A couple of years ago, I struggled to find oak chips. Now, our local home brew shop has gone under, and the bin inn has a good, but basic selection that just doesn't quite cut it. If you're looking to get from most of the online stores, they want to sell the spiral thingies that seem like I'm paying quite a lot for the parts of the wood that are sitting on the machine shop floor. So, I make rum. I only make the same recipe, and I make enough over summer that I don't need to brew over winter when it's cold. I bought myself a used wine barrel (white wine, french oak) over the summer just gone (I'm also in NZ!). The idea is that I fill the barrel, (I won't quite make it this summer), and then, each summer I bottle some at the beginning of the season and top it up with fresh rum, kind of using it like a solara cask. Like I say, this is the first year, but the rum is already drinking quite well. Also, the cost of filling a 40 gal barrel will be fairly... significant. If you're looking to make lots of different spirits, and play with wood and aging and peat and .... Then this is probably not the option for you.
Could you replace a jar lid with a wooden lid that has a wooden rod poking down into the spirit? That would allow it to breath more and work with temperature & pressure. Interesting experiment maybe?
I’ve definitely thought about that! I want to turn a lid that seals well to a jar and use a cube of oak for more surface area (I like to keep a certain ratio of surface area to volume). I figure you’d get some breathing with temp and weather as well as angel’s share and oxidation.
I use mason jars and replace the metal kids with balsa wood. The balsa wood can be cut with scissors. There is definitely an angel's share exchange going on. I had a batch that was way over-oaked and one day I looked and the levels had gone down significantly. I tried it and it's much smoother. Also, the wine guys have a lot to say about tannins and polymerization - worth while reading.
I have noticed the same bite at the end of the flavor profile with staves. I use glycerin and Mexican vanilla to help round the finish. Feels like a cheat but seems to work. Thanks for the video and confirming my own observations!
Nice. This was a good video for a more advanced distiller/mead maker/wine maker like me. So far I have only made clear spirits, aside from apple brandies, in which I flavor them with both fresh and baked apples with the skin left on the apples, which the ethanol saps the color out and turns a vibrant red. I also spice my Apple Pie Brandy. I leave the flavorings to steep for 3-4 days and then strain it out with cheesecloth. I use a tad of brown sugar to offset the astringency of the spices, and use apple juice to 'water it down' from the ~75-80% abv which it comes out of the still down to a more reasonable 50%abv. I have already purchased broken up pieces of Jack Daniel's charred barrels to oak age future corn whiskies and rums. The cost of barrels is fairly high. But worth the price as I would be leaving it to age for a year or more. I'm nearing the end of my mead stash, so it's time to get some new brews fermenting, both meads and rums and vodkas... Honestly, home distillation is great as it enables you to create liquors exactly to your personal taste.. Although I DO know of some AMAZING locally made gin and vodka which are well worth buying from my province's LCBO. I have some juniper berries frozen in my freezer which I picked last summer from my own trees with plans to make a gin using them.. It is nice to use my own grown ingredients in my creations. Both culinary and alcohol. I am by no means a heavy drinker. I honestly enjoy the process of making it FAR more than I enjoy being drunk.. The biological and chemical processes are far more interesting and fun to watch than getting hammered..
In physics it's often useful to take a scenario to an extreme to understand what is going on. So imagine putting a full barrel into a fire, the outside will heat up quickly, that heat will push out any held liquid into the barrel and then begin heating the inside of the barrel. If you put the jar into a fire the liquid near the glass will heat up some then diffuse into cooler liquid inside the jar, it will be some time before the stave temperature is changed and that expelling of wood juice. The big difference in thinking about this for me is the thing being heated is solid in one example and liquid in another and the physics of how a solid heats is quite a bit different than a gas or a liquid because of fluid dynamics. You can also think of it in terms of thermal mass, the outside of a barrel heats up to room temperature more quickly than the liquid in side. There's always a gradient so long as the outside temperature is changing. If you were to look at the temperature of the stave in relation to the liquid around it and also consider the outside temperature I think you would find a very small gradient between the stave and its surroundings even when you have a large gradient to the outside. In other words I don't think the stave sees as much variation as the barrel does in temperature because the liquid it is in is buffering that temperature change. If that made any sense what so ever. The thing that is really going to bake your noodle later on is when you realize we are trying to discover and improve the science behind a process that was just picked because barrels are more durable and available than clay pots and done entirely through centuries of trial and error.
I use staves but only because I don’t seem to be able to source barrels as a hobby distiller. I must do a bit of research to see where I can get a barrel here in New Zealand to make a fair comparison.
I'm also interested to know if you've ever tried a different form of wood - chips. I've been using wood chips that have a significantly higher surface area relative to the wood staves.
I can't get rid of the feeling that most of the discussions miss the point "air contact surface"... there's lots of talk regarding wood amount, barrel surface and so on... fish tank pumps are a seperate topic all the time, and bland product after filtering multiple times is a thing as well. From sherry soleras we know they're never filled completely and we know whisky barrels are filled up to reduce air impact over years of time - which we won't spend in most cases...
Barrels loose some to the Angel's share. (concentration of flavors) That doesn't happen as much in a sealed glass jar with a couple sticks of charred wood. Just sayin'
If I was going to make whisky, my main focus would be on developing a recipe, one very small batch at a time until I found something really good. Then perfecting that recipe. If each batch takes longer than a few weeks or a month, this whole process turns into years and decades... not very practical.
Great topic, Jesse. We home distillers think we are aging whiskey with oak staves, chips and/or spirals, but we are really infusing the spirit with wood that is slowly dissolving in spirit. When wood acts as the barrier between the spirit and outside air interesting things start to happen. Wood is porous as you state and barometric pressure and temperature affect oxygen transmission. As evaporation occurs inside the barrel, there is more headspace and therefore more oxygenation at the air/liquid boundary. Most distillers do not top up their barrels and the angel’s share can be substantial. If you want to judge what oxygen does to a spirit, pour a dram, taste and smell, then let it sit for 15 minutes. Smell and taste again. You will notice the difference. For me, it’s barrels, or old barrels with staves inside. Cheers!
Wonder if you could rig up a toasted wooden "head" for the jar in addition to the staves? Then you'll be getting the angel's share passing through the wood.
I may be jumping the gun; throwing out the opinions before watching the video conclusions (see if we match up :)) Oak aging is a matter of surface contact to volume ratio. So, as the container itself gets smaller, there's far more surface contact than there is volume. This can lead to "over oaking" or maturing faster. So those 2 - 10 liter barrels that are all the rage these days are mostly decorative novelty items. After a month or two it's over-oaked. As the volume of the container goes up, the surface contact goes down. So a larger container can take years without much issue. The 5 gallon/23 liter barrels a lot of craft distillers use tend to be great for about 6-9 months of aging/maturation although I've seen a few places age for 1 year with them. The next step up though is triple the size 15 gallons/68 liters is what Whiskey Del Bac uses in Tucson, AZ (I buy the used ones for mead aging) Those are usually aging for about 1-2 years. With some things lasting a little over 2 years. My mead, keeping in mind it's being aged indoors without major fluctuations in temps, has gone about 8 months now and is almost ready to come out. Oh, forgot to mention; the alternatives are chips, cubes, spirals, and staves. In order, I prefer Staves, Spirals, Cubes, and avoid chips. The chips work, they'll do what they say they do, but it comes off flat, like wood flavor was added as opposed to soaking in wood. Cubes are what I have available most often so I use them and they provide a good woody/oaky flavor with some depth. Spirals increase the surface area of wood and can provide a nice stave-like oaky flavors and aromas. The staves are a bit tricky for me because you're sticking both the untouched outside of a barrel and the toasted/charred inside at the same time. All of the alternatives can help maximize the flavors imparted by the wood while maintaining the proper wood to volume ratios for smaller batches in the 1-23 liter range. Smaller than 23 liters is where I'll say I would skip the expense, hassle, maintenance, etc of a barrel. Around 23 liters/5 gallon size is where it starts to make sense to go over to a barrel. However, even at this small size it can be finicky. Test often as it'll go from no oak to over oaked in a very quick timespan. At the 15 galon/68 liter mark it starts resembling the bigger commercial products we're trying to mimic. You can set it for longer, less of a chance of over oaking unless you forget about it for multiple years. And comes off rounder. BTW: The subject has so much nuance from the different wood species to what your goals may be will determine dosing; not to mention a little good ol' fashioned trial and error. 1-2oz per gallon is about the dosing I usually start with and see where it is. After about 2-3 months, the cubes will stop contributing; everything they have will have been expended. If it needs more, I'll throw some fresh cubes in at that point. Just remember, if you do over oak, there's nothing you can really do to tone it back down. But dont dump the batch; save it for blending with future batches. An over oaked product mixed with an un-oaked product can lead to some nice balance.
I think the barrel is hard for most people, because the volumes we produce. When I think about barrel aging it’s very complex. There’s a reason why bourbon tastes like it does. It’s because of the temperature conditions and changes at the barrel houses where it’s produced. I think barrel aging may be the most difficult part of Home distilling actually. I’ve been using oak spirals. They’re available in different toasts and you can cut them to different lengths.
I've been trying on wooden lids on Mason jars. I have turned myself a lid, that I treat like a barrel, and so far, it seems to be working well... I can also see the liquor change colour through the glass
With respect, my experience with my bourbon barrels does not support your assertion that climate changes in the barrel house makes bourbon taste like bourbon. My barrels are in a constant 74degF environment and after four years they are exactly bourbon, no qualifications. The right kind of wood (weathered new American white oak), the right toast and char, and the right amount of wood, plus the long slow oxygenation and transpiration through the wood over many years, are sufficient to make bourbon. My experience suggests that the “push and pull” mechanism is either complete horseshit or close to it. If it has an effect, it is very very small.
@@badmotivatorbarrels2273 what does an “exact bourbon” taste like to you? I’ve tasted hundreds and everyone has a unique taste. To your idea that the barrel house has no effect, jack Daniel’s has already proved you wrong. They barrel the lower 4 rows of their houses as an inferior product under their green label, the middle and upper is their black label, and their signatures are pulled from the upper layers.
I replaced one of the dowels on my small barrel rack with a barbeque rotisserie so that my barrel slowly rotates. It dramatically speeds up the aging process and really infuses the spirit with the compounds in the barrel.
I age my whiskeys in 3 or 5 gallon barrels now exclusively. Once I started using barrels over staves in jars or carboys I noticed a huge difference over similar time ranges and conditions. I typically make a couple different bourbon mashes (different mash bills) and I'll age each in their own barrel. Then I reuse those barrels for my Irish and scotch recipes. I will actually throw the barrels in the oven from time to time on 200. Works wonders. Anyway I vote barrels for the win.
@Bill Mooney I have a smoker, but I've never thought of taking the time to get that sucker up to temp to use it for forced aging. But it would probably yield a similar/better result. I only leave them in the oven for like 30 mins on 200. Then I shut the oven off leaving the barrel inside until the oven is back to low temperature. I only do this once and typically within the first week of barreling the spirit. After that I allow time to take over. So I really don't have a set time I age. I hate to be crass but I recommend "till it's done" . They usually don't recommend going over 7months with new charred oak barrels (3-5 gal) older than that it can have a tendency to taste like a popsicle stick. However I take wider cuts from all my whiskeys. Bourbon, rye, scotch, and Irish. Now these cuts may be heads heavy or tails heavy depending on the style. With that being said, I age longer sometimes. It takes more time to let the esters settle out. But I find it makes a much more complex product. I start taking samples after 3 months and sample every 2 months till I get to where I'm happy with the result. Hope this answers your question. Sorry for the novel
@@keenanfrady so wait, you only age them for 7 months? i am a total newb, so if you just want to point me in the right direction that is cool, but i expected them to take years? is there a further aging process you use?
@@vidard9863 it takes years in full (53) gallon barrels. I use 3 gallon or 5 gallon barrels. If you buy "new charred" barrels over oaking is a real concern. In a small barrel the spirit is in contact with more surface area, it can be a confusing principle I know. There are other factors to think about though. Like " micro oxidation ", which happens to a greater degree in full size barrels. Making a truly complex product. Micro oxidation still happens in small barrels but not as much. Meaning to get that greater degree of complexity it takes years in a full barrel but you don't have years to work with in small barrels because you run a serious risk of over oaking you're product after 8 or 9 months in my experience. However it also depends on the climate you live in. That's why I recommend taking samples along the way.
@@keenanfrady that makes sense, the surface area to volume would be larger in the smaller barrels, and while the micro oxidation would therefore have more oxygen, as it is related to surface area to volume, it wouldn't have time to process the chemicals and it would run the risk of over oxidation... thus too woody much sooner without the proper complexity... do your batches smooth out/gain complexity after you bottle them? at some point i will have to experiment with some form of wooden lid/hybrid wood/glass keg... it seems i will never run out of things to do...
I'm a wood worker who also has distilled a couple batches. Everything you said about the barrel is correct. The wood is very responsive to changes in temperature, pressure, humidity. How the pores open and close basically changes the surface area of wood available to interact with the spirits. So changes in flavor can change by season. Staves don't have the interaction with the air so their pore size will remain constant in the jar. I think it gives a more subtle but consistent across the aging or flavoring process. The couple of batches I've flavored with staves I've mixed both chared and unchared wood. Charing gives the wood its own distinct flavor but also opens up the wood pores to interact with the wood that's below the char. In barrels the pores open and close with the changes in pressure and humidity. Where staves don't. So with staves I've been experimenting with chared and unchared wood to even out the flavor and give the spirits different wood to interact with. I've been using white oak and adding in some apple wood chips to try to pull out some different flavors. I'm still new to the process but I've been liking the results.
End grain in wood?? At this stage of my journey in the craft, I am leaning towards preferring barrels over staves. Yes, I know barrels need to be recharred every now and then, but I find that task a fun part of the craft. There does seem to be a difference I can perceive between barrels and staves, but I accept it's a personal preference. One thought I have though, which might explain the difference I perceive, is "end grain" in the wood. I think staves, seem to me to produce some sharp tannons or notes in my end product. I started wondering why, and my conclusion is that the inside of a barrel has little to no "end grain" exposed to the distillant, whereas staves have a large amount of end grain exposed, especially "Oak spirals". I find I don't have to do much with the end product out of a barrel, but sometimes I need to cold filter the end product I make using staves. So, after some thought, I am shying away from using short staves, chips or spirals. I now have some long kiln dried Oak staves (no knots). I am going to try heavily charring the grain ends of these staves, to try and seal the end grain at both ends. I'm also going to try dipping the end grain in bee's wax to seal both ends. I am not confident that will work, but its worth a try. Bee's wax in theory shouldn't affect the flavour, but I guess I'll find out. Another thought is other woods, Cherry, Apple, Maple etc. I like to sit my distillant in a glass carboy for a few weeks before it goes into my barrels. Thats gives me the opportunity to add a few Cherry staves for a short time. I do that mainly because I like the colour Cherry gives the distillant. Obviously, it affects the flavour a little bit as well. Anyways, just my 10c worth. Y'all stay safe and well. 😁👍
@Still it Have you thought about potentially using a vacuum chamber to force the interaction of the spirit with the staves. Same principal as stabilizing wood with resin. Just a thought.
If you are going to compare barrels to staves in glass then you should use the same spirit and be sure that the area of exposed wood, the type of wood, the toast level, and the char in both cases is the same. And, of course, the amount of spirits should be the same in both cases.
Personally, I feel barrel are best for an end products. This is especially true for products that rely on barrel candy from a first use barrel. That said, they are rarely practical in this craft unless you are producing either large amounts per run or are producing the same thing over and over. But for those that like to make / try different spirits with modest hobby size equipment, staves are best. If quality if a priority and barrels are not practical, her is my suggestions. 1. Use all Grain/Fruit. Do not use cane/corn sugar to boost ABV. In my opinion, this is more critical to end flavors than barrel versus staves A side note is the type of yeast. It has a huge impact on flavor and is often over looked. 2. Have good wood that has been seasoned properly as toasted and/or charred . Personally, I try to avoid end grain so go with a longer stave. 3. Use a proper lid on your jar. Only stainless steel, glass, and or PTFE should be in contact with the liquid or vapor. You PTFE to wrap any silicon seal. Also if using mason jars, do not use the lids that come with the jar! Use a PTFE disc that fits the jar ring. 4. Ensure you use the proper wood to spirit ratios. 5. Ensure you open lids to air out product often enough. 6. Store in an area that has temperature swings. 7. Time is your friend if looking for smoothness. It will also give the best chance for your complex flavors. If you follow these tips, you'll get the most out of staves and in many cases won't notice the difference. Once you've have a recipe you love. Then that is the time in my opinion, to start making enough of it to place in a big ol barrel.
If you are interested in more such niche physical aspects of distilling, I can highly recommend the book "Whiskey Science - A condensed destilate" by Gregory H. Miller. It goes into super nerdy detail on all aspects of whiskey. You will need college level chemistry knowledge to be able to understand it fully, but you can always also just skip the overly technical chapters.
I use a stainless steel airstone and pump air into my jars every month or so, seems to make a big difference in mellowing out the flavour and smoothing out the wood notes. I aged a corn whiskey with medium toast uncharred oak chips for winemakers and it has the typical sweet bourbon profile so maybe the high char and heavy toast is the problem there.
i wonder if the temperature fluctuation over longer periods of time is quite the same as in single day fluctuations or 3 days (where i was originally from in northern california, it could be very hot, then the marine air would flood the zone for 3 days), having huge swings of temp (and barometric pressure). another factor to consider is the ABV during aging.... i understand that many commercial producers age at 62.5% ABV, but for me the jury is out on that as "the ideal"....i currently have an experiment in process with 6 levels of ABV, from 50 to 65, intervals of 2.5% and skipping 62.5, but i am doing it with heavily toasted oak bars in sealed glass jars, and have not noticed a huge difference in the 57.5, and 60.0 and 65.0. i live in an area in which barrels are pretty much out of the question and also, the effect of barrel compared to glass jar/staves would be much less because my tropical weather temperature fluctuates very little, consequently, my variances are using different woods, i'm up to 15 different ones now, and i am making rum from black strap molasses. i age in the jars for 6 months, but with cinnamon heart wood, one month is sufficient
Micro-oxidation? I am always very careful about that. The change of climate? Definitely dead on. As the wood is outside, changes of climate (especially temperature) has an immediate effect on the wood. For the glass jar - the whole liquid has to warm up first. Most importantly - which (I guess) wasn’t really touched on: wood surface to spirit ratio. Even though the staves are submerged a small barrel should have far more surface. That’s why small barrels are aging also exponentially faster than large ones.
Well I'm a total Nube to Distilling. Never distilled anything. But with that said I'm a total lover of Jameson Irish Whiskey so I've been curious to see just how close I could get to a homemade version of Jameson Irish Whiskey. So I guess what I'm wondering is what I should use as far a barely or oats or whatever yeast I should use to get that flavor as well as the barrel(Oak, Apple or Cherry wood). Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!!!! I did have one thought as to the wood process and that is to use large wood shavings and maybe roasting the shavings and use those shavings to Steap in the whiskey like a Tea?
You hit it right on the spot. Physics! A barrel will respirate and allow chemical and physical interaction with the atmosphere chemistry ( read about the chemical composition of the air) and pressure (physical pressure gradient) effects on the cellular structure of cellulose. What I have tried is to mimic this interaction using 1/2 gallon canning jars. But!!! I cut a hole in the lid so the stave can interact with both the liquid and air. To seal around the oak stave at the lid I use wax. There will be no contact other than with the small area of the stave and the metal lid. For the most part, air tight. This method allows the air and weather changes to influence through the stave to the liquid. Do I know for certain there is a difference, NO. I have tried this on liquid made 11-12 months ago. I also change my recipes every time. I can tell a difference with similar style liquids but once I reach 24 months, my usual maturing age, I will be more able to compare. Just my experiments.
I can't speak to distilling... but I make vanilla. I just use vodka or bourbon. The neat thing is... I have right now a 1L batch that is just sitting with the beans... I shake it from time to time. The second bottle under 200mls is a plastic vodka bottle. I daily and sometimes twice daily shake the bejesus out of it... then squeeze the air out and cap it and shake again.... later that day I release the vacuum. It will be done in 4 months instead of over a year. I can deal with that. I am not sure how or if this process could convert to aging in glass. It totally could be done in a mason jar with the vacuum sealer jar attachment. LOL I am pretty sure you guys don't need to shake it... vanilla likes the encouragement.
Okay, what I really want to know, is how to make 20 year old Scotch at home in a week or two. Or rather something that tastes like 20 year old Scotch. I'm gonna need a hobby for when they wheel out CORONA 2.0 and shut down the global economy again, next cold and flu season.
Tried for years to get the flavor of my favorites commercial products by using chips, staves, spirals in glass... not that they weren't good but could never get what I was looking for until I pulled the trigger and bought barrels. There's no going back for me.
Great timing on this video as this is the year I start my journey into oaking and aging. I really enjoyed hearing about your "hunches". I think that's where all the fun is in this hobby.
Staves give great performance for aging. The 'barrel breathing' romanticism is just a marketing ploy. Look up the 'artisanal firewood' youtube video, poking fun at marketing stories that consumers often believe in. Staves can be infinitely tailored from surface area to char level and get the aging accomplished much faster - like achieve four years of barrel aging in three months.
Do a video on how to pick and treat wood staves for aging wiskey and rum. How to find good wood (giggity.) How to char the staves at different levels. And which char levels are used by common commercial products.
Does any one make barrels out of other woods like fruit woods like apple or cherry? What about pecan or walnut? How many different trees are there and only oak is used? What's up with that? What about lemon or orange wood? Has any one tested other woods for barrels and what tastes come out? Charred vs. uncharred! How about maple wood or birch? What about multiple agings in different woods? Take it out of a oak keg and age it for 5 years in a maple keg then 5 years in an apple keg. what kind of tastes will that create? Why always oak?
New to the craft myself, im still trying to do things on a budget, so focusing more on my spending on the distillation equipment and grains over the aging costs right now. With that said I've been lucky enough to live in an area heavy with white American oak so I was able over a year ago, to go cut down my own tree for fire wood and had it seasoning since then. Once I started making my own whiskey that wood came in handy and I was able to use staves from the tree I cut down and seasoned myself to age my product. In only a few months time each has turned out to already have softened and imparted their flavors well into the spirit. As of now I'm going to stick with the staves in glass jars and carboys because I am really liking the flavors. Guess my next step would be to learn how to be a Cooper and make my own barrels. Guess that will come in time.
@@theworldisastage1984 the benefit of a budget is that you learn skills to cover your inability to spend. I don't recommend anyone to ever jump into a hobby with too much money. Better to stay small until you have the skill to actually use the equipment when you go big.
@@theworldisastage1984 I do agree with you on this. At some point you either go big or decide it isn't for you. But in my experience, a newb probably should start small and make their mistakes while they're still cheap.
I use oak chips add them to jars 3/4 full and will bounce from freezer to outside 24hrs each. Those 48 hours will have the color I'm looking for then rest on a shelf until it smooths out a bit.
Not sure if I’ve missed them but do u do tasting vids of what u make months later? If not u should do shorts, get a jacket, nice big leather chair and a cigar and review the final results. Perhaps even make a batch with what changes u thought initially and compare to the original.
I would use a sealed glass jar, the science behind why the glass jar didn't interact with the wood during temperature change is due to the seal in the barrel forcing the liquid in and out of the barrel as it changes temperature inside the barrel. by using a sealed container like the glass jar, when sealed, it will not allow any air to escape when the pressure inside the jar changes. this forces the liquids in and also out of the wood. it creates a vaccum as it cools down inside the sealed containers and creates pressure inside the sealed container while one that allows even minimal airflow will reduce this process and make it more likely to have a slower time extracting flavors. Barrels are sealed, but they don't have anything preventing the barrels contents from overexpanding along with the air in the container that slowly passes through the grain of the wood. I think of barrels as a long long aging process of potentially making and storing tons of things you may create but don't want right away. if you're using glass from what I've seen it will take 10-20 days. also sugars added before or after distillation cane sugar being the prefrence as it is natural can add the sweetness that you are looking for. I hope this helps. lol thank you if you made it this far
Can anyone answer if there is major difference between using table sugar and corn sugar in a sugar wash? Taste, mouth feel, smell etc. Which do you prefer?
you know...the better-barrel idea is also something I had... but what I made myself is a wooden lid for Mason jars. I just fitted the lid as close as possible, and plugged the leaks with bee's wax. that means I can use a bigger or smaller jar no problem, it means I can do small batches, it also means I can use small wood I find to make the lids! I am currently using a wild cherry wood, medium roast with char, on a tea wash.
So there is a Cleveland Ohio Distiller that is using vacuum jars and chips or staves to oak there spirit and the making spirits in weeks that taste like 3 to 5 yr spirits. Something i'm gonna try and learn soon.
Very lekker video man..... I think the wooding receives way way too little attention from people. The combinations are endless. Have 3 l of a sorghum grain single grain sitting on second use American oak chips (first use was in a barley single grain) which took some time to colour to where it is now. and just after nearly 3 months there is already so much chcarcter I've never had before, a sweetness like never before, but will just build after a year and a half. The barrel wood definitely acts as a barrier filter being between the air and the liquid. When it's just in the bottle it acts similar but it;'s completely surrounded by liquid. so different interactions. I try open my bottles and swirl the distillate to try get that air in.
Would barrels producing spirits by the coast opposed to up in the mountains, even if they were identical spirits going in and for the same time they would end up deferent?
I have aged my whiskey in wood chips in mason jars covered in paper bag and put in green house to take on the natural heat! This has been a great way to get great tasting hooch in under 3 months
For me i use stainless kegs with staves. The cost of an oak barrel in my neck of the woods would send most people bankrupt. I would love to use barrels.
What would happen if you used an excessive amount of staves that have been leached of tannins? What I mean is, if you force age the staves themselves that you want to use in distilled water, or age them normally for a long time (though you would need to be ultra sure the water and staves were sterile) before swapping the water out (hopefully full of the tannins and overly spicy notes) for the whiskey. This may allow you to use a much larger amount of the staves for same volume of alcohol. The pre water leach of the staves may remove much of the sweetness as well. It may still be interesting to test a small batch and load as many distilled water pre-leached staves as will fit in a small jar with the accompanying volume of whiskey just to see the outcome.
The sweetness that oak contributes to the spirit is pretty much absent in raw wood. It is a byproduct of the toasting and charring. Cellulose and hemicellulose are polysaccharides, that is, polymers of sugar molecules. Wood is mostly sugar, but it’s locked up in molecules too large to be soluble or taste sweet. During toasting and charring, they undergo pyrolysis, which means they break into smaller pieces, some of which are simple sugars. Your idea to quickly remove tannins from oak may have merit. If you experiment carefully and record good data, you may be able to help others out who are in the same predicament. Weathering oak is thought to have more beneficial effects than just tannin removal though… i could go on but you might enjoy doing that research yourself. I sure did.
Concerning the physics of temperature change and pushing in and out of the wood: Since you intentionally have an imperfect seal on the jars, you are correct that the pressure change is negligible and therefore there is no real reason for it to push in and out of the wood. What would be interesting is if you sealed them completely, as then the change in temperature would create a change in pressure inside the jar, which could force the spirit in/out of the wood. To still get the microoxication effects you could alternate between fully sealed and slightly open every few weeks/months, or just open the jars periodically to let fresh oxygen in. Disclaimer, I'm not a distiller and this is pure speculation based on my physics intuition from uni, so it definitely requires further testing, maybe a split batch?
One correction, Chemistry not physics, and I feel this video is your best because there's less bullshitery going on, more of I'm not quite sure what I'm doing kind of feel, that's why I take Rex and Daniel with a grain of salt MGP Sourced stuff they generally take the piss out of but there's is going to be brilliant but it's MGP as well, instead of getting, people to donate to there whiskey/Scotch collection they should of growd funded a massive mash vessel/Tank , like 10,000 ltrs to start with, I just can't take them guys seriously did they even triple distel or five times distil or charcoal filter there first release Vodka I'm not 100% sure but I don't think they did, anyway Jessey, Keep it real like this Video 👍🏻🇦🇺
Josiah Wedgewood in interesting. One of the founders of the industrial revolution. He did lots of experiments where one or two ingredients were varied tested and recorded. You could do the same. So what parameters? Well you could keep the alcohol the same for all. Eliminate that as a variable. Then its the wood, the char, and the length of time. Surface area to volume is another. Record it, analyse it, taste it. Then at the end you can also blend. ie. Being more systematic.
Staves, blocks, spirals or Chips will get you there quick but barrels will get a higher/ more complex spirit. Perfection takes time. Barrels = Angel's share and concentration of flavors. Not so much as wood in a sealed container.
Corkscrew oak staves! Are evaporation and oxidization things that are considered good for the aging process of whiskey? From the wine world, you have giant stainless tanks that prevent the loss and oxidization of the wine which are used primarily by the big name, grocery store brands. While higher quality wineries/wines still use the barrel method. You mentioned bite in the aging process, is that due to oxidization mellowing out the liquor?
Discovered your channel recently and love the videos Jesse! Just after stilling some whiskey and ready to start oaking it. Question: is there downside of reusing oak staves multiple times? Like staves that have been in whiskey for multiple years. I’m wondering if most the flavours & sugars get used up at some point? I was thinking of shaving off the surface of the staves with a plane to expose new surface, what are your thoughts on that?
A friend of mine built a garden bed with good soil and compost puts his alcohol with wood chips in glass jars then fully buries them upright and leaves them there from anywhere of 6 months to 1 year and have a unique taste..
Have you ever considered doing a whiskey with more exotic wood staves like mahogany or African Blackwood? I think they would have a very interesting flavor profile. Would love to see a scotch done in African Blackwood to throw to the material that bagpipes are made of.
Even though I live in a remote backwater, I can get oak chunks at my local grocery store. I split them into dominoes with a hatchet and custom toast them in the oven. They cost me pennies apiece. A barrel like yours would be very expensive, I'd be stuck with one char level, and I'd get that "new barrel" taste only once.
Ok I don't have much of a taste for woody tasting just got my first barrel looking for insight myself but atm I made 1 gallon sugar wash and 6 gallon of my fave grain mash 4lbs corn 2 lbs barley 4lbs white granulated sugar 2lb brown sugar mixed them and came out great better sweetness from the get go but that extra gallon sugar wash made separately made a huge difference thinking of making straight grain mash and sugar wash 100% separately so the difference fermentation process can reach max peak
