Barrel

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Jason Sledd's barrel and bulldog [1]

(To do)

Barrels are an ideal vessel for fermenting many funky and mixed-fermentation beers. This page discusses the sorts of barrels available to pro and home brewers and influences those barrels have on the final beer to help brewers choose the barrel that is right for them.

Types of Wood Used in Barrels

Acacia

Acacia wood, also known as "Black Locust," is a species of tree native to the southeastern United States - although its roots have spread worldwide, from Europe all the way to Asia and as far south as Southern Africa. More recently, Acacia has been used as an alternative to the traditional white oak when aging White wine.

Although white wine is often aged in steel casks, wine makers have since discovered that aging in an Acacia barrel preserves the wines aromatic and fruit characteristics. Acacia wood does not contain as much tannin content as oak, thus, it better preserves freshness as well as floral and varietal characteristics. Additionally, white wines aged in Acacia barrels do not suffer from a loss of overall structure.

Acacia is predominantly used in applications for furniture and flooring, however, its physical and chemical properties have led this wood variety to become an integral material within the wine industry: Acacia wood is ideal for aging White wine.

American White Oak

American White Oak (Quercus Alba) is regarded as one of the preeminent species of hardwood grown here in the United States of America. This species of White Oak has tyloses, an outgrowth of the parenchyma cells which stems from a reaction to natural stresses in the environment such as drought; which gives the wood a closed cellular structure, making it water- and rot- resistant.

Within the Wine & Spirits industry, Quercus Alba or American White Oak is the primary source of material in the production of Whiskey barrels; now inundated by law, requiring all bourbon whiskey to be aged in charred new oak barrels.

What makes this species of wood key to the whiskey industry is it chemical structure and the effect this imparts on the aging whiskey. American White Oak is known for its high vanillin content, oak lactone (coconut/bourbon characteristic), and wood sugars which all affect the bourbons taste. Additionally, American White Oak affects the coloring of the bourbon itself. Impure wood varieties like Pine contain resin canals which pass strong flavors into maturing whiskey.

Chestnut

French

Hungarian

Romanian White Oak

Toast level and Volume

In progress

Barrels and barrel products are generally available in toast levels of light, medium, medium+ and heavy as well as varying levels of char. in addition to different wood types, different toast levels each have their own characteristics and are chosen for different purposed. Barrels used for aging spirits such as whiskey generally have some degree of charring, or at least heavy toast, while red wine barrels may be more commonly in the medium or med+ range. While the homebrewer and professional brewer does not always have full control over the toast levels of the barrels that they are getting (as the barrels are frequently used by wine and spirit producers before being acquired by brewers), brewers will likely find that different toast levels are better suited different beers.

Some brewers select specific barrels based on what they previously held as a fundamental component of certain beers (e.g. Russian River, Cantillon 50N, 3F Zenne). In addition, sometimes brewers aren't looking for barrel flavor in their sour beers and are more interested in the medium that barrels provide for fermentation in addition to some less flavor active compounds that barrels may contribute (--source: Jay and Tim Clifford for on the sour hour, probably something from JvR). Due to the delicate balance that good mixed-fermentation beers have, an aggressive barrel character may not always fit and brewers will have to get a feel for their barrels to know how long it takes for a beer to develop appropriate barrel character compared to how long until it develops the right fermentation character. For a first fill, it is recommended to taste the beer regularly to see how it is developing, and it may be necessary to allow additional aging in other vessels like carboys or stainless tanks for the beer to arrive at the right level of both fermentation development and barrel that the brewer is targeting.

---flavor description table to come (see also the flavor descriptions for different wood types above)----

Barrels are also available in a number of different volumes. Typical volumes of wine barrels are around 228L (60 gal) and may vary slightly depending on region and cooper. Professional breweries generally use barrels of this volume and larger. For homebrewers, filling a barrel of such volume can be a bit more tricky and may require a group effort and/or many brews. Some smaller barrels are available for homebrewers via craft distillers (among other producers). These barrels which can be found in the 5-15 gallon range provide an attractive option for homebrewers though some special considerations may be needed.

First, smaller volumes mean a greater surface area to volume ratio. This means that both flavor extraction from the barrel will be faster and O2 pickup will be greater (as oxygen penetration is tied to the barrel's surface area). Both of these factors make these small barrels attractive to craft distillers as they can shorten the aging time for certain flavor developments, but for the homebrewer looking to produce long-ages mixed-fermentation beers with no barrel flavor impact to supportive barrel character rather than strong barrel character this is not ideal. The barrel character can be partially stripped by repeated use and soaking with water. Because many of the small barrels available to homebrewers are derived from distileries and therefore may be more likely a heavier toast level, it may take longer to remove the character of the wood. Continuing----

Second, the staves of smaller barrels are generally thinner allows greater oxygen permeability. So smaller barrels, both by surface area to volume ratio and by generally thinner staves, allow greater O2 transfer to the beer than larger barrels. Homebrewers may wish to counteract this O2 transfer by waxing smaller barrels [2].

Misc Info

  • Barrels used by some lambic producers (notable 3 Fonteinen and De Cam) were originally 4000 liter barrels used by breweries like Pilsner Urquell. The barrels used for lager brewing are pitched. However, they were rebuilt to hold 1000 liters, and the pitch was removed before being sent to lambic brewers in Pajottenland [3].
  • Potassium bitartrate (KHTa) is formed in wine, through the reaction between the bitartrate ion (HTa-), from tartaric acid (H2Ta), and the potassium ion (K+) found in grapes, especially grape skins. It is also known as potassium hydrogen tartrate, and commonly called "Cream of Tartar", "wine crystals", potassium salt of tartaric acid, tartrates, argols, tartres (French), Weinstein (German - "wine stones") [4][5]. KHTa build up appears as crystals in wine barrels. It has no affect on the taste of wine, and is assumed to have no affect on the taste of beer [6][7]. They can be removed through the use of Proxycarb™ (see the Barrel Builders Barrel Maintenance Repair Manual).

General Resources and Articles

Sourcing Barrels - Manufacturers and Suppliers

Pro Sizes


  • If you live in a wine producing region, meet your local winemakers and join local winery forums to see what sorts of used stuff comes up.

Offers Smaller Sizes

Homebrew sized used barrels

Barrel Alternatives

To do

See Also

References

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