So I want to take two gallons from a porter I brewed two weeks age and add some maple flavor to it. So I figured I'd soak some oak cubes in Crown Royal maple and throw it in a two gallon glass jug I have sitting around. My question is..... 1. How much oak should I use? I don't want is super "Oakey" just want the maple whiskey 2. How much crown royal do I use? 3. How long does the beer need to sit on the oak chips ? I've never done any additions to the fermenter except dry hopping an IPA, also this is my first time doing any thing in a secondary fermenter. So any one who has done this or something like I would really like to hear you suggestions. Cheers..
I have done 6 oz of chips soaked in bourbon for 2 weeks then took the chips and threw them in 5G secondary for 3 to 4 weeks then kegged turned out awesome
Why employ the oak "middle-man?" Just add the liquor directly to the beer to taste. If it has any sugar in it, you'll need to give the yeast a week to ferment that out before bottling. Alternatively, you can include that sugar in the priming calculation, Randy Mosher has a formula in Radical Brewing.
I don't have any answers to your questions, but you are trying a different approach to try to resolve a frequently-asked question about how to get that elusive, quality maple flavor into your beer. If you've read these threads for a while then you may already be aware of the different approaches. (Do a search if you haven't seen them in the past.) However, no one seems to be satisfied with how these various methods turn out, so if your method is successful, be sure to report back to us.
Im betting that the maple flavor ferments out, CR Maple is super super sugary I hope Im wrong though and that youve stumbled upon the best maple flavoring there is for beer
I've done this with a barleywine in the past. Soaked approximately 1 ounce of American Oak chips in just enough Crown Royale maple to cover the chips (soaked for about a week) and added it to secondary for another week of oaking. In my opinion, this is the best way to get maple flavor into a beer. While it tastes somewhat "artificial" in maple flavor, it is definitely present as a major flavor (not necessarilly overpowering, but certainly noticeable)
Well finally tried the finished product with the crown royal maple in my porter. I tried it two ways: First I added one table spoon to 6 bottles, the maple aroma and flavor is very prominate but not overpowering at all. First two bottle were very tasty but they gushed all over the place. I'm not sure if that's from infection or from sugar in the whiskey. Second I did a one gallon secondary with one cup oak cubes soaked for two weeks. I soaked the cubes for two weeks then poured off the excess and added it to the beer. I let that sit for three weeks then bottled. I tried the first bottle and all I'm getting is the oak chips and a little vanilla. I'm thinking I should have put the whiskey in with the chips but I'm not sure if that would have helped or not. So I defiantly wanna try this again on a larger scale like a full five gallon batch. Do you guys see anything in what I did that I can improve upon to make the work better in the future?
What ideally are you wanting flavor wise? More maple flavor, vanilla flavor, or do you want the booze, and/or the oak? The gushing was probably because of the sugars in the whiskey fermenting in the bottles. If you want more whiskey flavor, you could take those oak cubes, boil them to remove the tannins for a short while. Drain, add your whiskey to soak, and then add the cubes, and then add the whiskey to taste. I'd let that sit, maybe ferment out some more, and then taste.
Thanks for the report back to us. The sugar is the likely culprit that caused over-carbonation, so your idea apparently isn't the hoped-for answer unless you allow that sugar to ferment out before bottling. But you also say that the maple flavor also deserted your effort, so that flavor is still elusive.
