Bottle condition barrel aged beers?

Discussion in 'Homebrewing' started by thetomG, Oct 1, 2012.

Tags:
Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.
  1. thetomG

    thetomG Savant (1,051) Feb 17, 2010 Illinois

    About a month ago I bottled a barleywine that I'd aged in a small 5 gallon bourbon barrel. Decided to crack one open the other day to see how it was coming along only to notice that there was very little carbonation - the beer smelled and tasted great, but it was almost totally flat. I guess it might be possible that's its just moving along slowly and could yet gain a bit more carbonation, but after speaking with some friends I'm thinking I might have needed to add more yeast in at bottling time in order for it to carbonate - it was suggested that most of the yeast likely died off/settled into the wood so when I transferred from barrel to the bottling bucket, virtually no viable yeast was brought over to bottle condition the beer with.
    I don't yet have any kegging equipment (but I am looking) so what might I be able to do in the meantime to alleviate this issue on future barrel aged batches?
    I'm wondering if it might work to sort of rouse what's in the barrel a bit before transferring into the bottling bucket... would that do the trick? Would I be better served just adding fresh yeast into the beer at bottling time, or maybe using a krausening method like the one mentioned here: http://www.winning-homebrew.com/krausening.html
    thanks in advance for any input you might be able to provide...
    cheers!
     
    #1 thetomG, Oct 1, 2012
  2. cmmcdonn

    cmmcdonn Initiate (0) Jun 21, 2009 Virginia

    What are the og/fgs of the beers you made? what yeast did you use? This is important to answer your question.

    If you aren't at or above the alc tolerance of the yeast used, you shouldn't need to add more. I've yet to read on here (or HBT) of a case where bottles truly didn't carb because of yeast falling out of suspension.
     
    #2 cmmcdonn, Oct 1, 2012
  3. leedorham

    leedorham Initiate (0) Apr 27, 2006 Washington

    A friend of mine recently packaged a bourbon barrel aged stout. IIRC - At packaging time he blended it 3:1 barrel aged stout to freshly fermented stout (i.e. 15 gallons BA stout and 5 gallons non-ba stout) then primed and bottled as normal. I sampled a bottle and the carbonation was perfect.
     
    #3 leedorham, Oct 1, 2012
  4. thetomG

    thetomG Savant (1,051) Feb 17, 2010 Illinois

    OG: 1.106
    FG: 1.012

    Used two packets of re-hydrated Safale S-04
     
    #4 thetomG, Oct 1, 2012
Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.