Logistics and gotchas for barley wine?

[BarryNL]

I'm thinking of making a barley wine for my next brew - something around 1.100. I'm looking for any tips - my current highest gravity AG was around 1.070 and that was a stout that finished out around 1.025, so this would be easily the largest attenuation I've tried.

I'm assuming I'll need more than the usual 1 litre starter. Is splitting a Wyest pack between two 1 liter starters likely to be enough, or will I need to step up starters? Say split between two half liter starters then use those to make one liter starters?

Also, I think I'm going to need to use some extract - my mash tun doesn't have the capacity to make anything much higher than 1.060 with a two stage batch sparge - even a three stage probably won't get me to 1.100 - should I just stick to using the minimum light extract to get the gravity where I want it?

Finally, any recommended recipes - I have a few in books but nothing that really jumps out - I also have Wyeast 1028 and 1335 on hand - any ideas on which would be best to use?

[Dan]

personally i would be tempted to use dry yeast on such a high OG wort You can achieve a much higher pitching rate of healthy cells.

If you were to go with liquid yeast and made a 2L starter I would expect you will have a high finishing gravity. When you pitch a smack pack (even with a 2 litre starter) the yeast has quite a lot of growing to do. If you underpitch a 1.100 gravity wort the high osmotic pressure will put a lot of stress on the yeast. It wont grow properly like in a normal grav wort.

If you are stuck on liquid yeast I would brew a normal beer first and look to pitch slurry from it.
otherwise i think you would be looking for at least a gallon starter with a stir plate to get the cell count

hope this helps

[BarryNL]

Not a bad idea - I could certainly use some S04 - I assume that's a reasonable choice for barley wine? Would one pack be enough for about 17 litres or should I pitch 2 packs?

[Dan]

you are looking at about a 25Plato wort there
the rule of thumb is 1M cells X ml wort X degree Plato

1M Cells x 17,000 ml wort x 25 plato = 425 Billion cells

However, for a high gravity wort (over 1.060) you would need to double this.

approx 800 Billion cells

your average dry yeast can contain 20 Billion cells per gram
800/20 = 40 grams

In short if i made this brew myself I would pitch 4 packs of S04

[Aleman]

This is one that I am looking at doing, which is from the Duerden park book



As Dan has said the big issue here is pitching rates, I'd make a starter as usual and pitch that into a low gravity wort at no higher than 1.040. Rack the beer of the yeast cake, and pitch the barley wine on that. You will need Bags of aeration, and then you will need to aerate another 12 hours later, this should help avoid any problems with attenuation. Personally I intend to do this, then to loosen the sediment and pour it into a conical flask and wash it. then on brew day I would add some dilute wort and oxygenate it with 3 30second blasts over 30 minutes, while using the stir plate. I'll oxygenate the wort on the way to the FV, and again after 12 hours.

Of course using 4 or 5 packs of a Dry yeast - And I would avoid SO4 using something like Nottingham

Another issue is that by cramming as much mash in the TUN as possible you will use a lower liquor to grist ratio . . . which I have found with high gravity worts can lead to low attenuating worts, so would mash on the lower side . . . Probably around 64C.

[Dan]

You could make a second mashtun by wrapping a camping mat around a 5Gal fermenter. dont bother with adding a tap and manifold.

1 mix one mash in your usual tun and addjust temperatures
2 mix the next mash in you insulated bucket
3 batch sparge the first mash as normal while leaving the second to convert
4 dump the spent grain from the first then add the 2nd to your empty lauter tun.

OR

you could mash in two stages. collect the runnings, keep them for an hour while you mash a second batch. blend the two runnings together and boil down to a gravity of 1.100

OR

you could just use malt extract like you suggested, which is a very easy option.

[mysterio]

I use 2 mash tuns similar to Dan one with a manifold the other just an unconverted cool box. I split the recipe in half for ease of calculation, mash in half in each mash tun with normal grist to liquor ratio, then after the mash start draining the manifolded mash tun then scoop the grain on top as the level drops. While fly sparging the main mash I mash out with boiling water with whatever is left in the second tun then batch sparge the extra at the end.

The yeast issue has been covered but my preference would be for a large quantity of Nottingham too. Or you could make a batch of ~1.040 bitter with a well attenuating English yeast (London or Dry English?), then pitch a measured amount of the yeast slurry, oxygenate the hell out of the wort and use yeast nutrient.

And think about whether you're going to keg or bottle. If you're anything like me, the temptation to take sneaky samples every week from the keg would be too much. I think I would repitch some Nottingham and bottle so you have some healthy yeast to prime the bottles (although Barley Wines are only very gently carbonated). Then squirrel away the bottles somewhere you'll forget about them for a year.

[Dan]

I agree with mysterio, the act of squirreling Is most important with strong beer. they will improve drastically over 6 months and If you have kept your hygeine strict You can sit on them for years.

I found when i made some barley wine It peaked at 8 months, but i was a bit lax with the sterilising and the storage temps went up and down all the time.
I primed the bottles and they all turned out very gassy

I havent tried it, but i suspect that you wouldnt need to prime barleywine becuase of the extra 'partially fermentable dextrins' left over after fermentation.

[Aleman]

Another way of handling the vast qty of grain required is simply to mash twice, Use half the grain of the recipe each time, then mix the two worts and boil once.

[Dan]

you could always drink 2 pints of 1.050 beer

[BarryNL]

I agree with mysterio, the act of squirreling Is most important with strong beer. they will improve drastically over 6 months and If you have kept your hygeine strict You can sit on them for years.

Yeah - the plan is to make them now to "celebrate" my 40th in ten months time *sigh*

[brewsters millionths]

have you seen the wort as mash liquor method? i think it's in the latest byo. you basically mash as normal. keep the runnings, clean out the mash tun and mash again with fresh grains, but use the wort from the first mash instead of water.

[Aleman]

I wonder if you end up with the law of diminishing returns kicking in.

Personally I would be tempted to go with the No Sparge method for brewing these big beers (and keep the mashed grain for a small beer). Basically You increase the grain by a third, use your usual liquor to grist ratio, then drain the tun, and use whatever you get our of the tun for making the big beer.

I've done this for a barley wine and got close to 1.100 out, I suspect that mashing again wouldn't get that much higher.

[steve_flack]

I've got a simple excel spreadsheet I knocked up for doing parti-gyle calcs. You can get it here.

It's pretty basic. You enter the OG and volume you'd get if you wanted to make the beer in the normal way. It then works out what you'd get if you split the runnings 1:2, 1:1 or 1:1:1.