Bourbon Barrel Char and Sour Bugs

[lawbadger]

I've got a 10 gallon bourbon barrel and was wondering about the effects of the char on eventual sour bug inoculation. I'm planning on doing a handful of "clean" beers (baltic porter, imperial stout, wee heavy, old ale, quad...) in the barrel until the bourbon starts to dissipate.

I was reading through an old post and comments on The Mad Fermentationist about smaller barrel aging and sours. There was a note that due to the charring, souring microbes may have trouble inoculating the barrel.

I was wondering folks experience with this and if it does seem to be the case, if people just use the bourbon barrels more for secondary/tertiary aging to taste.

 

[Rob_B]

I've been using 5 gallon whiskey barrels for sours with no noticeable issues. Of course my beers going in them already have bugs. And honestly I just rack out one beer and in with the next. Not quite a solera since I'm removing most of the beer but I'm leaving enough of the microbes in there too. My barrels have gone through the same type of routine you're talking about with clean beers first, then some funky (brett) beers and then full on sours. The longest I've let a beer sit in one at the moment has been six months with no ill effects.


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[lawbadger]

Thanks for the info and reassurances. I brew a pretty good mix of clean and sour/funky beers. After I get through my clean beer brew schedule, I will probably put in a few beers primary'd with bugs. I have enough East Coast Yeast, Eureka Brett experiment strains, and a nice wild sac/brett/bug mix from a local yeast wrangling start up that I hope to make a house strain to eventually inoculate the barrel.

 

[Oldsock]

We did a couple turns in a 53 gallon bourbon barrel without repitching bugs. Beers two and three soured fine. (The comment on that post was from someone paraphrasing Lauren Salazar).