using bourbon or scotch in secondary fermentation

[mlivengood]

I have a peat smoked porter that I brewed last Saturday in primary right now, fermenting aggressively I might add. I'm wanting to make this a "barrel aged" peat smoked porter. I have 2oz of medium toast oak cubes and 2 cups of Highland Park 12yr single malt scotch in a mason jar doing the soak. I'm planning on racking my peat smoked porter onto the scotch and oak cubes in the secondary.

What I'm concerned about is...is this too much scotch that it will be overpowering? I would like this beer to be balanced. Measured my OG to be 1.082, here is my recipe....

16 lbs Maris Otter
10 oz. Caramel 120
10 oz. English Black Malt
6 oz. Peat Smoked Malt

1/2 oz. Magnum at 60min
1 oz. Fuggles at 20min

Irish Ale Yeast WLP004

Any suggestions would be helpful!

Cheers!

 

[BigRedHopHead]

I did Denny Conn's bourbon vanilla imperial porter last Oct with oak chips and 16oz. Knob Creek bourbon. It came out very well. You can definitely taste the bourbon, but it is not overpowering or out of balance for my taste. You might have to allow the beer to condition for 6-8 weeks to allow the flavors to develop and the scotch to mellow a bit.

 

[mlivengood]

How long did you let it set on the bourbon and oak in the secondary?

 

[LLBeanJ]

I brewed Denny's Bourbon Vanilla Imperial Porter last fall. I soaked 1 oz of medium toast oak chips with 8 oz of mid-grade bourbon for about 4 weeks, then put it all in secondary for 1 week. The bourbon was definitely present, but not overpowering. I did let it bulk age in the keg for about 4 months, though, so it had plenty of time to mellow. Also, this was a 4 gallon (in the fermentor) batch.

 

[BigRedHopHead]

How long did you let it set on the bourbon and oak in the secondary?

2 weeks

 

[pdxant]

I brewed Denny's Bourbon Vanilla Imperial Porter last fall. I soaked 1 oz of medium toast oak chips with 8 oz of mid-grade bourbon for about 4 weeks, then put it all in secondary for 1 week. The bourbon was definitely present, but not overpowering. I did let it bulk age in the keg for about 4 months, though, so it had plenty of time to mellow. Also, this was a 4 gallon (in the fermentor) batch.

Do you steam the chips prior to introducing them for sanitization? This sounds in readable and more viable than getting a bourbon barrel to age in.

 

[Osedax]

Ahhh! At least you used "cheap" scotch. I don't even like ice in my scotch. I need a glass of scotch to calm my nerves at the mistreatment of scotch.

Haha. Looks fine. Irish wiskey would have done.

 

[LLBeanJ]

Do you steam the chips prior to introducing them for sanitization? This sounds in readable and more viable than getting a bourbon barrel to age in.

All I did was soak them in the bourbon. The alcohol should effectively sanitize them. The plan was to soak them for a week, but my brew schedule got shuffled around and it ended up going four weeks.

 

[ricksam]

Hah, looks much like what I did few month ago! Blow off tube & all! I soaked my cubes in 8 oz of woodford reserve bourbon with 3 vanilla beans for a month and a half and poured the cubes, bourbon, and one bean in secondary 4 weeks ago. The last test I did two days ago says yes, we definitely have bourbon, but the oak isn't strong enough yet. My reading says to let the oak get to just a bit powerful and then bottle/keg and let the oak mellow with the bourbon. Right now it tastes like I want a big, juicy prime rib to go with it...mmmmm

 

[Boy]

When I did a bourbon barrel age I split the batch. I pulled 1 gallon out of 5 or 1/5 of the batch into a gallon jug. I used this with Makers that aged on oak for 3 weeks. By splitting the batch I could control the infusion better. Let the jug age for 4 weeks until it was stronger than needed and then recombined the batch. It gave a really great flavor without risking the entire batch all at once.

 

[Gixxer]

All I did was soak them in the bourbon. The alcohol should effectively sanitize them. The plan was to soak them for a week, but my brew schedule got shuffled around and it ended up going four weeks.

Just soaking the chips in your spirit of choice for a few weeks has worked for me with no probs. I have some JD barrel chips soaking in crown royal (its all I had laying around at the time), they have been getting happy for at least a month now. I have used about a half cup of liquor in a 2.5gl batch and it worked out nice for my tastes. The extra liquor might work well with the peated malt, but it might take some time to get the flavor to balance to where you like it.

 

[ricksam]

My understanding is that there is a big difference between wood cubes vs. chips. The chips have more surface area and thus release the wood characteristics much quicker. I think the bottom line is to continue to taste during the time the beer is on the wood and pull when you think its ready.

 

[Boy]

^^ Your bottom line statement is dead on. You just have to be dead on with it. This is why I like blending the batch. You have a little more leeway by splitting it and working each batch. Lets you experiment and not screw up the whole batch at once.

 

[ricksam]

Good advice!

 

[mlivengood]

Well, I've had 2 oz. of toasted oak cubes soaking in a cup of scotch for 2 weeks now. Gonna rack to secondary onto the cubes only tonight. Taste in a week and decide if I need more scotch. Will report back later. Cheers!

 

[BigRedHopHead]

wohoo! good luck!

 

[mlivengood]

Ok, it's been awhile since I posted on here so an update is needed.....

Bottled my scotch/oak aged peat smoked porter on 4-21 so it's been in the bottle for almost 2 months. I took one bottle to my homebrew clubs meeting this past Sunday and it was amazing and everyone loved it and was surprised how good it was. Its roughly 9.5%, carbonated just right well balanced. Not one flavor overpowering the others. I love this beer.

Today is our homebrew clubs tasting at a local restaurant. Its for charity, since you can't sell homebrew. We all donate beer and people buy tickets to sample our beers. There are going to be 35 beers there from about 14 homebrewers. Going to be an epic day today. I'm only taking 6 bombers of this beer for the VIP tasting. Having a Heady Topper at lunch to kick things off!

Cheers!