Barrel-Aging Roll Call

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flyangler18

flyangler18

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I know that a number of us have procured barrels thanks to the efforts of Saccharomyces and Infidel, so I thought it'd be worth discussing/cataloging our efforts in a single thread.

I'll go first:
First up, my English Barleywine (The Leviathan) will be getting racked over to the barrel either today or tomorrow for a length aging, I'm thinking around two months before racking to the keg for further bulk-aging.

Second, I'm thinking a historic porter that I've had bulk-aging will get some short barrel time (2-3 weeks).

Finally, for the coup de grace: Dulle Griet

Sound off, new barrel owners!
 
I got a Rumble full of mead that I made about 6 months ago, ill taste it every month or so... and see how it goes!

I have a whiskey barrel, that Im making sure stays hydrated with cheeeeap whiskey. I brewed JZs brown porter this saturday, and will rack it into the barel (sans cheap whiskey) in about 2 more weeks.

after I think Ill make an RIS or Barley wine.... then move on to an aud brun.
 
My Balcones Distillery barrel is in the mail (thanks to buyers flaking). I already had a Porter planned so that'll be the first to get the barrel aging. I'll have to increase the batch size for topping off due to angel's share.

But I really have no idea on barrel aging. Is it necessary/preferred to let the beer mature a bit first before you put it in the barrel? Do I want to have as little yeast in solution when it goes in the barrel?
 
First batch will be an Arrogant Bastard clone that I'll brew next week. The barrel is full of water till I rack to it in a few weeks to ensure that it does not dry out and start to leak. I plan to run a number of batches through it before it gets used for sour beers...
 
I will be brewing ten gallons of my RIS next week. 5 will go in the barrel to age and 5 will be kegged.

Currently the barrel is sitting with some Jim beam in it to keep it wet.
 
I have a quick and dirty barleywine to rack to it in a week or so.
Depending on the character I get, I may go with a Baltic Porter or a Tripel a al Allagash Curieux.

Eventually this will be a sour project barrel.
 
I also brewed a brown porter for my Rumble barrel. Right now it's sitting with some Bacardi to soak up the staves a bit, and probably a week or two will get that porter.

After that, I'll probably rotate some meads in and out of it before I start making sours as well.
 
I've got two barrels. One will have an English Barleywine go into it in about a month or so. The other I will put Denny's Bourbon Vanilla Imperial Porter in. Still need to brew that one though.

Ashz-
Any plans to blend the two RIS's or leaving one as a "control"?
 
I had a keg of Gatos Locos Imperial Stout aging in a keg I threw into one of the barrels, I racked it last Saturday after 23 days in the barrel and it's perfect. Whiskey head, nutty and vanilla flavors from the oak, slightly astringent finish from the oak tannins which helps to offset the sweetness of this beer which finished at 1.031.

At the same time I tossed in an Irish Red into the other barrel, after 4 weeks in the barrel it still needs more time. The only way to really know is just by tasting and racking when you feel it's done. :)

Oh, one other thing, the opening of the barrel is not quite large enough to use an autosiphon, so you need to use a racking cane (or the cane from an autosiphon) and prime it with water or sanitizer to rack out of the barrel.
 
Saccharomyces said:
I had a keg of Gatos Locos Imperial Stout aging in a keg I threw into one of the barrels, I racked it last Saturday after 23 days in the barrel and it's perfect. Whiskey head, nutty and vanilla flavors from the oak, slightly astringent finish from the oak tannins which helps to offset the sweetness of this beer which finished at 1.031.

At the same time I tossed in an Irish Red into the other barrel, after 4 weeks in the barrel it still needs more time. The only way to really know is just by tasting and racking when you feel it's done. :)

Oh, one other thing, the opening of the barrel is not quite large enough to use an autosiphon, so you need to use a racking cane (or the cane from an autosiphon) and prime it with water or sanitizer to rack out of the barrel.
Click to expand...

or get a smaller autosyphon :)
 
I have two 15 gallon wine barrels, one has a Lambic in it and the other has a Flemish Red in it. The lambic I am going to leave in there for 3 years and make another lambic every year until I can blend a gueuze. The red I plan to leave in there for a year, then bottle it up except for 5 gal I will put on cherries. Once the red is out of that barrel I will put another lambic in it and I also have a ten gallon wine barrel that I haven't put anything in yet. I have a pyment I think I will put in there until it is time to fill it with lambic.
 
Getting ready to brew ~70 gallons of Wee Heavy on December 6th for our next barrel brew. This time we're hoping to score a Buffalo Trace or Maker's barrel.
 
Hopefully sometime next year I will be able to put my Foreign Extra Stout in some good bourbon barrel. At work the old owner still has 7 Buffalo Trace barrels in our warehouse for some reason. I need to convince him to give me one or sell me one cheap.
 
I have a brown porter that will go into mine soon. It's the second half of the same batch jezter6 has. I'll probably put it in after Thanksgiving.
 
Might be worth a new thread but what adjustments do you make when brewing for barrel aging?

ABV- Higher gravity and higher alcohol? Since the alcohol will go down due to angel's share and since we're aging a beer for a while it seems to make sense. Is there a minimum ABV% you would brew for barrel aging? 6%? 7%? More? Sacc mentioned that the higher the ABV the faster the flavors seem to be extracted from the barrel.

Body - Should we adjust the body? Will the beer come out of the barrel with more/less/the same amount of body as when it went in? Seems losing some alcohol might have the perception of more body but I'm just guessing.

Sweetness - Adjust the sweetness to balance the wood/whiskey flavors?

Hops - Keep aroma/flavor additions on the low side so they're not 'in the way' or on the high-side since they'll mellow with all the aging?

Anything else?
 
I have barrel envy. I did not get one from the group buy, but I do have a 1/3 share of the 65G lambic barrel project in Claphamsa's basement.
 
Just for s**ts, I tossed a Black Project Stout into mine on Tuesday for 8 days. I need to pick up some Jim Beam to keep it wet until I figure what else to brew in it. I hope it picks up some slight oak and bourbon flavors.
 
I brewed an RIS yesterday afternoon that will wind up in that barrel in a couple weeks. (as a secondary). In the meantime, I have a handle of Rebel Yell rolling around in there.

I hope to get another, not-so-sour beer out of that barrel, as well, but I understand that can be a bit of a crapshoot. I have an English Barleywine recipe that I would like to get into there, if I can. I may lose my nerve and just put a sour mash beer in there.

Ultimately, though, I will go to the bugs and start fermenting some weird and wonderful things in there.


TL
 
I have a 10 liter oak barrel that I am going to rack a portion of my latest barelywine into in the coming days. Its O.G. was 1.095 and has been in the primary since 10/27/09. Up until a couple days ago the barrel contained 90 proof spirits (which had been in there for 4+ months). I assume this killed the majority of the bugs so I don't plan on doing any additional cleaning/sanitizing before racking. Am I crazy? If I do get some funk, I suppose this will just add to the complexity...
 
Jumbo82 said:
I have a 10 liter oak barrel that I am going to rack a portion of my latest barelywine into in the coming days. Its O.G. was 1.095 and has been in the primary since 10/27/09. Up until a couple days ago the barrel contained 90 proof spirits (which had been in there for 4+ months). I assume this killed the majority of the bugs so I don't plan on doing any additional cleaning/sanitizing before racking. Am I crazy? If I do get some funk, I suppose this will just add to the complexity...
Click to expand...

The barrel proof spirits were about 130 proof, so yeah I don't think you need to worry about anything. Neither of my beers is having any signs of infection after going into the barrel, though the Irish Red is getting a bit oxidized so I am planning on krausening it when I move it back to the keg to remove the oxidation.
 
Be sure to keep the barrels topped up guys! That means that you have little to zero head space. Crack a beer, top the barrel and then drink the rest. :mug:

Oh yeah, I am planning a barleywine or a belgian quad. Haven't had the pleasure of doing that yet.
 
Or, you can use a wine preserver to purge the headspace after filling and after taking samples, which is what I am doing.

After this first round, I will use my Beer Gun to purge the barrels with CO2 before filling. If you have the means this is a good idea, otherwise you may want to consider moving into the barrel while you still have enough yeast in suspension to take up the oxygen picked up in the transfer.
 
^ He's right. But do remember that the barrel is exchanging oxygen in and out every time there is a temperature change, so don't expect any gas to remain around too long. It is like the airlock liquid. It doesn't last forever ;)

Technically, depending on the length of time you are going to barrel age, you could do what the wine guys do and add a little bit of SO2. Say 10ppm. That would make it so that your beer isn't quite as prone to oxidation in the long term. Also, that small amount will go away with any transfer that you do and also means that you would still be able to bottle condition if you see fit. Just rack into your bottling bucket (splashing along the way of course) and then get your yeast ready and bottle away.
 
Re: oxygen permeability of the barrels,

A wine barrel is 15-25 cc/L/year;
A 20L whiskey barrel is 30-50 cc/L/year;
An HDPE ale pail is 220 cc/L/year;
A 5 gallon glass carboy with an airlock and stopper is about 20 cc/L/year.

(Source: Wild Brews by Jeff Sparrow)

So, aging in a large oak barrel is about the same as aging in glass, and a small barrel with twice the surface area to volume ratio is about 2x glass but significantly lower than plastic. I wish I could find Better Bottle statistics as well, but I haven't found any sources that quote its permeability (and the mfg just beats around the bush by saying it's "comparable" to glass... sheesh... and I suspect that only holds true if you use their uber-expensive check valve in place of an airlock, since the airlock/stopper lets in 99% of what gets into a glass carboy).
 
Kilted Brewer said:
I've got two barrels. One will have an English Barleywine go into it in about a month or so. The other I will put Denny's Bourbon Vanilla Imperial Porter in. Still need to brew that one though.

Ashz-
Any plans to blend the two RIS's or leaving one as a "control"?
Click to expand...


I plan on aging the other as well but in a keg. So yes more of a control than anything. I have brewed this a couple times and know what it's like so I think the aging in the barrel will go great. Last batch I did of this aged 7 months, keg conditioned and it was awsome, so I am shooting for 7 months. We'll see if I can last that long. :)
 
I'm brewing up a strong ale tonight and that will be followed by Denny's Bourbon Vanilla Porter. This is going to be cool!!
 
Keep in mind the 5 gallon barrels were only used once, and they are double the surface area to volume ratio of a 53 gallon Bourbon barrel so the beer will take on the oak character twice as fast. Past three or four weeks, you may get too much oak and it will completely overwhelm even the strongest beers, so make sure you sample at least weekly and decide when enough is enough.
 
I purchased one the second go-around. I'm looking for a RIS or Baltic Porter recipe to brew this weekend and age in the barrel for a bit. Any suggestions would be appreciated:mug:
 
Many thanks to Ed at Brewmaster's Warehouse. Here's the six gallon recipe to be brewed this Sat.

16.8# MO
14.4 oz. roasted barley
9.6 oz C-60
7.2 oz chocolate

Maginum 2 oz @60
U.S. Goldings 2 oz @8
U.S. Goldings 2 oz @3

yeast 2L 1056 starter

Any additions/substractions

Thanks
 
I just got my barrel. I have a smoked porter sitting in a corny right now naturally carbonating. It finished a bit high, so I'm thinking about pulling it out of the corny and putting it into the barrel with some more yeast and let it go for another couple weeks, seeing if I can bring it down a bit while adding some delicious oak flavor. The vanilla smell from these barrels is outstanding. It shouldn't be a problem to ferment in the barrel, right?
 
Hugh_Jass said:
I purchased one the second go-around. I'm looking for a RIS or Baltic Porter recipe to brew this weekend and age in the barrel for a bit. Any suggestions would be appreciated:mug:
Click to expand...

baltic porter:

15 lbs german two row pilsner
1/2 lb dextrin
12 oz. 65L german dark crystal malt
4 oz. black malt
4 oz. chocolate malt
4 oz. german munich malt

1/4 oz lublin hops 90 minutes
1/4 oz lublin hops 15 minutes

wyeast 2308 munich lager or
wyeast 2206 bavarian lager

cheers

Lucas
 
My Arrogant Bastard clone went on on Saturday. I plan to start tasting after 2 weeks... you all think this is about right, or should i try sooner???
 

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