hi, just got Stones Old Guardian barley wine recipe. the recipe is for all grain and i lack both experience and equipment to pull this off. It calls for 21 pounds, 9.6 ounces crushed North American two-row pale malt and 14.4 ounces crushed 60L crystal malt. Any ideas on how i could do this with extract? thanks for any advice.
If you post the complete recipe with O.G. and batch size it will be easier to adjust.
Use software to calculate it. Pretty easy, steep the 60L and use the lightest extract you can find to get to the correct OG.
This sounds like it will be a lot darker than old guardian though. I’m suprised there is 60L in there.
ok thanks, will post full recipe. Any recommendations for software?
Stone Old Guardian Barley Wine
5 gallons (about fifty-four 12-ounce bottles or thirty 22-ounce bottles)
· 21 pounds, 9.6 ounces crushed North American two-row pale malt
· 14.4 ounces crushed 60L crystal malt
· About 10 gallons plus 8 cups water
· 1.69 ounces Warrior hops (15.0% alpha acid)
· ½ teaspoon Irish moss
· 1.94 ounces Crystal hops (3.5% alpha acid)
· 1 (35 ml) package White Labs WLP007 Dry English Ale Yeast or WLP002 English Ale Yeast
· 1 cup plus 3 tablespoons light dried malt extract
I can’t stress it enough: clean and sanitize everything.
Mashing
In a 10-gallon brew kettle, combine the crushed malts with 7 gallons plus 1 cup of 161°F water. The water should cool slightly when mixed with the grain. Cover and hold the mash at 148°F for 90 minutes.
For safety’s sake, set up your propane burner outside. Set the brew kettle of mash on top and heat to 160°F, stirring frequently to avoid scorching. Turn off the heat. The mash will continue to increase in temperature to about 165°F.
Lautering and Sparging
Lauter the mash according to the instructions on page 159. Once the liquid is lower than the level of the grain, begin to slowly sprinkle 3 gallons plus 7 cups of 168°F water over the grains to start the sparge. Continue sparging as instructed on page 159.
The Boil
Set the brew kettle of wort on your outdoor propane burner and add water to bring the wort level up to 7 gallons, if needed. Bring the wort to a rapid, rolling boil. As it begins to come to a boil, a layer of foam and scum may develop at the surface. Skim it off and discard. Once the wort is at a full boil, put a hops bag containing the Warrior hops in the kettle and set a timer for 1 hour and 45 minutes. Stir the wort frequently during the boil, and be watchful to avoid boilovers.
At 15 minutes before the end of the boil, stir in the Irish moss. When the boiling time is over, turn off the heat and put a hops bag containing the Crystal hops in the kettle. Cover the kettle and immediately begin cooling the wort quickly (see page 160).
Pitching the Yeast and Fermentation
Once the wort has cooled to 72°F, discard the spent hops and check the specific gravity of the wort with a hydro-meter. The target starting gravity is 1.103 (24.5 Plato).
Transfer the wort to the primary fermentation bucket according to the instructions on page 160. Pitch the yeast (or prepare a yeast starter) according to the instructions on page 160.
Allow the wort to ferment through primary and secondary fermentation (see page 160) at 72°F until it reaches a specific gravity of 1.016 (4 Plato).
Bottling
When you’re ready to bottle, clean and sanitize the bottles, caps, and bottling equipment. Put the dried malt extract in a medium saucepan and stir in just enough water to dissolve it. Bring the mixture to a boil over high heat. Remove from the heat, cover, and let cool slightly. Proceed with bottling according to the instructions on page 161.
have the book, i got this from http://www.notsoprofessionalbeer.com/20 … ebrew.html (didnt want to type it all out)
BeerSmith makes conversions like this pretty easy. I’m sure other programs do too, but it’s what I use.
Using its conversion tool, it tells me to swap the pale malt with 12 # 4 oz of of extra pale dry extract. However, I would consider swapping some of that for sugar, as that much extract will be difficult if not impossible to ferment out to 1.014. That with the crystal steeped gives an SRM of 10.6. I’ve not had this beer, so I don’t know if that’s too dark.
I would advise pitching cooler than 72 and pitching a huge starter. One vial of yeast may eventually get this going, but I wouldn’t risk it. I like to pitch fresh slurry from a 1.050 or so beer on beers this big.
If trying to convert all grain to extract try to always steep all the specialty grains (crystal & roasted malts). To convert the base malt to DME multiply the number of lbs of base malt x 0.67. To convert to LME multiple the number of lbs of base malt x 0.75.
This should get you pretty close to where you want to be. If you plug the recipe into a program you can tweak then numbers up or down to get you to the OG you desire. Most of the time you want to use the lightest DME or LME you can find.
I agree with BR in that I’d swap out around a pound of that DME for table sugar.
The real key for a beer like this is pitching enough yeast. If you aren’t going to make a starter, 1 pack/vial of yeast is NOT going to do it. Times that by three at least.
sweet so get beer smith (for now i’ll use x .67) so DME seems to be the consensus, should i do briess golden light or muntons extra light? i built a little stir plate that i used to pitch for a belgian strong golden ale bottling that on saturday. From what i’ve read 24 hours seems to be universal for pitching, is that pretty true or is that wrong. sorry for all the questions i’m still new to brewing. thanks again for all the advice
I would definitely use Munton’s Extra Lt. I do not like Briess Golden light.
As far as stirplate, what I would do for a beer of this size is make a starter with 1 pack of yeast and let it run for 24-36 hours. THEN, I would turn off the stirplate and wait 2-3 days for the yeast to drop out. I would decant the spent wort and make another batch of starter wort, add it to the yeast, and run that for 24 hours before pitching the whole thing.
