I just made my first Brett beer yesterday. I used Belgian Saison, Brett Brux, and dregs from a bottle of Logsdon Saison Brett all dumped into primary at the same time. I want to age the beer for about 8 months on some white wine (chardonay?) oak cubes. I plan on using about 1oz of cubes but I am not sure how long to soak the cubes in the wine for. Should I add some of the oaked wine to the beer as well?
You can soak the cubes for a week or two. It won't impart hardly any wine flavor unless you dump some wine in the beer.
Id use a little a more oak if this is for 5 gallons. Id also boil the cubes first and maybe double soak them(2 weeks on the wine, drain, add fresh wine for another 2-6 weeks). @OldSock has added straight white wine to the beer with good results. Check it out on his blog.
I just made a tart peach saison. I boiled the oak spiral for about 10 min, soaked in gruner veltliner for about a month, then added it and let it sit for about 2 weeks. I actually got a good amount of wine flavor from the spiral.
As other suggested, boil or steam the cubes to remove some of the fresh lumber aromatics. I'd add them directly to the beer and age until the gravity is stable and it is oaky enough. You can add more oak after six months if it is still lacking. At bottling, blend in the wine of your choice to taste. I don't see any big advantage to employing the oak as a middleman to move wine into the beer. Here's a funky saison I brewed with a bottle of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc.
