New Oak Barrel

[HopRunner]

I wonder how many batches of whatever it would take to mellow a new barrel out? If I ran three batches of stuff through it at three months for each batch, would it be good to go then?

I was thinking about making a kind of strong dark ale of some sort and letting it get super oaky. I could then save that overly oaked batch for blending with regular batches that I want to "oak". Maybe what I should do is brew a strong dark and a strong pale batch, over oak them both. I would then have a the ability to oak light and dark brews.

My eventual goal would be to use the barrel for sour beers, so to have a bunch of homebrewed oak concentrate for oaking nonsoured beers seems like a good idea.

I don't have the cash right now so it is all academic at the moment. Hopefully by fall......

[Nate Diggler]

You could always cook with it instead of tossing it

I've been playing with the idea of getting one of those barrels too. I can buy cheap red wine from a local winery for not much money. I figure I can fill the barrel with that for a couple months to soak up the oak taste. I'm not real fond of their wine anyway so tossing it down the drain with the heavy oak flavor wouldn't be that big a loss.

Wayne

[ApresSkiBrewer]

I've heard you get a TON of oak out of those 5 gal barrels the first few times. Doesn't take much. Maybe the over oaking/blending back idea is a good one.

[Sent From My iPhone]

I was thinking the first few batches would only take a couple weeks, not months.

[Caped Brewsader]

I've been thinking about getting a 5 gallon barrel too. If I do I was planning on filling it with water and let that sit in it for a week, dump, repeat a couple more times. Alcohol also pulls out more from the oak than water, so I would then throw a big beer in there for a week or two. After all that I think it would be "ready" for general beer use.
hmmm.... that sounds like a lot of work. Maybe I'll just throw a mead in there and then use that as a "blending mead"

[oneal66]

I got a "new" oak barrel almost a year ago. It's not really new, it's been sitting in my buddy's garage for about 15 years. So when I got it I soaked it in water for a couple of weeks to let the staves swell. Once it could hold water I soaked in Barrelkleen for a couple of days. Then I rinsed that out, and made this sanitizer out of citric acid and something else that I can't remember. The ingredients for the sanitizer are on the Barrelkleen bag. Then I rinsed that out and filled it with a Porter. I let the porter sit for about 6-8 weeks in a cooler. The barrel is 10g. The beer came out really nicely. I haven't refilled it yet, but I'm thinking about going ahead and starting a Flanders Red in it. My plan is to let that age for a 6 months to a year, then make another one or go ahead and put a lambic in there.

[Sent From My iPhone]

I got a "new" oak barrel almost a year ago. It's not really new, it's been sitting in my buddy's garage for about 15 years. So when I got it I soaked it in water for a couple of weeks to let the staves swell. Once it could hold water I soaked in Barrelkleen for a couple of days. Then I rinsed that out, and made this sanitizer out of citric acid and something else that I can't remember. The ingredients for the sanitizer are on the Barrelkleen bag. Then I rinsed that out and filled it with a Porter. I let the porter sit for about 6-8 weeks in a cooler. The barrel is 10g. The beer came out really nicely. I haven't refilled it yet, but I'm thinking about going ahead and starting a Flanders Red in it. My plan is to let that age for a 6 months to a year, then make another one or go ahead and put a lambic in there.

How much evaporation did you notice in 6-8 weeks?