After 26 months, my brewing partner and I have decided it is time to empty our bourbon barrel. We did a solera so we drew off a couple of time and refilled. At most we took out 10 gallons. Today we drew off 20 gallons. I need to bottle two cornys this weekend and then we will empty the rest next weekend. What I found interesting is how much volume was lost. We took out 20 today and there is probably 15 gallons at most left. That means over 15 gallons was in headspace and lost to the angels share. I'm not looking forward to bottling, but am looking forward to 6 or so cases of sour bourbon barrel oud bruin.
So over 26 months out lost 15 gallons? Interesting. I have a few barrels going now and plan on topping them off every 3 to 4 months to make sure they are still full.
I'd definitely believe that over that long period of time, you'd lose that much to the angels share.. Hard to keep them topped off and full. Hopefully they taste good still!
They still taste amazing but it was time to move on to something else. I think next time we will be better about topping off. We have a straight lambic going in a wine barrel so we may be brewing soon to top that one off.
How often with the solera method do you have to change the barrel out, so you're still getting the wood and liquor flavors? I have an rye whiskey olde ale I did, that will eventually me mixed with a porter, and so on and so forth, and I'm not sure how much mileage I'm going to get.
We started in July of 2010. In November we pulled 5 gallons and added 5 back. In April we pulled 10 and added 10. Then last December we pulled 10 and added 10. The first pull had a really good bourbon flavor, the second had a little less and the third had very little. You could still tell the final came out of a barrel but you could not really pick out that it was bourbon. Once it is empty we will rinse it and re-add some whisky to the barrel and then refill with something else.
Are you going to re-char the barrel first? From what I understand (and please correct me if I'm wrong) the whiskey, rum, or whatever - acts as a solvent and pulls the caramelized sugars out of the wood... and the wood in turn, absorbs some of the liquor. Since all of the sugar is gone (or eventually will be gone), I feel like you're going to hit a point of diminishing returns on what exactly you're going to get out of the fact it's in a barrel, as opposed to stainless steel that you just poured a few ounces of liquor into first. Thoughts?
My understanding is that at a certain point it just becomes an oak barrel, that will impart some oak to it, but different flavours than the charred oak. The local brewery here did 4 consecutive beers in a Crown Royal barrel, and after the first the booziness was gone, but the later batches (two beers, each done twice) had a nice oakiness to it. It has since been "retired" to sour making.
Mine was retired to sour making from the start and will still have a life for that purpose. The barrels let in oxygen to help with the souring process.
