Batch #20: Barleywine

Since I had built up a large charge of nice British yeast during the last two batches, I thought it was time for a nice big barleywine. It was also my 20th batch since going all grain, a perfect excuse for brewing something special.

The recipe is based on Thomas Hardy's ale, as described in a malt advocate article and the Real Ale Almanac. It differs from the real thing in being slightly lower gravity, and with some Kent Goldings thrown in for bitterness because I wanted to use them up :-) Like Thomas Hardy's ale, this is an all-pale malt brew which gets its deep color from a long boil (here about 8-9 gallons down to 5), with Goldings and Challenger aroma and 50-70 IBUs.

Recipe

Grain Bill

21 lbs. Crisp Maris-Otter

Hops

2 oz. East Kent Goldings (5.7% AA -- in freezer since Sept '02) @ 60 min
1.5 oz. Challenger (7% AA) @ 60 min
1.5 oz. Challenger (7% AA) @ knockout
2 oz. Kent Goldings dry hops (leaf)

Yeast

WLP022 Essex ale. 8-12 oz slurry from previous batch.

Mash

Single infusion, overnight at 154F. Overshot temp to 160 intially.

Vitals

OG: 1.114
FG: 1.030
Calculated IBUs: 70
Carbonation: bottle primed, 3 primetabs per 12-oz bottle

Timeline

Brew day: May 31, 2003

May 30 11:40 pm: Mash-in at 160F (oops!) with 6-6.5 gal water at 175F
May 30 11:50 pm: After plenty of stirring and a few handfuls of ice cubes, dropped temperature to 152-154F.
9:30 am: Temp dropped to 135F.
9:55 am: Topped cooler up with 2 gallons of 180F sparge water. Start first runoff into 10 gallon pot.
10:09 am: Finish 1st runoff, 5 gallons collected. Put 10 gallon pot on to boil. Added 4 gallons sparge water @175F to cooler.
10:25 am: Begin second runoff into 6 gallon pot.
10:42 am: Put 6 gallon pot on to boil.
11:30 am: Boiling... First runnings SG 1.084, second runnings 1.032.
12:30 am: Transfer some wort from small to large pot.
1:30 pm: All wort now in large pot.
5:30 pm: Measured SG 1.092.
6:45 pm: Added bittering hops.
7:30 pm: Add moss and chiller.
7:45 pm: Add finishing hops, turn of burner, start chilling.
8:20 pm: Chilled to 75, whirlpool. Noted color slightly deeper than the earlier Mild, even though only pale malt was used.
8:45 pm: Begin racking, OG 1.114. Didn't let settle enough, lots of trub being carried over. Strained last 1/3rd of wort through sanitized mesh strainer.
9:?? pm: Finished racking. Aerated by pouring back and forth between sanitized fermenter buckets until very foamy (and very tired :-). Split into two fermenters.
9:44 pm: Done with clean-up. Fermenters at 72F.

High krausen reached within 8 hours. Moved to mid-60s basement June 1st, after fermenters rose to 74F.

Racked to secondary June 7, S.G. 1.036. Still somewhat active, transferred large amounts of trub, may need to rack again. Trub losses appear to be over a half gallon :-(

July 9: Racked to corny keg with surescreen onto/under 2 oz Kent Goldings leaf hops. Purged and de-pressurized headspace.

August 13: Bottled, 44 12-oz bottles, 3 primetabs per bottle.

March 4, 2004: Re-bottled with a pinch of Danstar Nottingham dry yeast in each bottle. 22 bottles got just the Nottingham, 18 bottles got Nottingham and an extra primetab. The bottles with extra priming have their caps marked in red to tell them apart. Previous tastings noted no oxidative notes, so the primary yeast was able to prevent that at least...

Tasting notes

08/13/2003

Aroma of Earl Grey tea and candied fruit. Flavor is reminiscent of a well-brandied fruitcake with caramel sweetness, candied fruit and orange peel notes.

10/5/2003

Still quite flat, with a slight sparkle. Hop aroma has subsided since 8/13, reducing the earl grey and candied fruit aromas. A pronounced nutty character now dominates the flavor. Mouthfeel is almost syrupy. With the diminshed dry-hop character, the beer is much more balanced. All it needs is some carbonation.

12/7/2003

Chilled to cellar temperatures (mid-50s) and is now perfectly flat. Not even a sparkle. Beautiful aroma of Goldings hops, spicey, orangey, and oily. Well balanced between malt an hop character, with a clean bitterness and a good lingering sweetness. Excellent flavor from the kettle carmelization. Still, it just needs carbonation.

2/1/2005

Wow, I've actually managed to hang on to this for almost two years. Entered in 2005 Upper Mississipi Mash-Out, and won a gold medal in the strong ales category, out of 21 entries. Score: 32-1/3 out of 50. Judges were obviously able to see past the lack of carbonation which has annoyed me greatly with every bottle I've had. Not too many surprising comments. Judges noted low hop aroma, to be expected after strong aging. Most found the hop bitterness level good, although one got a cloying impression. Some commented on a low level of malt character. It's getting a bit winier at this stage, and I'm glad it stayed around for this long.

Oh, and the carbonation is coming along. My multiple rescue attempts apparently worked for some of the bottles. I've so far had three carbonated bottles out of my last 6 to 9. The bottle I'm drinking now is very well carbonated, which makes me very happy. The carbonation brings out a very alluring dark fruit well-aged-port aroma. It takes away from the mouthfeel a bit, but since it's almost syrupy when flat, that is OK. Very smooth, balanced, straightforward flavor completely unlike barleywines made with caramel malt.

This one definitely gets another go. My current rehash is a bit lackluster by comparison. Version 2.0 was boiled less, and had a lower gravity, which combined with the greater amount of Goldings to give it a bothersome orange-juice character. It's on tap. I don't think flat bottles of that would be as forgivable :-)

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