Thanks, Moose. From your comments, and those of others, I have more
respect for the common whiskey barrel. My Dad had a problem with
alcohol, so I don't imbibe, which puts me at a disadvantage in these
discussions. But, I reside between the two most well known distilleries
in Tennessee, so I should be better informed. Speaking of stills, I
found what appeared to be remnants of a still in a "hollow" near the
back line of our farm in Mississippi, back when I was a kid. My wife
and I used to joke about the sources of whiffs of smoke over the Bear
Creek backwoods in North Alabama, as we flew over on our journeys back
to Mississippi. But, I kept my distance.
Jim Nichols
Tullahoma, TN USA
On 4/27/2015 3:50 PM, Moose wrote:
On 4/27/2015 1:17 PM, Paul Braun wrote:
Quite a few of them find their way to the Caribbean and are used for
aging
tequila and rum as well.
Interesting how complex a tiny area of knowledge can be.
They are also used to produce Canadian Whiskies and by a few micro
breweries, to age beer.
I had a great uncle who had a career as a 'revenooer', a Federal agent
searching out and destroying stills and prosecuting their operators.
He told us that the flavoring effect of the barrel was determined by
whether it was newly charred or used, the surface area of the charred
portion relative to the volume and the time in the barrel. To get the
expected flavor profile of a five year aged Kentucky Bourbon, you have
to start with a new, freshly charred barrel of a certain size.
OR, you can use any sort of container, put in a lot of charred wood
chips and your fresh moonshine, set it on a rocker powered by a car
battery and leave it to age a few weeks out in the woods. Huge surface
area of fresh char and gentle agitation apparently equals several
years lying still aging in barrels.
He told many tales, including the one of the ersatz Canadian Club that
was so good, and pervasive in the South, that they had to send samples
to the SF office for analysis, to be reasonably sure it was being
compared to the real thing.
Used barrels are particularly suitable for making mild whiskies or for
Whisky that gets it's flavor elsewhere, as from drying the barley with
peat fires. (Extra credit for knowing the difference between the way
this is done for Irish and Scotch Whisky.)
Unless my memory is playing down, I believe I had a winery tour many
years in the Napa Valley where they used really well used ex-whiskey
barrels for aging some of their wine. Apparently even after they can't
be used to make even very mild whiskey, the barrels may live on before
becoming planters.
Whiskery Moose
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