Whiskey Stout

Discussion in 'Homebrewing' started by Eric_Headlee, Jan 10, 2015.

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  1. Eric_Headlee

    Eric_Headlee Initiate (0) Jan 10, 2015 Texas

    This is my first time brewing and I am making a stout. I have been reading up on adding Whiskey to it via oak chips in the secondary fermentation process. Could you not just add an amount of whiskey to the bottling bucket before bottling vs adding the oak to the secondary fermentation process to avoid adding any extra oak to the finished product? I have no experience here so I wanted to see if any of you might? thanks.
     
  2. FATC1TY

    FATC1TY Pooh-Bah (2,564) Feb 12, 2012 Georgia
    Pooh-Bah

    I would suggest you brew your kit as is before addin additional items. Especially given its your first time brewing.

    Read "how to brew" by John Palmer and you'll get some ideas on what's going on.

    That said. Sure you can add whiskey to your beer. Add to taste. It'll taste like a shot of whiskey in a beer and will not mimic barrel aging.
     
  3. Supergenious

    Supergenious Maven (1,273) May 9, 2011 Michigan

    Just add whiskey to individual bottles before capping. That way you get some with whiskey and some without. Also, this will prevent potentially ruining the entire batch.
     
    PapaGoose03 likes this.
  4. psnydez86

    psnydez86 Initiate (0) Jan 4, 2012 Pennsylvania

    I have no experience with oak chips. All I know is that Barrel character cannot be imitated. You need a barrel. I think you should just get a handle on the brewing basics before trying advanced techniques.

    Brewing is a long journey (if you get hooked) and is more of a crawl than a sprint, so relax, have a beer and enjoy the ride.

    Drink one of your favorite commercial stouts dosed with whatever whiskey you want and see if you like that. Cuz that's basically what you will be making.
     
    tkdchampxi likes this.
  5. billandsuz

    billandsuz Pooh-Bah (2,097) Sep 1, 2004 New York
    Pooh-Bah

    welcome to BA.
    oak and whiskey are similar... but not interchangeable. you will not get the same results if you begin to substitute. that is a fact.

    nobody is going to tell you that there are short cuts to barrel aging. your question is specific and the answer is emphatic. do not expect to get the same result of barrel aging by simply adding whisky.

    further, this board is lousy with new brewers that want to skip a process or modify a step and have questions about the end result. the answer is always the same. you have zero experience; your ideas are not worthless but need to be considered against 1,000 years of brewing tradition. are you that confident? why?

    for this brew, and the next few, stick with the basic recipe. once you have the process nailed you can begin to screw with the recipe. until then you are asking for trouble. do you want 5 gallons of crap or 5 gallons of something you can drink?

    Cheers.
     
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