Barrel stout entry

[Ciderhead]

Barrel comp was a straight 1,2,3 no feedback all judged by 5 commercial brewers

[imark]

Coincidentally, Dr. Homebrew podcast on Friday covered barrel aged stout. Worth a listen if you want to hear how the score a beer on it. Note, the complain about not enough dark roasty malt and too much whiskey...ho hum!  :

I would have thought the lack of any vanilla from the oak would have been the biggest failing of all the barrels. No mention of that from the judging though?

[imark]

True. I was going by this post http://www.nationalhomebrewclub.com/forum/index.php/topic,5774.msg77914.html#msg77914

It says looking for whiskey and some had too much dark malt. It's all I have t go on.

[Taf]

I know Tube that you asked on another thread about the whiskey character of our brew, as you didn't seem to have much, or maybe that was someone else. Anyway, ours had a lot. Too much I thought to begin with, but it's starting to mellow now, but will always be there.

When you got your barrel, did you take out much whiskey before you filled it with beer? Ours had about a litre and a quarter of whiskey in it, which we removed, so I guess that's why we got so much whiskey character and maybe others didn't.

I didn't hear much feedback from the barrel judging either, but did hear they were looking for whiskey character, so that could have helped the Rebel cause.

[Taf]

I think the key to vanilla is getting fresh barrels, not making the beer too strong, not leaving it in there too long, and not leaving it too long before drinking. To be honest whiskey stout isn't my favorite style, but the best one I ever tried was the first cask of the jameson that the well put on at xmas for the party. I could really get the vanilla, but by the time I tried a cask of the same batch at the cask fest in feb the vanilla was gone.