A barleywine to do an Irish Whiskey barrel justice...

[burntgraphite]

Hey everybody,
Since I have just obtained a freshly emptied Irish Whiskey barrel, I went about thinking of the best ways to use that amazing flavor, and decided that #1 would be a barleywine. I'm formulating a recipe for it, but wanted to see what some of y'all might have to say about grain bills and or hops that would meld well with some of those flavors.

What I have on hand;
35# of Golden Promise
2# of Cascade leaf
some odds and ends

Hmm... now that I think of it, irish whiskey barrel plus GP plus cascade might make a match made in heaven. Any thoughts on specialty grains in a decent size barleywine recipe?

 

[fantomlord]

My last barleywine was ~1% pale chocolate, and ~2% British crystal 55. Came out really nice.

 

[drchris83]

Look into October beer. Basically a barleywine strength ale, but 100% pale malt and loads of English noble hops. Marris Otter should be awesome. This is a beautifully simplistic ale and should be amazing with that barrel.

 

[burntgraphite]

Drchris, are you talking about October keeping ales?

I buy boxes of J.W. Lees harvest every year for the cellar... it is divine. And their Lagavulin and Calvados aged aren't any slouched either. That is a fantastic idea.

 

[drchris83]

Please report your results, I'd be thrilled to hear what you ended up doing and how it turned out!

 

[JKaranka]

All tasty pale malt sounds like the way forwards. A tiny tad (<2%) of some interesting malt like Amber or Chocolate could do too. Just in case you get restless.