oak x glass ?!?!?!?!?!
Posted: Sun Jan 02, 2011 10:20 am
I used to age my goró in oak barrels, from 10 to 20 l, i have some of them, but i noticed every week i loose some volume.
1 year ago i received as a gift a pair of 34l glass bottles, i believe that they would be used for decoration, i started using them for aging.
At the beginning i used comercial bought oak chips, but the results arent good enough, someday i found a old lady who had 4 x 200 l oak barrels she used in the past to age wine, as the barrels passed some years empty, they do not have all the belts and had some missing parts and stripes, so they are useless to store anything liquid, i bought and cuted the barrel´s stripes in 1" x 10" thinner strips and with a gas burner toasted them all making a "degradee", very toasted on one side and almost untoasted on the other.
I left these strips (6 or 7 at a time) from 2 to 4 months on the glass barrels with 30 liter of rum , it achieved color and a very better taste, not the same as if it was done with oak barrels but my looses with evaporation and absorption were zero.
i bought and aquarium pump and put it bubling on the glass barrel for 1 week, it added a little "smothness" to my goró.
Finnally, the dust from cutting the strips (i put it in a fine bag), i mixed with some tails, 1 liter 60 abv / 250 g of oak dust let it rest from 1 month them distill it on a glass lab distiller, i got 400 ml of a very strong product i added to my goró, finally i got it as it was on the oak barrel, but whithout loosing .
Now i´m really thinking on use my oak barrels as gift only, and i want to know if someone had similar experiences on using glass for aging and if it have some problem.
my best regards for all and a very nice 2011
Moorea, from Ilhabela-Brazil
1 year ago i received as a gift a pair of 34l glass bottles, i believe that they would be used for decoration, i started using them for aging.
At the beginning i used comercial bought oak chips, but the results arent good enough, someday i found a old lady who had 4 x 200 l oak barrels she used in the past to age wine, as the barrels passed some years empty, they do not have all the belts and had some missing parts and stripes, so they are useless to store anything liquid, i bought and cuted the barrel´s stripes in 1" x 10" thinner strips and with a gas burner toasted them all making a "degradee", very toasted on one side and almost untoasted on the other.
I left these strips (6 or 7 at a time) from 2 to 4 months on the glass barrels with 30 liter of rum , it achieved color and a very better taste, not the same as if it was done with oak barrels but my looses with evaporation and absorption were zero.
i bought and aquarium pump and put it bubling on the glass barrel for 1 week, it added a little "smothness" to my goró.
Finnally, the dust from cutting the strips (i put it in a fine bag), i mixed with some tails, 1 liter 60 abv / 250 g of oak dust let it rest from 1 month them distill it on a glass lab distiller, i got 400 ml of a very strong product i added to my goró, finally i got it as it was on the oak barrel, but whithout loosing .
Now i´m really thinking on use my oak barrels as gift only, and i want to know if someone had similar experiences on using glass for aging and if it have some problem.
my best regards for all and a very nice 2011
Moorea, from Ilhabela-Brazil