver]

Very cool. If you need someone to sample the progression of the beer, I'll volunteer ha

 

[cannman]

Congrats!

Just a heads up here, I plugged in an awful barley wine into BeerSmith and for 1.130 OG, I got 5 packets of US-05 or 9 liters of starter. I'm a big fan of US-05 so as it slows down, it might slow way...way...way down, but will still keep on converting.
US-05 has an upper limit of 75F, so if you can control your temps, I'd warm that puppy up from your 62F (lower limit for barley wine and US-05 is 59F btw). The yeast will be slower at lower temps and you don't want them to knock out early and leave you with sweet sweet beer. Ramp them up with higher temps and let them finish strong before the knock out . Getting the gravity down is important especially if you want to age the beer (bottle bombs), but I think the resulting alcohol will be so high that you may need to add yeast at bottling anyway...

sounds like a great time!

Good luck!

 

[Silentdrinker]

Eight weeks ago I found out that my wife is pregnant with our first baby!

Congrats... I'll be right there with you. However, I never made a pact. She actually tries to get me to drink more because she can't drink. We just had our first ultrasound today. They said the fetus was 8 weeks. We're due dec 10.

This is our second--first is 3yrs (born dec 11, go figure). My issue is I'm going to be busy as hell. I built this bedroom for my son:



http://www.oregonlive.com/hg/index.ssf/2015/02/pirate_ship_diy_boy_bedroom.html

I posted it on reddit, and now It's all over the Internet and they printed it in our local newspaper (search: Kian's pirate room, or, dad builds 3 year old son pirate room)

Now I have to do it again, or it will look like I don't love this one as much.

If you can think of a good theme, let me know!

 

[Dixon9717]

Congrats on the new Baby......
Hope your Barley wine turns out awesome....

 

[B8A_AMYLASE]

Wow some quick replies! I am def going to ramp up the temps to let the yeast do its thing. Cannman called it though with everyone saying to pitch more yeast than I did but for some reason it does not seem to be needed (dumb luck?) either way I hope its a great beer!

 

[B8A_AMYLASE]

Your wife is a great supporter. Dads go through pregnancy also right! haha anyways I wish you and your family great health.

 

[tarmac]

Congratulations! Welcome to the club.

US-05 is a monster. I pitched 2 rehydrated packets in a 1.104 black IIPA this winter and it took it to 1.018. The last .004 points took about 3 weeks then it stopped. Total ferment time @ 64F was around 4.5 weeks. Also give it plenty of time in primary to batch condition and come to life. It's going to be awesome. You'll really enjoy it...after many months of no alcohol you'll be feeling really good after a glass.

 

[B8A_AMYLASE]

You got that right! I was thinking two weeks but maybe I should wait another week to let it mature. I am in no hurry so I think thats what ill do. How cold would you cold crash to drop this particular yeast out of ferm?

 

[day_trippr]

When it comes to cold crashing, the colder/longer the more effective, the beer style or yeast type doesn't really matter given enough time.

I drop to 34°F for at least four days...

Cheers!

 

[B8A_AMYLASE]

Ok perfect...Thanks

 

[B8A_AMYLASE]

So a quick update. After 14 days in primary I racked into secondary. The gravity readings stayed consistent at 1.029 from a 1.130. After racking, slight activity occurred in the airlock which is what I wanted (Co2 blanket).I figured I would keep it in there for three months then bottle age further, any thoughts?