My Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Ale attempt

I'm sad, my KBBA clone is already almost gone!!! It's been a huge hit. I'm going to have to get started making another batch lol. Problem is, I've recently been trying my hand at AG brewing and loving the process, that I kind of want to try this as an AG now. A little afraid to with the reviews that my clone is spot-on to the original...worried it will not be quite the same.

Wreck, how long did you leave it in the secondary?

I think 2 weeks maybe 3.

subscribed, this looks fantastic. Never tried original but looks great! Will give it a try soon!

Its really good. I'm doing it again soon running low.

Matteo57 said:

subscribed, this looks fantastic. Never tried original but looks great! Will give it a try soon!

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You won't be disappointed, I drank all mine in just a few weeks.

I am going to take a crack at this one in 2 weeks. I'm going to kick it up a notch though and brew it off the first runnings of a partigyle batch.

I brewed this up this morning and it's happily bubbling away already! Just finished getting the oak chips in the Woodford Reserve. Hope it all goes well

Wreck did you dump the bourbon you soaked the cubes in or did you add it too the secondary?

Draken said:

Wreck did you dump the bourbon you soaked the cubes in or did you add it too the secondary?

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I added it all to the secondary, then added a little more bourbon at bottling.

So I've seen so many different recipes through this thread.. I'm gonna try to do it AG, but which one should I use?

Stevo2569 said:

For anybody interested. A little lesson on Oaking your beer. Posted by another member.
http://morebeer.com/content/using_oak_in_beer

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Thanks for the light reading of the evening

I ate at a restaurant in Lexington today after speaking at a meeting, ironically, they served Kentucky Ale Bourbon Barrel on tap, it sounded very interesting so I ordered a glass...WOW! it is absolutely great! after two glasses I was very "happy".
I asked the waitress a dozen questions, explaining that I was a home brewer. She couldn't answer many questions, but a bartender came out to talk to me, he told me that he use to be one of the brewers and after talking for a little bit, he gave me the following details:
A regular pale ale base malt
Caramel 40
Caramel 80
Fuggles
Goldings
ABV 8.4%
I asked him if I could use bourbon soaked staves and he told me that they would work perfectly, but to stay away from the oak chips as they will impart too much oak, too fast (I use the same basic advice when making wines, oak tends to impart too much too fast), staves would be easier to control during fermentation.
I'll use Marris Otter as my base malt and Wyeast Irish Ale Yeast (1084) since it is marketed as an English Ale and Irish Ale.
I bought 3, 4 packs at wally world to bring back to NY, and a bottle of makers mark to soak my staves
In the mean time, i'll try to get a bourbon barrel.

Been out of homebrewing for over a year but got the itch again so Im back in. Im out of town so I dont have my notes but I can post my recipe for a BB clone when I get back. Mine was pretty darn close, maybe a little more bourbon flavor than the original. I use oak chips soaked in makers mark. It took about 3-4 months for my bottles to come to a good flavor but those ~50 I had went fast among family and friends when they did mellow.

Ill post my recipe in a bit. Might have to brew this again for the winter.

Zombie thread, but I just read through the whole thing and had to make a comment.

I was at GABF this year and had KBBA for the first time. Great beer, At the booth they had a poster for the beer and it states the ABV is (may have changed over time) 8.2%, so a starting gravity of 1.070 is way low unless you can get 89% attenuation (per brewtoad).

Which yeast is everyone using?