Strong Ale Recipe/idea

Australia & New Zealand Homebrewing Forum

Help Support Australia & New Zealand Homebrewing Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Samwise Gamgee

Well-Known Member
Joined
27/1/05
Messages
538
Reaction score
0
Hello,

I'm doing a partial mash this weekend. Here's my recipe:

Ingredients:
6Kg Light LME
300g Torrified Wheat
230g Choc Grain

80g Super Alpha (60mins)
20g EK Goldings (15mins)
20g Amarillo (Flameout)

WLP099 Super High Gravity Yeast

Method:

Mash Torrified wheat and Choc Grain for 60mins @ 67C

Sparge @ 78C.

Boil LME + Sweet wort for 60 mins. Hop additions as above.

Cool and pitch yeast @ 20C.

Ferment @ 20C.

2nd Ferment @ 20C for 3-4 weeks.

(20L batch)

Once bottled I plan on cellaring for quite a while!

Any thoughts/advice? Mainly on mash and sparge temps?


Cheers,
Sam
 
Hi sam,
You'll need some pale malt in with the grain to mash the puffed wheat.
Also i'd look at using a more common english ale yeast and swap the amirillo for more EKG.


Jayse
 
you'll need to partial mash with some pale malt grain otherwise all you'll get out of the torrefied wheat is clag. there are no enzymes in torrefied wheat or choc malt for the mash to work, so you need to sub a kilo of pale malt grain for say 500g of the extract. then your minimash will work at those temps.
80g of superalpha sounds like a lot, but why not.

to balance all that bitterness i'd put in 300-500g of crystal for a bit of body and sweetness, otherwise you could potentially have quite a thin brown bitter brew on your hands.
 
neonmeate said:
snipped.

to balance all that bitterness i'd put in 300-500g of crystal for a bit of body and sweetness, otherwise you could potentially have quite a thin brown bitter brew on your hands.
[post="55425"][/post]​

I totally agree it needs some crystal aswell, i'd look at a darker to very dark one to get some of the flavours ussually common to a strong ale.

Jayse
 
80g of superalpha sounds like a lot, but why not.

I was thinking that since it will be quite alcoholic (i've had 1 calculation say about 11% and another say about 9.5%) that I should have relatively high IBU's to balance it out. Or will this possibly add a kinda chemically taste because of the high AA's?
 
am said:
80g of superalpha sounds like a lot, but why not.

I was thinking that since it will be quite alcoholic (i've had 1 calculation say about 11% and another say about 9.5%) that I should have relatively high IBU's to balance it out. Or will this possibly add a kinda chemically taste because of the high AA's?
[post="55431"][/post]​

sure, you'll get worse utilisation with an extract partial boil, especially with a strong one, so you can pretty much throw as many hops as you like at it and it'll be ok. superalpha isnt called superalpha for nuthin though.
youll just need some sweetness to balance it all (specially as that yeast ferments through pretty dry). most barleywines/strong ales use a lot of crystal for that characteristic "hops fighting toffee" taste.
 
That recipe really cries out for a part mash of say 3 kilos: 2.25Kg pale, .5Kg amber and the torrefied wheat and cut down on the chocolate, 100g woulkd be enough. Steep the crystal and chocolate malt.

Get a 20L pot and boil say 15l wort. 200g Goldings plugs or 170g goldings pellets will provide enough bitterness.

11% is nowhere near high enough to justify High Gravity yeast. I suggest 1028 London or 1728 Scottish, preferably the latter and ferment cool.


Jovial Monk
 
Cool!

Thanks everyone for your help! Now to start tweaking recipe!


Cheers,
 
The long weekend is over and the airlock is bubbling away.

The final recipe i went with is as follows:

6kg Light LME
2.25kg Trad Ale Malt
500g Crystal Malt
100g Choc Malt
300g Torrified Wheat

60g Super Alpha (60mins)
20g EK Goldings (15mins)
20g Amarillo (Flameout)

WLP099 Super High Gravity Yeast

All was going pretty well for my first partial until the boil.

Was boiling up 16L (in 20L pot) of wort (including the LME), then it came time to throw in the Super Alpha, so I did which caused it to boil up and over the pot, stove, bench, floor quite quickly. So i think my bitterness won't be as strong as intended as a lot of the hops boiled out and over quicker than going in! :(

Not to worry, i lost about 1-1.5L but gave me more head space for boiling. When adding remaining hops, it didn't even come close to boiling over (is this because of the high A/A in Super Alpha?)

After boiling and cooling I cleared the tap in the fermenter and took the O.G. but the hydrometer wouldn't drop far enough in that the wort level would measure against the numbers. So after clearing the tap again the hydrometer dropped a little further but i still had to guesstimate it a little.

O.G. 1155

Ever eaten a beer before? :p

Within 12 hours the fermentation is pretty active, not a very big krausen but lots of airlock activity.
 
am said:
Not to worry, i lost about 1-1.5L but gave me more head space for boiling. When adding remaining hops, it didn't even come close to boiling over (is this because of the high A/A in Super Alpha?)

[post="56330"][/post]​


What you will find is now you won't be chucking the first addition in one big pile as you just had first hand experience of what that does. If you chuck in a few pellets first you can stop it boiling over. Technically this is normally refered to has breaking the surface tension.
Anyway its not the A.A% of the hops or anything like that its simply you should throw a few hops in first before you go dumping in a shovel full.
The finishing hops didn't throw out a big mess because the 'big mess' had already been done with earlier.

Hope it is a ripper
Jayse
 
hope it is a ripper also - but WOW og of 1155..that is big....

That high grav will also effect your hop utilisation...

but i LOVE big BEERS....

Hope it is a Gooden!
 
I agree 1.115 is big. Will be quite a while before that one is at its best. At least a year.
 
not a very big krausen

I stand corrected! This krausen is growing quite nicely (as long as it stays in the fermenter :D )

That high grav will also effect your hop utilisation...
Does this mean that the hops essentially won't have the effect that they would on a lower gravity beer?

Therefore more hops would've been needed?
Will be quite a while before that one is at its best. At least a year.
Once bottled after about 6 weeks of fermentation (primary & secondary) they will be cellared to open probably winter 2006. Unless i've got drunk annoying ppl over and i want them to shut up & pass out, then i think i'll pass them one! :party:
 
am said:
That high grav will also effect your hop utilisation

Does this mean that the hops essentially won't have the effect that they would on a lower gravity beer?

Therefore more hops would've been needed?


[post="56437"][/post]​
If your using the same hop utilisation as you would for a 1.040 beer than yes you will be quite a bit out.
But if your using software most programms have the hop utilisation built in for the gravity for the beer, if yor using a pen and paper then check out the utilisation chart in HTB or NBLB for the correct number.
either way you can't simply use the same number for a 1.040 wort as a 1.140 wort.

Misty mountain hop
Jayse
 
Ah ok,

i did put it through promash and the ibu's were higher than recommended for the style, so should be ok and prob more true to style as a heap of the bittering hops were lost
 
A quick update.


I bottled on saturday with a FG of 1040, so approx 15.8%

I was surprised how clear it has become after the extended secondary.

My final yield was about 18.5L (after gradual losses through racking, readings etc)and I bulk primed with 100g dextrose.
I think i've underprimed it though.

I'll probably crack one in a couple of weeks, then let the rest cellar for 12-18months (except a couple of testers will come out every few months to record ageing)
 
After a couple of months in the bottle, I've finally cracked one.

Aroma and appearance is great! A beautiful rich amber colour with a good creamy head which lasts for most of the glass.

Taste: malty, rich and warming. No mouthfuls at a time here as it becomes too spirity, just smaller sips. Have been drinking it at room temp.

I think i'll brew it again but as an AG and cut the alc level down so it's a little easier to drink.

It'll be interesting to see how it ages and hopefully becomes smoother.
 
am,

U will probably note some elements of sherry/muscat/port in the taste. Especially as the brew ages.

I have a brew of about 15% alc which is about 3 yr old now.

Hard to polish off more than one stubbie, as it's equivalent to about a schooner of port (apologies to all who do not understand that this is a 425ml measure in NSW). I usually don't have much capacity for another beer after one of these.
Definitely sipping material...and wobbly boot material.

Seth
 
Back
Top