Making 11% alcohol beer.. wine or beer yeast?

[chemman14]

pacman took my barleywine from 1.130 to 1.032 for 12.8 percent so it can be done. I am just wondering what I should do now that it is in secondary. Do I need to pitch more yeast to condition?

 

[remilard]

I have heard bad things about the WLP099 Super High Gravity so I am staying away from it.

People always say that but I think it has to be user error as this yeast was used to make one of the most highly regarded beers ever made (no, not dark lord).

 

[weremichael]

pacman took my barleywine from 1.130 to 1.032 for 12.8 percent so it can be done. I am just wondering what I should do now that it is in secondary. Do I need to pitch more yeast to condition?

How old is your barleywine? I would think if it's older than six months pitching some dry yeast wouldn't be a bad idea when your bottling. I have a pacman barleywine that is rotated back and forth on one of our taps (the wife and I can't drink a 13.5% beer constantly) and I really like it to have very little carbonation. So I would recommend using very little priming sugar.

 

[bootney]

Greetings,

I just did my first batch of IIPA and it had a starting gravity higher than 1.100 and I used 2 packs of WY 1056 American Ale without a starter. I just checked it yesterday after being in primary for two weeks at 66 degrees and it's averaging one bubble every 2 minutes and it came back at 1.023 So the WY 1056 was able to handle it, but would I go this route again, probably not. I would suggest using a starter to insure that you have the proper amount of yeast for your batch, and try to keep it around 10% ABV. Someone eluded to high alcohol beers as coming out hot and I will say that is what appears to be the case with mine. I tried the tester and the potential is there, I just wont be able to find out until early November on just how this batched turns out.

 

[JefferyL]

I'm gonna rack my Barley Wine onto a WLP001 yeast cake left from a pale ale I made. I am going to see if it will go down a little more from 1.040.
White Labs says that the WLP001 is more tolerant than the WLP007. The key is to start with a whole bunch of yeast.

Racked the barley wine onto the WLP001 yeast cake and nothing. That's all she wrote.

 

[chemman14]

How old is your barleywine? I would think if it's older than six months pitching some dry yeast wouldn't be a bad idea when your bottling. I have a pacman barleywine that is rotated back and forth on one of our taps (the wife and I can't drink a 13.5% beer constantly) and I really like it to have very little carbonation. So I would recommend using very little priming sugar.

Oh trust me, I plan on only 2 volumes of co2

 

[yellowthere]

[quote/]I went to my LHBS and I bought a pack of Safbrew S-33. It's supposed to withstand up to 11.5% alcohol (says good for trappist ale)... I'll try that, if it doesn't work, I'll go with the wine yeast. However the lady from my LHBS told be wine yeast will give a very dry taste to the beer, just like wine! I'm not sure how.. I'll try that as a very last resort then![/quote]


wine yeast will not dry out beer, this includes champagne yeast. Maltotriose (trisaccharide (three-part sugar) consisting of three glucose molecules linked with α-1,4 glycosidic bonds, that is in beer,but not in wine) is not fermentable by wine yeast. If you are really interesting wine yeast and brewing check out the brewing network episode with shea comfort.

I fermented a 1083 wort down to 1030 using red wine yeast. I planned for it to poop out. I'm pitching Brett in the wort to finish it off. I wanted residuals for the brett, but I was surprised at how much there were.

 

[2-0turbo]

For what it's worth, I'm using Wyeast 1272 in this beer. I'm over 12% now (somewhere below 1.026) and it is winding down. Wyeast's website says it will only go to 10% (the same for almost all their yeasts) but it seems to be doing okay at 12%.

As others have touched on, I think the key is pitching a lot of healthy yeast. I pitched a 2.5 liter starter made from a Wyeast XL pack into only 3-gallons of wort.