Time in secondary

Hi everyone. I've been poking around here for a while and this is my first post. My apologies up front if this has been discussed elsewhere, I couldn't find it if it has.

I've recently tried my first Sour (and also my first partial mash) by brewing the recipe below I found on hopville.com.

http://hopville.com/recipe/804589/flanders-red-ale-recipes/017---flanders-red

I pitched the Roselare right into the primary and let that sit for a month. I then racked into glass over 5 pounds of sour cherries and 2 oak spindles for the secondary. I've read conflicting ideas for how long I should let it sit on the cherries and oak. Some guys in my homebrew club recommended going to a clean tertiary after only a month. I've heard from other places to leave it on the cherries and oak for a year.

Does the hive mind here at HBT have any advice for a Sour freshman? How long should I leave it on the cherries and oak?

2 oak spirals sounds like it may be a lot. I usually use about 1oz of fresh med toast oak cubes in the Flanders reds that I've made. Anything more and it tastes over oaked. Fresh cubes meaning they haven't been boiled or used before in another beer. I added 3oz of cubes to a porter for 3 months and its still undrinkable, even after removing the cubes and sitting for another 2 months. Undrinkable to me at least... Like gnawing on an oak branch.

As far as the cherries go, I'd leave them for a couple of months, then go to a tertiary carboy. I usually go off of taste rather than set timeframes.

Thanks for the advice. I've never oaked a beer before. The guy at my LHBS told me to use both spindles for 5 gallons, though I'm pretty sure he just read the package and didn't have any personal knowledge. I'll probably pull the oak this weekend, then rack to a tertiary in another month or two and let it age out in there, probably bottle in about a year. Thanks again!

cadillacandy said:

I usually go off of taste rather than set timeframes.

Click to expand...

With sours, this really is the way to go.

I've had Flanders Reds in the secondary for 18 months, and I've had Golden Sours in the secondary for 5 months. Just go off your taste and you probably won't mess it up.

I let my sours sit on fruit for about 8 months. They are usually at least 6 months old before I move it on to the fruit.

Oak it if you want, but I don't believe oak is a part of traditional sour. Yes, they are aged in oak barrels, but they are old barrels which have no more oak flavor to give.