Increasing ABV on current kit AG Caribou Slobber

So the exciting part…getting a used bourbon barrel in the next couple of weeks!!! :smiley: :joy: :heart_eyes: :+1: :tada:

With that…time to get beer in it as soon as it is in my greedy bourbon barrel beer loving hands. Have a Caribou Slobber kit (all grain) on deck, but want to bump up the ABV to make it a little more agreeable for barrel aging.

What is the best approach to increasing the ingredients so that the character stays (besides the higher alcohol, know that will change the outcome some). Is it as easy as just upping everything the same amount, say 10%, as an example, or do the ratios need to be different as the grains will impart their own character at different levels?

Scaling up all of the ingredients, and keeping the fermentor volume the same, will increase the alcohol content and will also intensify flavors. Intensified flavors and a higher alcohol content could be going from a brown ale to a porter.

Caribou Slobber is a good candidate for aging. I would keep the recipe as is if I was getting a good bourbon barrel and just let it age.

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If you had time for some ‘test’ batches consider experimenting with number of a 1 gallon batches (brew a five gallon batch and split it into smaller batches). It’s ‘easy’ to bump the ABV with sugar (see this thread) in the one gallon fermenter. The book Brewing Better Beer (chapter 2) offers some alternative approaches to steeping grains that may be helpful when brewing small test batches with different amounts of steeping grains. Finally, pay attention to the hops / gravity ratio so that it is reasonably consistent between the original recipe and the scaled-up recipe. .

Could try adding 1 lb. of DME which will kick the OG up 8 points, and add an additional oz. of the Liberty hops. Make sure to run your changes through an online recipe creator to see if the balance is similar.
Maybe add about 8oz. of cherrywood smoked malt as well. Love that stuff!

Me did try adding more dme around one pound did increase the abv so final product became a 6.7% insted of 5.6%

Will keep that in mind flars, thanks.

Could have some time smallbatch, and might try to run a few experiments to see what happens with additions.

May just let it roll and only age for a couple of weeks the first run to some subtle oak.

Be sure to have fun if/when you do the experiments - and let us know the results!