Midlands brewers 1st Barrel project RR Supplication clone

[LASERBOY147]

Brown Ale aged in used cab sav barrel. It is aged for about 12 months with sour cherries, brettanomyces, lactobacillus, and pediococcus added to each barrel. Flavors from the cherries, cab sav and oak balance each other nicely with a little funk from the brett.
We are embarking on what I hope will be the first of many barrel projects in the club which is now in  its 2nd year and we are lucky to have experienced barrel beer  agers in our team.
Videos and pictures and fermentation results to follow along with full recipe and each of our own experiences. Sharing the experience is important to  us  as the brewing community helps each other and so anyone with any questions fire away.
Fingers crossed we'll have a beautiful beer in a year or so. Slaintè

[LASERBOY147]

6
25kg pale
1.4kg Vienna
900g crystal 40L
80g carafa  lll
30g perle at 45 mins 8%aa
2 pkts Belgian Abbaye yeast
11.3kg fresh cherries into 225lit barrel
Wait 2 months then add Brett and bugs
1yr later decant and prime and btl.
.... at least that's crudely the recipe and plan....

[nigel_c]

Looks savage.

[LASERBOY147]

LASERBOY147 .

Mashed at 66oc with 3 weeks to go before fill day.
O.G was 1081 crystal clear wort. Yeast was dry & rehydrated.
I noted it didn't take off while hydrating it but after 11hrs in f.v it's been bubbling every 3/4 seconds for 4 days now at 17.5oc which is low for a yeast (danstar/lallemands) but Web pg recommends 17oc. Belgian yeast usually likes 20+oc and a few other brewers in the project have taken a different approach so it'll be very interestingon fill say to note the differences.

[LASERBOY147]

Looks savage.

Cheers . Here's hoping!  The barrel is beautiful and clean and fresh. The wine flavour is very strong too...

[LASERBOY147]

When I die....

[LASERBOY147]

LASERBOY147 O.G. 1081 & a view from inside the barrel

[LASERBOY147]

LASERBOY147 1081 O.G.

[Leann ull]

Looks amazing, with the barrel so dry did you do anything to sanitise sterilise before the beer went in?

[phynes1]

Looks class. I started a batch of this 12 months ago. Primary with abbeye yeast, then after 3 week transferred onto wine soaked oak, pitched a culture stepped up from supplication dregs and let sit. Currently it's got a fantastic ballanced sourness to it. At the moment I'm debating the source of cherries to use. You're using fresh, where did you source them? RR use all dried fruit, but they're hard to get here.

[LASERBOY147]

Looks amazing, with the barrel so dry did you do anything to sanitise sterilise before the beer went in?

Fill day is 26th Nov.  Btw nice meeting you at the beer shop the other day. We'll make a judgement call on the barrel as far as sanitising sterilisation but tbh it's a sour beer and the aroma of red wine is just amazing so I think we're going commando

[LASERBOY147]

Looks class. I started a batch of this 12 months ago. Primary with abbeye yeast, then after 3 week transferred onto wine soaked oak, pitched a culture stepped up from supplication dregs and let sit. Currently it's got a fantastic ballanced sourness to it. At the moment I'm debating the source of cherries to use. You're using fresh, where did you source them? RR use all dried fruit, but they're hard to get here.

The cherries are being sourced from one of the group but tbh I think they might turn out to be frozen sour morello cherries . Not entirely sure but either way they won't be cheap! Fresh are crazy price but we don't mind.

[phynes1]

I'm having trouble sourcing sour cherries myself. Would it be possible to help a brother out with details of your source?

[lordstilton]

Any decent Polish shop sells frozen sour cherries

[Bubbles]

You run a high risk of leaks if you rack your precious beer into a dry barrel. The staves need to be kept wet or they shrink slightly and introduce leaks. At least that's my understanding..