Woxford Brewing Co. New 5 gallon Oak Barrel filled with Fancy Lad English Mild

Friday night was brewnight for a Belgian Blonde, Sophie Amalie, which was a successful brew, hitting all of the numbers.  The beer had a great taste and aroma thanks to a last minute addition of some spices, lemon verbona, lemon peel and lemongrass.

That night we also racked the Jester King Black Metal Stout (BMS) into my 10 Gallon Whiskey barrel that I had prepared.  I also needed to rack the 5 gallons of Fancy Lad that wasn’t being soured and had initially planned for a stainless keg.  One of my assistant brewers suggested that we use the 5 gallon oak barrel since it needed to be used to pull the strong oak flavor out so we could eventually use it for souring beers.

I was easily convinced though slightly concerned about the barrels’ small leaks.  I ended up soaking the new 5 gallon barrel for 5 days and only on the last day did it seem to hold water.  Hoping for the best, we went ahead and racked Fancy Lad and BMS into their respective barrels.

Once filled, the next challenge was moving the barrels into the room with the rack for aging.  The empty barrels are fairly light; the 5 gallon barrel weighs close to 10 pounds and the 10 gallon barrel closer to 25 pounds.  But after adding beer, roughly 8 pounds per gallon, we were lugging 50 and 100+ pound barrels.

5 gallons of Fancy Lad, leaking a bit around the head. Black Metal Stout on the right, holding perfectly in the 10 Gallon Whiskey Barell

I ended up using a non-fancy metal turkey roasting pan under the 5 gallon barrel to contain the slow leaking mess.  This proved less useful than intended.  The weight of the barrel stand poked through the tray in a few places so a backup of using old cloth diapers was employed to soak up the beer.  I even used a large fan to dry the barrel in an attempt to slow the leak.   This helped quite a bit and it’s not leaking much at all.

Days later something new appeared; the slow leak is soaking the outer wood of the barrel and keeping it moist with sugary beer, and the temp is a balmy 75F.  This leads to mold forming on the outside of the barrel.  Daily cleaning and scraping should prevent any migration of the bugs into the barrel, but only time will tell if that’s true.

Since the 5 gallon barrel is new and beer (Fancy Lad) is light, I plan to leave it in the oak prison only for two weeks.  I’ll put up a post on sampling the two barrels next week.

10 Gallon used Whiskey Barrel, 5 gallon new Oak Barrel with Woxford Brewing Logo

I’ve been brewing for a few years now and I’ve been contemplating starting some new phases of brewing.  The first big change was to start up a sour pipeline.  Sour beers take a long time to mature so one needs to plan ahead.  One of the typical vessels used in sour-beer making is oak barrels. The typical oak barrel is between 50 and 60 gallons and quite large.  This is far beyond the capacity of most homebrewers so it makes some sense to try something smaller.  There are many places which let you order new barrels in smaller sizes, 1 to 20L (5-ish gallons) in capacity. New oak has some challenges when aging beers.  The initial liquid in the barrel can pull out huge amounts of oak flavor, tannens, aromas, and can quickly overpower a beer.  Practically, one cannot leave a beer in a new oak barrel for very long, certainly not long enough for the typical aging requirement for sour beers. There are a couple ways to address this over-oaking issue.  The obvious one is to start putting beer into the barrel.  Depending on the style of beer, the initial period in the barrel may be up to two or three weeks before it tastes too oaky.  For the second beer, something like one or two months.  By the third beer, it can be close to three or four months before the same level of oak character is tasted.  At this point, the barrel is ready for sour beers.

Before I can add beer to a barrel, one must prepare it for use. The technique is the same whether new or used. The general technique involves filling the barrel with water until it doesn’t leak any more.  I started with the warm-water method which involves filling half of the barrel up, re bunging, and then rolling the barrel around to ensure all surfaces are covered.

I drained and re-filled the barrel.  This also helps loosen up the various bits that were inside the barrel.

That’s some nice char and whiskey coming out.  But the color is clear, so it’s good to go.   After refilling, it will be left on its end over night.  If it holds water then it can be stored empty until I’m ready to rack; though the longer one goes without something inside it, the more likely microbes will grow inside.  My plan is to fill this with beer this coming Friday.

The five gallon new barrel has proven to be a bit leaky at this point.  In case you cannot tell, some of the rings seem to be a bit loose and gaps in the staves are wide enough for water to just flow out of it.  The current plan is to work on swelling for five days.  The first two days one end is soaked, then after changing all of the water, another two days for the other end.  After five days, if it doesn’t hold water, then it won’t likely be trouble free.  Here’s hoping that the Woxford Brewing branded barrel will swell up and be ready for an Imperial IPA in two weeks.