My daughter is now 10 weeks old and I'm looking for ideas of a beer I can brew now that I can leave aging until then. The idea would obviously be to break it out and share it with my friends on her first birthday. She was born on Father's Day this year. I was thinking an Imperial Stout (Ten Fidy clone, or maybe something else...), since it would be able to sit in secondary for a while. Maybe even grab a wood barrel and throw it in that for about 8-9 months? What does everyone think? Imperial stout or something else...
If you're doing a Ten Fidy clone one thing to keep in mind, Ten Fidy is super expensive because it is a first runnings only beer (no sparging), so be prepared to do multiple mashes to hit your boil volume or use a way bigger kettle than you normally would. My daughter will be born in early November. In honor of her birth and for my wife for not drinking beer for 9 months (this was a tough one) I will be brewing my wife's favorite beer, a clone of Firestone Walker Stickey Monkee (A barleywine with Turbinado) and aging it in a combination of freshly emptied Rum, Bourbon and Whisky barrels, and will be doing a blending party with friends and family for the first birthday blend. Planning to do the brewing in December, after I've finished my thesis defense.
