Barrel flavour

[tonyhibbett]

2 years ago I bought a small oak cask and filled it with home made port. I subsequently bottled the port and filled the barrel with some rather unimpressive red wine, which had failed to improve in bottles over 18 months. After a couple of months, I sampled it and found it had taken on the flavour of the port which had impregnated the wood. It is fortunate that the port had a good flavour. Had I initially used the poor wine in the new barrel, the outcome would have been unfortunate, and probably permanent.

 

[RobWalker]

nice! port barrels have a plethora of uses. they age dark beers well along with bootleg rum/whiskey....i'm envious.

 

[tonyhibbett]

Some legit whiskey makers use used sherry barrels for the same reason.

 

[Donny70]

I used rum barrel chunks to age my Belgian IPA. It was lush. Mmmmmmmmmm

 

[tonyhibbett]

The port was fortified with a significant amount of rum, rather than just brandy. Although the effect on the wine used to refill the barrel has added interest to it, the flavour is somewhat alien to typical red wine. I have bottled it and filled the barrel with a fresh batch of basic red wine, made from concentrate. One step I omitted in the elaborate preparation of the barrel was to roll around a bottleful of wine inside and then discard it. I also omitted the last step of fermenting wine in it. Effectively I have now done the former, so I now need to do the latter.