Crossed my mind as I was sipping a Bourbon County tonight.... When these breweries age beer in barrels, how do they sterilize the barrels? I recently did a RIS and would have loved to buy a barrel and barrel age it but how do you do that without infecting the beer??
They use high octane to sanitize the barrels. Usually bourbon or rye do the trick. In a pinch you can use a brandy or a brandy barrel. If you ever buy a barrel, (any size), you'll probably sanitize it with a bottle of whisky, (pardon the E), or the like.
Usually you don't need to sanitize a new spirit barrel. There is enough barrel-strength in the wood that nothing should survive. Best to have the beer ready to go, fill the barrel ASAP so it won't dry out. You could add a bit of spirit at home to re-"hydrate," but that would be illegal commercially.
They are pretty clean if you get them fresh dumped, and they have been sealed up since the dumping. I took mine, ran some near boiling water through it for 2-3 cycles, to make sure it was sealed up and to flush any debris out, then put half a bottle of bourbon in there, sloshed it around and let it sit for a couple days until I was ready to fill it. Dump bourbon, fill with beer. Came out awesome..
With my barrels I bought a handle of some decent whisky and let it sit there for a day or two rotating and flipping it when I saw it. Then after the first use I rinsed with 190 degree water until it looked clear just to get the yeast out, let it cool and put my saved bourbon from my last rinse in there again for a day or two or rotating and flipping. It takes a few hours or overnight for the barrel to cool down after rinsing though. I also always had beer ready to go in when I pulled beer out. I got 3 or 4 uses out of my balcones barrels and then sour'd them. They are still doing real well, though the tops are drying out a bit after extended aging @OldSock any suggestions for that? Ive heard about people waxing the tops have you done that? What kind of wax is best?
@cfrobrew , appreciate that info there. I'm working on the 2nd run through my balcones barrel, myself. Didn't have a beer ready to roll through it, so I'm brewing up a quick porter to toss in there to be a "holding" beer until I get my scotch ale brewed up and ready to barrel for a while. Then I planned to probably sour it as well, not sure how much character I can get from the barrel after 3 batches, and figure it's worth souring, and tossing in some Oud Bruins and Flanders in there. Maybe keep some bourbon and toss in a black sour.
Id love to get my hands on a 5 or 10 gallon barrel, right now our brew club has 2- 55gallon barrels which we brew with. We have a flanders going into the one barrel within the next few weeks. Id love a smaller one for home use and to mess around with.
Sure thing, most of what I did was drawn from OldSock's suggestions. I ran a dark English mild through one of my barrels without reconditioning it with whisky. It was the 3rd use and came out with lots of oak. I brewed that beer after a near by brewery's Dark English Mild and brought it there to try side by side with the owner and he said he really liked the character from mine. Every time I used it I let the beer sit longer to get more barrel and the whisky dropped off but I really enjoyed it. I think that porter will come out nicely. I would let it sit something like 3 months if you can. I did a scotch ale in one of my barrels for its second use, it came out pretty nice though for that bigger beer the barrel could have used more bourbon conditioning before I put it in. If you're feeling adventurous put some of that barrel aged scotch ale on coffee. I put a bit of Vietnamese coffee in mine and it was a big hit, very strange but that Nguyen coffee has a nice toffee and cocoa character to it. As for the sours, I will say, the roast on the barrel is very unique when paired to a sour. It gives it a harshness I think, its not bad but it isn't as clean and smooth as some can be so that may be a consideration when choosing your style and grain bill.
Yeah, my first beer was in the barrel for 4 weeks. It's no where near over oaked, but present, and plenty of bourbon notes! Looking forward to seeing how the barrel evolves. In any case- there's a place I get beer from in NC called Wicked Weed. They do pretty much all funk/sour/barrel age stuff. Couple clean beers here and there, but they have a black sour aged on tart cherries and aged in bourbon barrels. There's plenty of bourbon in the finish, it's fantastic.
I've said it before & I'll say it again.. I don't know why more breweries don't have an industrial steamer on hand. Sure, capital investment may run $5k for industrial steamer, but long term investment of reduced chemical and water use surely add up. On a homebrewing scale I'm sure something like this could be rigged to do something similar.
