English barley wine - how to mature?

[mgbridges]

Hi guys,

I've just brewed my first all-grain barley wine:
8kg Maris Otter
250g Dark crystal (120L)
1kg Dextrose

90 minute boil

70g Pacific Hallertau @ 60 mins
40g NZ Styrian Goldings @ 30 mins
40g NZ Styrian Goldings @ 15 mins

Pitched onto the entire yeast cake from a batch of best bitter which was brewed with Wyeast 1968 London ESB.

After 2 weeks the SG has dropped from around about 1.100 (my hydrometer only goes up to 1.080 and it was off the scale!) to 1.018 and all activity seems to have ceased, so I think it's pretty much fermented out. It's tasting pretty damned good, although with a little too much hot alcohol, which I hope will mellow out as it matures.

My question is how to mature this sucker. I guess my options are:
- rack to keg now and mature in the keg for as long as I can before counterpressure filling bottles
- bottle it now and bottle-condition

I guess the first one is probably preferable, but I'm not keen on tying up a keg for 6 months to a year.

Any thoughts?

[Mills]

I say force carb and bottle now. I might even fine it first to make sure it is going into the bottle ultra clean.

[BadRock]

I'd prefer to keep it in a keg. This gives you a lot of option in the future plus it makes it easier to pull samples through out the year. But bottles will work fine if you can't spare the keg.

[mgbridges]

Thanks guys. I decided to keg and carb it, so that's what I've done today. Not sure how long I'll keep it in the keg - until I need the keg and I've got enough small bottles I guess. It tastes absolutely awesome though!

Martin