Double-Maturing Scotch-style whisky

[Brookspn]

I'm a long time all-grain brewer and going to make the next step to distilling this winter. As a life-long Scotch lover, I am thinking of making my first spirit a single-malt with as much Islay character as I can muster living here in upstate NY. Many of my favorite malts are extremely peaty and double-matured in a used bourbon barrel then a Pedro Ximenez sherry cask (the 2011 Lagavulin Distiller's Edition was A+). My question is this: could I take some oak cubes (accounting for surface area/volume ratio) and soak some charred American in some bourbon and another batch of medium toast french and soak them in some Ximenez sherry, then age the spirit on the bourbon cubes for a bit, then the sherry cubes for a bit, to emulate, through probably not duplicate, the effect of double-maturation? If this is possible, for how long would I need to soak the above mentioned oak cubes in their respective liquids before they would impart any sort of noticeable character to a single-malt (probably 100% Baird's @50ppm phenol) and leech out any unwanted vanillins/tannins out of the oak?

Thanks all, I'll look forward to hearing from some experienced folks whether this will work.

[blind drunk]

My question is this: could I take some oak cubes (accounting for surface area/volume ratio) and soak some charred American in some bourbon and another batch of medium toast french and soak them in some Ximenez sherry, then age the spirit on the bourbon cubes for a bit, then the sherry cubes for a bit, to emulate, through probably not duplicate, the effect of double-maturation?

Worth a try, why not. Have you seen this thread -

http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... 6&start=20

Some folks add a touch of sherry and or a touch of bourbon to their aging all grains to try and emulate the flavors in those woods.

Others will chime in shortly. Good luck.

[rtalbigr]

The best thing about this "hobby" is the liberties we can go to. I say go for it, experimentation will always expand our base of knowledge. In my experience, used sticks don't perform as well as used barrels, so, I'd go a little oversize, to compensate, and then check pretty regular. Also, in my experience, sticks/cubes just aren't as good as barrels, but I understand that we can't always have the barrels we need. But I think what you have in mind is definitely worth trying.

Big R

[Brookspn]

Thanks, Big R. Truth be told, I haven't even bought/built a still yet, but was going to start soaking the oak in sherry/bourbon so it had ample time to permeate the wood before being used in the whisky. We'll see what happens come this fall/winter.