Barley Wine Collaboration

I’ve been a bit a busy (and a little lazy when it comes to posting to this blog) lately and am a little behind on a couple brew day posts and other posts I’ve been meaning to get up for a bit now, so I’m hoping to get a few more updates up here in the next week or two to catch up. 

A few weeks ago, I had an opportunity to brew my first collaboration for the year (this was also the long-overdue first brew that I did with my buddy Dan).  In order for both brewers to gain value from a successful collaboration, it should accentuate the similarities between the brewers, but also force both brewers out of their box a little and teach them something new.  That is something I look for when I pursue doing collaborations.  In the case of Dan and I, we both tend to lean towards American styles, with experimentation mixed in.  In collaborating with Dan, I expected to not just get an exceptionally made traditional beer, but also to try new ingredients and experiment a bit. 

For our first brew together, we landed on barley wine as a style to brew.  This style would serve well as a base to use a variety of treatments on (i.e. different yeasts, dry hopping, oak-aging, etc.).  The idea was to take one base 10 gallon batch and split it into four different variants (5 gallons for each of us, which we each split again into 2.5 gallon batches).  Our goal was to brew a fairly dry (for the style) barely wine that would finish out around 10% ABV. 

When March 18^th rolled around (note to self – in the future, don’t schedule brew days on the day after St. Patty’s Day), I found myself driving down to Delaware, coffee in hand, to start up the brew day at Dan’s place.  After cleaning the equipment, heating the strike water, and grinding the base malt, we were ready to mash.  The 75 minute mash, sparge, and 90 minute boil all went smoothly.  We then kicked off the flame and added some Calypso to steep for a few minutes before chilling, and splitting the wort between our carboys.  Another successful brew was in the books.  Really, the only hitch in the brew day was that we missed our OG by a bit because we over-estimated the amount of boil off slightly.  No big deal; that just means more beer in the end.  :-)

We both ended up going with a starter of California Ale (White Labs 001) for the yeast and let the primary ride out.  The secondary fermentation is really were we took one beer and ended up with four different variants (half of mine was hit with an ounce each of Bravo and Calypso, and the other half got 2oz of American Oak chips soaked in 150ml of Cruzan Single Barrel rum for two weeks).  I am very excited to see how our four different variants will come out in a few months.  We are planning on doing a side-by-side tasting down the line to see how they compare.  It will be a lot of fun to see how the four variants compare to each other in a side-by-side format.  This beer should be perfect for the Fall and Winter (although, I will definitely be sampling a few bottles before then, because I’m impatient).  After tasting my variants when I bottled the beer a couple weeks ago, I was very excited to see how these beers develop with some age.  They dropped down to a pretty dry level for barley wine (FG of about 1.016 for one variant, and 1.017 for the other), which is exactly what we were aiming for.  The oak/rum aged variant is probably my favorite of the two so far, striking a great balance between bitterness, malt, oak, and a touch of rum aroma and flavor.  I can’t wait to sample them after they have conditioned in the bottle for a bit!

Samples of each of my half-batches of barley wine at the time of bottling.

I definitely learned a lot with this brew and got to experience some new hops and malts that I had not used before.  It was also nice to brew on someone else’s system and get some ideas for what kind of setup I want to build for myself when I have the room to upgrade to a true full-boil all-grain setup.  All in all, the brew was a great experience and I will be updating this blog after we do our tasting of the four variants.  We are already planning on doing another brew together.  The next one will probably be a little further out there – probably something along the lines of Theobroma.  A big thanks to Dan for hosting the brew day!

Big Dog Barley Wine

Batch size: 10.0 gal

Boil volume: 11.0 gal

OG: 1.099

FG: 1.025

Bitterness (IBU): 87.6

Color (SRM): 20.1

ABV: 9.7%

[Grains]

Maris Otter Malt    22.000lb    Grain    65.7%

NB Gold LME    6.000lb    Extract    17.9%

Crystal 135-165L (British)    2.000lb    Grain    6.0%

Cane Sugar    1.500lb    Sugar    4.5%

Biscuit    1.000lb    Grain    3.0%

Light DME    1.000lb    Extract    3.0%

[Hops]

Magnum 2.00oz 12.0% AA Pellet @ 60 min, 29.0 IBU

Bravo 2.00oz 15.0% AA Pellet @ 60 min, 36.3 IBU

Magnum 2.00oz 12.0% AA Pellet @ 30 min, 22.3 IBU

Calypso 3.00oz 12.0% AA Pellet @ 0 min, 0.0 IBU

[Yeast/Other]

Irish Moss    1.0 unit(s), Fining 1 tsp at 15 min

California Ale yeast    1.0 unit(s), Yeast

Recipe Notes: This recipe was split into 2 five gallon batches (5 gallons for each of us).  I split my half into two batches at the time of secondary.  One half got an ounce each of Bravo and Calypso hops for a week, and the other half got 2 ounces of American Oak chips soaked in 150ml Cruzan Single Barrel rum for two weeks.

Song of the Day: “Under and Over It” by Five Finger Death Punch

Beer of the Day: Troegs Nugget Nectar