Oak Aging

Alright, I've done some looking around and can't exactly find what I'm looking for on this subject. If you know of a thread please direct me.

What I'm thinking about doing is oaking a robust porter. It will have been in the primary for 2 weeks on this Sunday and I want to rack it onto some bourbon soaked cubes.

What type of cubes would be best for this and how many oz of them should I use if I want to keg it in about 2 months.

I think I want to soak them in makers mark also. Should I just follow another good known bourbon porter recipe and use that much bourbon on top of the cubes for a few days?

Thanks in advance,
J

i dont know the answer to your question, but the idea sounds awesome. would love to know the recipe and the answer about the cubes.

couple of threads on this site that should help out, google it also. Usually people go pretty light on the oak because it can overpower a beer really fast.

I did find this thread discussing oak chips and cubes.

In my experience, oak chips release a ton of oak flavor in a big hurry. I recently brewed this very same kind of beer... a robust porter racked onto bourbon soaked oak chips.

I used 3/4 Cup of bourbon and 1 oz of American Oak chips. I left the beer on the chips for two weeks before bottling.

The flavor right now is Waaay too much bourbon and a smidge too much oak. However, this is the kind of beer that's going to have to sit and mellow for a while before it's fair to judge. But I'll give you this... one ounce of oak chips at two weeks in a five gallon porter is plenty at the onset.

It's my understanding that oak cubes work more slowly since they've been somewhat used up by whatever vessel they were used for. I haven't used them, but the wine makers site I checked out said they're slowly and impart "darker" flavors, whatever the hell that means.

I do 1 ounce per 5 gallons, and have also soaked with MM - makes a damn fine beer!

I'd start with 1 ounce and go from there. Remember, you can always add more, but you can never take away.

Cubes give you a more rounded flavor, because they are toasted as oak staves before being cut up for cubes, and therefore have several layers of toast going on that give you the different levels of flavor. Chips are toasted in an oven and have one toast level, giving you one dimension of flavor.

Brew Strong had a good show about this as well. Not that I'm biased or anything ...
http://thebrewingnetwork.com/shows/Brew-Strong/Brew-Strong-09-15-08-Wood-Aging

Never done any oak aging myself but I've been told if you microwave the oak chips in some water until it is boiling and then allow them to steep for a while it will 'age' the oak chips a bit. Dump out the water and then use the oak chips.

This is my experience/recommendation with this. For a porter I would take 1-1.5 oz oak and put it in a mason jar or small tuper ware and cover it with just enough makers mark to soak it all. Leave it in the fridge for two weeks strain the chips out and save the liquor. Add the chips and let em sit for about 10 days and taste to see where its at. Then after how ever long you want to let it condition taste again and see whether or not you want to add any of the liquor solution. For me that was a better way to integrate a milder bourbon/oak character into a beer without overwhelming it from the beginning.

One of the best threads here on wood aging.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/tips-wood-aging-119445/

emacgee said:

This is my experience/recommendation with this. For a porter I would take 1-1.5 oz oak and put it in a mason jar or small tuper ware and cover it with just enough makers mark to soak it all. Leave it in the fridge for two weeks strain the chips out and save the liquor. Add the chips and let em sit for about 10 days and taste to see where its at. Then after how ever long you want to let it condition taste again and see whether or not you want to add any of the liquor solution. For me that was a better way to integrate a milder bourbon/oak character into a beer without overwhelming it from the beginning.

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Yeah, I think I'm going to do a bourbon vanilla oak porter.
I'm thinking:

1) 1.25 oz medium toast french cubes soaked in MM for a week or two.
2) Toss into secondary for about 10 days.
3) Taste for flavor. If not enough, keep it going for a week or so.
4) In the last week of oaking I'm going to add 3 vanilla beans sliced in half and cut into thirds (in a hop bag.)
5) Add left over MM to taste at time of kegging.

I'm thinking this whole process will be over a period of about 1 to 2 months. Sound right?

Does this sound like too much flavor into one beer?

McKBrew said:

One of the best threads here on wood aging.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/tips-wood-aging-119445/

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Awesome man. Thanks.

Depending on your gravity, I'd say 4-5 months for the oak aging. At least, that is how long I go. The cubes will give up all of their flavor in 6-8 months, and at 1-2 you are just starting to scratch the surface of what goodies they can bring to the table. Otherwise that sounds like a great beer to me!

Jipper said:

Depending on your gravity, I'd say 4-5 months for the oak aging. At least, that is how long I go. The cubes will give up all of their flavor in 6-8 months, and at 1-2 you are just starting to scratch the surface of what goodies they can bring to the table. Otherwise that sounds like a great beer to me!

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Alright, this is what I've had a problem finding out. I've read at about two months the oak flavor starts to come out in cubes, but If I wanted to speed that up I could use chips right? See, I'm wanting to turn this over by Christmas or new years. Like I said before, it will be ready to be racked to the secondary this Sunday.

Do you think that's possible?

If so, how would you do it?


This is what I'm thinking,

3 oz House toast french cubes soaked in MM for a week. After that, I'm going to just pull small tastes every so often until I've got a keg open for it. If it's new years, I'll keg it around new years if it's later, I'll do it later. Since this is my first oak aging, I'd rather under-do-it than over-do-it. Also, like I said before I'll put the whiskey in to taste at time of kegging.

The flavors start to come out right away, but the longer the cube sit, the more depth comes out as well. And it could be that in 2 months the flavor is just where you want it.

Chips are done in about a week. So what you could do is use cubes now, and if you need more oak by serving time, toss half an ounce of chips in there for a week.

Jipper said:

The flavors start to come out right away, but the longer the cube sit, the more depth comes out as well. And it could be that in 2 months the flavor is just where you want it.

Chips are done in about a week. So what you could do is use cubes now, and if you need more oak by serving time, toss half an ounce of chips in there for a week.

Click to expand...

Sounds good.

Thanks,
J

I have NB Oaked Bourbon Porter in secondary right now.
It came with 2ounces of American Oak cubes and directions call for a pint of bourbon(Makers Mark).
I put the oak cubes and the bourbon in a sanitized mason jar for a week then added it all to secondary. All the reviews say to leave it in secondary no longer than 10 days.

Hmm. I actually just made 5 gallons of my 10 gallons chocolate vanilla yesterday, but i have another five still sitting in the primary that I dont plan on kegging for a couple of months. I think I'm going to oak it in about a week and just check every now and then for flavor. when it's good, I'll rack it off. I'll also add the borbon to taste at time of kegging.

That should be fine too, just go really easy on the bourbon. I think of bourbon beer flavors as going in this order: Beer, oak, bourbon. O course, it's all up to you, but be careful.