Strongest Beer You Have Made?

[THE DRUNK ARAB]

My Golden Carolus clone attempt went from 1.082 to 1.008 using Wyeast 1388, that works out at 9.7% ABV.

C&B
TDA

 

[PostModern]

I am planning to do a Saison (when I can get the b3 out of the shed)

Merc, from this and other posts it sounds like you haven't been brewing much lately. Good to see you back into the swing. How are things with Mercs Own?

For the record, my strongest beer was a 1.100 tripel which fell apart due to chlorophenols from bleach sanitising and poor rinsing of my secondary vessel. It tasted promising out of primary then like band-aids out of secondary.

 

[Cortez The Killer]

Foreign Extra Stout @ 7.1%

I'm finding that I can only have a couple of these - shouldn't have put the cane sugar in it - finished at 1.011

My next few batches I think I'll try and stick to the 4.5-5% mark

Cheers

 

[3GumsBrewing]

Did a Elephant clone a while ago, OG: 1.076 FG:1.004 Approx 9.5%.
It tasted bloody awful. Had to add a dash of lemonade to get it drinkable. Yeeetcchh...
DK

 

[DJR]

I was reading the article in BYO regarding brewing the 20% beer and just wondered what the strongest beers you guys have made. I am planning to do a Saison (when I can get the b3 out of the shed) and am contemplating where I will place it in regards to the Alc content. Trent what yeast did you use for the Saison and what ferment temp?

There's heaps and heaps about Saison on the site - try this thread for starters http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...showtopic=12252 . WLP565/WY3724 although there is a Wyeast VSS 3726 out at the moment which is the other Dupont strain (there is supposedly 3). Pitch at 20-25C and raise to as much as 30C. I'm doing one with WLP565 recultured from Stuster's beer and it's sitting on 23C since it started, it's been 1 and a half or 2 weeks to get from 1060 to 1020, the yeast is slow, but worth it.

Anyway, back OT, the strongest one i've done was a Tripel that started about 1075 and ended up being about 9%.

 

[sinkas]

10.6% Belgian strong "Les Chant des Maldoror", extract, recultured yeast from Unibrou Frigiante, over a year old now, recently had a bottle in Mt Gambier, I had gifted 2 Xmas's ago, amazing.

 

[DarkFaerytale]

Doger Dan's Barley wine, over sparged and i'm pretty sure some kind of infection (altho i can't taste anything wrong just a low final gravity of 1.013)

13.1%

 

[Goat]

I think I might still have abottle of "Les Chants" somewhere at the back of the fridge from the Chrissy Case 2005 (?).

I'll save it for an appropriate occasion and bring it along !

 

[Kai]

I was reading the article in BYO regarding brewing the 20% beer and just wondered what the strongest beers you guys have made. I am planning to do a Saison (when I can get the b3 out of the shed) and am contemplating where I will place it in regards to the Alc content. Trent what yeast did you use for the Saison and what ferment temp?

I brewed one last summer, but went more to the lighter end of the scale (around 5.5-6% iirc). The BJCP guidelines suggest that 8.5% is the higher end of the style, if you use wyeast 3724 then it would eat that sized grist (or higher) for breakfast. Just don't be afraid to raise the temperature when the ferment slows.

In general big beer terms the biggest I have brewed was a barleywine sometime last year. OG 1.100, FG 1.020, 100% trad ale. I used the coopers pale ale bottle yeast and it stomped the ferment home in two weeks. The beer itself is still maturing. General advice I'd offer for a big beer includes mash low (say 63-64C), don't use too much crystal and to make sure you aerate well and use a big healthy starter. Don't let the ferment temperature run away during the initial stages of fermentation, but you may need to raise it as the ferment finishes. Advice for normal yeasts is a little different than for specific saison strains, they tend to perform a little differently in most people's experience.

 

[The King of Spain]

Got a low OG using Galaxy, added LME and ended up with 6%, It just would not stop fermenting!

 

[Trent]

Paul
I used white labs 565 pinched out of Doc's xmas case Saison. I pitched it at 30C odd (chilling mishap) and it fermented at 26C for four weeks. Very slow yeast, but the character it adds is amazing. Very much worth the wait.
All the best
Trent

 

[Tony]

I pitched my IIPA at 1.090 onto a fresh US-56 yeast cake on sunday night and in under 48 hours at 19 deg it has dropped to 1.016.

bloody amazing.

I mashed it at 64 deg which would have helped i guess.

looks like i will get 10 to 11% out of it.

Will rack it over easter and see what it gets down to in secondary.

cheers

 

[Chris]

My Strongest is my Drunk Monk Belgian Strong.
Og 1.084 to 1.012, so 10% with priming sugar.
1214 yeast and 20% CSR brown sugar.
I took it into work with a selection of other beers and got half the bridge design section wobbly during lunch, suprisingly everyone finnished their half glass and a few went back for seconds :chug:
Typical damn engineers

Cheers

Edit: dodgy spelling

 

[haro]

I pitched my IIPA at 1.090 onto a fresh US-56 yeast cake on sunday night and in under 48 hours at 19 deg it has dropped to 1.016.

bloody amazing.

I mashed it at 64 deg which would have helped i guess.

looks like i will get 10 to 11% out of it.

Will rack it over easter and see what it gets down to in secondary.

cheers

That yeast is crazy i recently put down an Indian Pale Ale with U-56 and within 24 hours it was down to 1.012. Pitched at 26 with heaps of aeration. I didn't even get a chance to get its temperature down significantly

 

[brendanos]

RIS (all grain) bottled 12-13% (1.108-1.016). Prominant acetaldehyde and sweet finish, only bottled it in February this year. Nice as a dessert beer atm, though I'm looking forward to aging it for a few years. Brewed it on Christmas Eve, so Christmas this year should be a good trial date.

 

[Tony]

JUst racked my IIPA and its gone from 1.090 to 1.010 in 5 days.

2 weeks in sedondary and in the bottles she goes.

If i can get a couple more points in secondary it will be 11%.

Its a bit harsh ATM but thats to be expected.

Cant wait to try it in 6 months.

cheers

 

[neonmeate]

these days my average beers are about 8-9%... since i took my belgian vows especially... although just bottled my record at the other end of the scale, a 2.5% brett-only berliner.

i think i've made a few over 11% - three barleywines, maybe four or five belgians, (including a saison!), an imperial stout. not very hard to do.

strongest beer i've tried is DFH raison d'extra which was 20% or something stupid - tasted like port. i hate port.

 

[Kingy]

Ag is looking better every day i been trying to do some bigger beers with kits and specialty grains but the higher the sg the higher the fg and all it does is taste a a bit sweeter.

tried rehydrating and all that biz. personally i dont think its worth the effort to rehydrate.

bits and pieces are slowly accumilating in my shed for AG without the missus catching on so hopefully i can get a beer up around these % ages that others are doing.

 

[Adamt]

One thing you can do to lower the FG of big extract beers is use sugars. Sugars will ferment out completely (with a high attenuating yeast) compared to malt extract which contains some hard-to-ferment compounds. Most if not all specialty grains will not ferment very much at all, yielding a higher FG.

 

[crakaz]

1.085 down to 1.015: 9.2% Belgian Dark Strong.

Hi, just a quick question. Have just put down a similar beer with an OG of 1.072. After 5 days @ 21deg. in a temperature controlled environment the SG is only down to 1.054. I have used White Labs liquid Belgian Abbey IV yeast and made a starter. Question is "how long did it take your beer to get to the FG?" The yeast efficiency is 72-84% or so the information says, so it still has quite some way to go.