The Badmotivator Bain-Marie and Oak Barrel

[Badmotivator]

Large oak barrels are the gold standard for long-term aging of brown spirits. Home distillers generally cannot fill a full-size barrel, so alternatives are needed for aging. This forum is filled with such alternatives, many of them very good, but all of them differ in some functionally important way from a large oak barrel.

I have developed and made small "barrels" which I believe will give small-scale distillers a way to simulate the inside of a large oak barrel. The spirit "sees" only stainless steel and white oak, and the oak surface area to volume ratio is similar to that of a large oak barrel. There are no gaskets.

Here's what we're going for:

IMG_1398.jpg

The body of the barrel is an inexpensive stainless steel bain-marie insert from Amazon. These are 6-qt sizes, $15 each. The wood is white oak, about $4 worth each. The spigots are either stainless steel ($11) or wood ($5-$10)

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