Alcoholic Warmth, How?

[PanzerBanana]

So I finally have a beer named for something I wanted to do for a while now. I'm looking for ideas on how to get a noticeable, yet pleasant, alcoholic warmth in a brew.

I've been looking around on line and it seems, I've got some Belgian beers to try out. I can't remember the name of it but I had one French beer that had a very definite alcohol character. It was a "lighter" beer but is 13% ABV. It's quite good, and I was thinking they probably added more sugar.

I don't like having to dump in a lot of sugar just to up ABV. However, for my concept the warmth is needed. I know most beers try to avoid that, but I want the beer to be an experience and that's a part of it.

I've had some pretty beefy barley wines that without that much alcohol character, so it's a matter of finding what can put it in the beer.

So whatever fermentables or other things would be great. I won't be trying to make that French brew so other ingredients are fine as long as they can let the alcohol come through.

 

[Edcculus]

For higher alcohol beers that are made right, there is really nothing wrong with adding sugar. Some advocate the use of sugar in Triple IPAs to dry them out a little. The problem with all malt beers above about 8% or 9% is that they will get very sweet.

I brewed a 13% Belgian Golden Strong ( look up the 10.10.10 Devil May Cry brew) that had about 3lbs of sugar added incrementally in 1lb additions to up the ABV. In this case, we were going for a high ABV monster beer, not just some crunk juice.

 

[PanzerBanana]

Did the warmth of the alcohol come through though? I've most got every other part in line.

For this one I don't have an issue with adding the sugar, as long as that warmth comes through. And helping take some of the force out of the sweet will be good. I thought about honey, but I know a lot of the character and aftertaste will come through even though it's fermented most of the way.