Big Mouth for Primary & Secondary in NB Rebel Rye Porter

[texasgrant]

Evening, all,

About to brew NB’s Rebel Rye Porter (when kit arrives in a couple of days). Was thinking about doing primary fermentation in the big mouth, since that’s 6.5 gallon glass, and simply opening the big mouth a week into primary to add wood chips and let a “secondary” fermentation occur in the big mouth, but not rack it anywhere. I know I’ll expose the batch to oxygen, but not more than siphoning over to a secondary fermentation, right?

Alternatively, what if I just add the rye soaked wood chips to the primary when I pour the wort in there from the get-go and pitch the yeast?

Finally, anyone just skip the addition of the wood chips and add the whiskey directly to the wort before pitching?

In the end, it’s all beer, so long as the yeast does its thing and I drink it! All help is, as always, appreciated. Thanks,

Grant

[frenchie]

I have a bourbon porter fermenting right now. Plan on adding the oak and bourbon to primary after about two weeks. Mine is a 3 gallon batch in a 6 gallon fermentor, so lots of head space. If I’m careful putting the chips and bourbon in, I shouldn’t lose much of my co2 blanket in the fermentor. I really don’t see any need to rack to another vessel for this, and technically it won’t be a “secondary” fermentation because no further fermentation will be taking place, only conditioning. I’ve decided on this method based on the advice of lots of others here on the forum

:cheers:

Ron

[texasgrant]

[quote=“Frenchie”]I have a bourbon porter fermenting right now. Plan on adding the oak and bourbon to primary after about two weeks. Mine is a 3 gallon batch in a 6 gallon fermentor, so lots of head space. If I’m careful putting the chips and bourbon in, I shouldn’t lose much of my co2 blanket in the fermentor. I really don’t see any need to rack to another vessel for this, and technically it won’t be a “secondary” fermentation because no further fermentation will be taking place, only conditioning. I’ve decided on this method based on the advice of lots of others here on the forum

:cheers:

Ron[/quote]

Thanks, Ron,

That’s kind of what I thought, too. In my mind, I assumed the risk of oxygen contamination from racking to a secondary was greater than simply adding the wood chips/rye whiskey to the primary. Thanks for the tip!

Does the recipe call for the same timelines for the “secondary fermentation” that you’re going to use, or are you going to shrink/expand that time at all? Thanks,

Grant

[frenchie]

Recipe calls for one to two weeks of aging with the bourbon/chips. Based on my previous batch (a couple of years ago) I’m going with one week and about 1/2 the recommended chips. In my first batch, the oak flavor was way too strong for my taste. I like the taste of booze that the bourbon brings, but I prefer only a slight hint of oak. It’s really all about your preferences.

I’m gonna let primary go for two weeks minimum before I add the bourbon and chips. It has already slowed to a crawl since Saturday, so I’ll take a gravity reading in another week to see where it’s at.

Good luck with yours!

:cheers:

Ron

[texasgrant]

Roger that - I’ll report back after I brew with what I did. Thanks again,

Grant