solera in corny kegs

[FL_ABG_brewer77]

I've been reading and doing some research about solera.

I'm thinking since I don't have the space or the budget for oak barrels.
I could use my ball lock corny kegs to do this.

My plan is to brew 5 gals of English Barley Wine and let it mature in the keg for six months. then pull 2.5 gal and bottle it. then top that keg off with 2.5 gals of fresh beer. I'd continue this process every six months

I've read that oxidation is a character in solera beers due to the barrels allowing in oxygen. I'm thinking I could take out the pressure release valve on my keg and put in a wooden dowel to allow in some oxygen and then just replace the pressure release valve when I need to carbonate the beer do you think this will work. I was planning on using oak chips or spirals to simulate barrel aging and tasting the beers occasionally to make sure they don't get to oaky.

 

[Stealthcruiser]

Watching!

 

[CadillacAndy]

I probably wouldn't try to intentionally oxidize the beer. I think you'll get plenty of oxygen exposure when you open it to add more beer after each pull. If you're trying to get some oak flavor, I'd use cubes.

I currently use a stainless sanke keg as a lambic solera and it works very well. Since you're working with a clean beer, you shouldn't have to worry with excess pressure building up like you would with a sour beer.

 

[FL_ABG_brewer77]

so would you not seal keg with a little co2..say at 5 psi?

I probably wouldn't try to intentionally oxidize the beer. I think you'll get plenty of oxygen exposure when you open it to add more beer after each pull. If you're trying to get some oak flavor, I'd use cubes.

I currently use a stainless sanke keg as a lambic solera and it works very well. Since you're working with a clean beer, you shouldn't have to worry with excess pressure building up like you would with a sour beer.

 

[CadillacAndy]

so would you not seal keg with a little co2..say at 5 psi?

I would purge and seal the keg for sure. 5 psi sounds fine to me.

 

[jasonclick]

Matthew- just curious how the solera corny keg went? I was wanting to do the same thing.

 

[TAK]

Bumped again. Did you end up doing this?

I'm currently starting a sour solera in glass, but I'm considering starting a Russian Imperial Stout solera in a corny.

 

[FL_ABG_brewer77]

unfortunately I got too busy and never was able to start this project. plus I had moved into a small apartment and didn't really have the space.

I'm now looking to move into a bigger place so hopefully I can start this soon.

I've changed my plan a bit. Instead of brewing this every six months, I'm gong to brew it once a year. so to start this project I'll do the following:

I'll brew batch # 1 and forget about it

in 2016 I'll brew batch #2. batch# 1 will now be 1 year old. I'll pull 2.5 gal from batch# 1 and top it off with 2.5 gal from batch# 2 and so on down the line. hopefully i'll be able to continue this for 5, 10, 20 years

 

[jasonclick]

when you do this are you going to control the temperature?

 

[FL_ABG_brewer77]

yes I have a chest freezer I can put all 7 kegs in for aging and a spare fridge for controlling ferment temp

 

[ruger988]

I assume you would do primary in another vessel, then rack over to the corny once done fermenting? Cold crash first or let some of the yeast stick around to keep working??

 

[jasonclick]

I'm wanting to do a similar thing but I was concerned about temp control. I've got a few small temp control freezers but one is always filled with bottles/cans of beer and the other is my ferm chamber... so no real space for long term storage.

I see your from Jax. Do you belong to the CASK?

 

[ruger988]

Trying to think of a way to carb if you went this route. Wouldn't think you would want to carb the whole 5 gallons every year at bottling time, I guess you could rack to a bottling bucket and pitch new yeast/priming sugar, I hate bottlign that way though after getting used to force carbing.

Anyone think it would be ok to go this route and carb the full keg, bottle 2.5 or so gallons with a beer gun, top it off and wait to repeat again the next year?

 

[jasonclick]

when I've worked this out (in my mind), I imagined pushing (with CO2) half to another keg and forcing carbing that. Then using CO2 to push from the fermenter to the corny that's serving as a solera

 

[FL_ABG_brewer77]

I probably wouldn't try to intentionally oxidize the beer. I think you'll get plenty of oxygen exposure when you open it to add more beer after each pull. If you're trying to get some oak flavor, I'd use cubes.

I currently use a stainless sanke keg as a lambic solera and it works very well. Since you're working with a clean beer, you shouldn't have to worry with excess pressure building up like you would with a sour beer.

how long should I leave the cubes in? should I pull them out when ever I open the corny keg to add fresh beer and then add them back in?

 

[FL_ABG_brewer77]

when I've worked this out (in my mind), I imagined pushing (with CO2) half to another keg and forcing carbing that. Then using CO2 to push from the fermenter to the corny that's serving as a solera

my plan was to transfer 2.5 gal to my 3 gal corny keg, force carbonate the 2.5 gal that's in the small corny and then bottle from there using my beer gun once it's fully carbonated. I would just transfer using an auto-siphon (as oxygen would only be interested during pulls, which in my case would be once a year)