Oak Ageing my Stout

[Jekster]

So, I decided to Oak Age two gallons of my Oatmeal Breakfast Stout from this thread:

http://www.homebrewchatter.com/board/showthread.php?t=2989

I ran off the uncarbed beer into two 1 gallon Carboys:

http://www.homebrewchatter.com/board/picture.php?albumid=71&pictureid=540

I then boil some water and turn it down to low heat and added one ounce of oak cubes to steam / sanatize:

No pic cause I did this later in the night after I had a few beers and didn't think to snap a pic.

Added half the cubes to each gallon carboy and now it's time to wait:

http://www.homebrewchatter.com/board/picture.php?albumid=71&pictureid=541

http://www.homebrewchatter.com/board/picture.php?albumid=71&pictureid=542

This is my first stint at Oak Ageing anything. I'm going to give it a couple days and then take a taste from each batch. Once it has the desired amount of oak flavor I'm going to add some Bourbon to one gallon and then bottle each up as my special reserve. ;) It will be neat to try the original out of the keg and each of the different ones from bottles. Should be fun.

[Ronthered]

cool, glad you went thru with it

[Ó Flannagáin]

Fekkin sweet, dude

[MrMarbleHead]

Dude next time just soak the oak in the bourbon to sanitize it. I did that with some oak (but used brandy) i used in a wine i made and it turned out well.

I didn't know you had this project going on, let me know when you get this one finished.

[landis]

This sounds like a great experiment. I think next go-round with an oatmeal stout I'm going to try the same thing

[PseudoChef]

Dude next time just soak the oak in the bourbon to sanitize it. I did that with some oak (but used brandy) i used in a wine i made and it turned out well.

I didn't know you had this project going on, let me know when you get this one finished.

Soaking oak in spirits isn't enough to sanitize them.

If you're super concerned, you want to steam the oak before adding it.

[MrMarbleHead]

Soaking oak in spirits isn't enough to sanitize them.

If you're super concerned, you want to steam the oak before adding it.

Why not?

[PseudoChef]

They went over it on this podcast: Brew Strong: Oak Aging (http://thebrewingnetwork.com/shows/Brew-Strong/Brew-Strong-09-15-08-Wood-Aging).

[MrMarbleHead]

OH goodie in pocast format, because i listen to so many of them, So Again I ask Why?

[PseudoChef]

Eat some balls.

You're probably fine, on second thought. I know some people have said that it's not sufficient because it might not penetrate (twss) the wood all the way, but looking around in multiple places it seems tons of people have done it with no ill effects. People have even just thrown the oak in there without anything and been fine.

[Ó Flannagáin]

What's interesting is I got my oak barrel and I just swelled and rinsed out with cold water. No sanitation what soever. The first beer I put in it didn't have any bugs and turned out awesome. Now all the beers I've put in have bugs, but they still taste great.

[Jekster]

This project is going really well. I was scared during the first three days because I was getting a super tannin oak taste and almost some astringency out of my samples.

However, at about day 4 everything mellowed and the oak character blended in better with the beer. Now, I smell a slight bit of oak with a mellow toastyness. I can then taste every single complex flavor in the beer after I taste a nice slight oak flavor. The cubes have been in for a week lastnight and I'm going to sample again later today. I think I'm going to take them out either today or tomorrow.

WOP: I didn't want Bourbon soak because I wanted some with only an oak flavor. At bottling I'm going to use an eye dropper to add a slight bit of bourbon to half of the batch. That way I have three versions of the beer: 1. Original, 2. Oak Aged, 3. Bourbon Oak Aged. Should be fun to taste in flights. =D