A few months back, a buddy and I brewed an espresso stout. It's around 5.5% and 65 IBUs (which ended up being a bit too bitter, so we decided to let it sit for a while so that the bitterness would hopefully tone down). I've recently acquired a 5gal whiskey barrel and was wondering if anyone's had any experience barrel-aging low abv beers, particularly stouts. I don't necessarily want to go through the effort of bottling a beer that I'm not completely enthused about, so I'd like to spice it up, if possible. Any input would be appreciated!
Barrel aging a low abv beer you already don't like in hoped of improving it is probably not the best idea. Ballast point barrel ages Piper Down, a low abv scotch ale, and it's fantastic, so barrel aging low abv beers can be done. However, I'd rather put a beer I already liked in a barrel than something I didn't. Also, if the beer is already over bittered, any tannins you pick up from the barrel will make it seem even more bitter.
I read somewhere recently that it takes at least 8% ABV to help get the flavors to come out of the barrel, plus it would seem like the higher ABV would help to kill any weak bugs that might be in the barrel. But if it's a beer that you don't particularly care about enough to want to bottle it, and you aren't doing anything with the barrel otherwise, then I think it would be a worthy experiment.
It's not that I don't care for the beer itself. It's more that, since it's been so long, I've lost some of my excitement about the beer. I know plenty of breweries do lower abv beers that have been barrel aged. I guess it's more of a question of whether a stout/porter will work. I'd actually prefer to strip the barrel of the whiskey flavor and use it again. I'll do some sampling and decide.
You can age it in there if you want. One thing about barrel aging is, if it's a fresh dump barrel, or you re wet it with the spirit, aging it will thin the body a bit. Thats why you generally see bigger beers in there, because they have some decent residual body left over to stand up to the barrel.
