Quote:
Originally Posted by loosbastard
This is good news to my ears. I brewed up my first barleywine about a month ago. I too missed my target OG of 1.100 (1.090) and it finished drier than I expected (1.010). I used a good amount of maple syrup and molasses and that's all I could taste in the first hydro sample: syrup and hot alcohol.
Everybody keeps telling me the flavors and alcohol hotness will smooth out, so I'm still optimistic...but this is my first attempt at a barleywine and I'd hate to have screwed up such an expensive grain bill.
Oh and any chance you could post your recipe?
Whoa, that's really dry. I wonder how hoppy it'll taste. You might be getting some astringency from the hopping/FG combo, and that would definitely make the alcohols stand out. Oh, and if you've got a small brewery or brewpub around, go in in the middle of a workday and ask the brewer if you can buy a bag of pale malt. Not everyone will say yes, but you never know, and it makes these big beers much, much cheaper. Our cost for a bag is about $22 for 55lbs, so I just plan to do something like 5g of barleywine and then 10g of an IPA and use most of it up.
My recipe was just straight out of JZ's "Brewing Classic Styles." The first time I brew a style, I like to use his recipe and then tweak it on repeats. Hint: his IPA is way too sweet for my tastes.
Batch size: 7g preboil, 6g postboil, 5.5g into fermenter
OG 1.115
FG 1.022
23.2lb 2-row
1lb corn sugar
1lb Crystal 15
1lb Crystal 80
.25lb Pale Chocolate, 250L
.25lb Special B
99IBUs of Magnum at 60m
1oz Chinook 0m
1.5oz Centennial 0m
1.5oz Amarillo 0m
American ale yeast, Mash at 149