Hey guys,
Has anyone ever doctored up an Irish red recipe with some oak and Irish whiskey? I was thinking the flavors would blend well, but was just looking to see if anyone has ever tried it and how it turned out.
Cheers,
Josh
I had a barrel-aged “Imperial” Irish red ale (7% ABV) before and it was good. I’d say the flavors would all be complementary, I would go easy on the whiskey is all. My experience with bourbon in beer has told me that a little goes a long way.
I agree with Lennie on the whiskey, you may want to do some experimenting before committing to a full batch.
Thanks for the quick feedback.
I made our host’s Bourbon Barrel Porter so I can attest to power of liquor blended with beer.
I was already planning on buying some commercial examples of Irish reds to doctor up this weekend, thanks for verifying that I had the right idea there.
Yes. Got 5 gallons kegged right now… I made a basic “irish red.” Fermented it primary for 3 weeks. transferred to secondary and added a couple ounces of medium toast oak cubes and 12 ounces of Jameson whiskey.
Left it for another 3-4 weeks.
I brewed it on New Year’s Day - thinking it would be ready for St. Patrick’s Day. At first, the whiskey was overpowering- too strong. Thought it was still too strong at St. Pat’s. It has mellowed and blended better over the past weeks. I am not sure that it is going to be a great beer - but it is a good beer/interesting beer right now. It has some potential and I will brew again. #1 thing I will do is cut whiskey to 6-8 ounces… I think the key is that there is a “hint” of whiskey, not a dominant whiskey flavor.
Have not tasted it in 2-3 weeks, so I will have to revisit it this weekend.
This was my grain bill (6.5 gallons I believe)… 1.05 ish gravity I think.
Some fuggle/ekg for hops
Can’t remember yeast right now… 1056 - something basic I think. It was NOT Irish Ale yeast, I do know that.
2 Row 4.5 lbs
Munich 2.0 lbs
Golden Promis 4.0 lbs
Roast Barley 2.0 ounces
Caraaroma 11.0 ounces
Oats 0.5 lbs
Melanoiden 4.0 ounces
Carafoam 4.0 ounces
So, 12 ounces of whiskey overpowered the batch initially. What’s a good ounce per gallon or per 5 gallons? I have a quasi-Irish-frankenstein-brown I’m considering oaking and bourbon’ing :shock:
I brewed the Rebel Rye Porter and put 2 oz med oak cubes in 16oz Rye Whiskey for 48 hours then added that to the carboy for 2 weeks before bottling. It’s been in the bottle for almost a month now and it’s got a VERY potent rye whiskey taste. One buddy who tasted it said it burned like whiskey. Can’t say I’ve ever noticed whiskey burning but obvisously it’s pretty pronounced. I’m hoping it will mellow as it ages. It’s hard to taste the beer at all right now. If I made it again I’d definitely cut the whiskey down by at least half.
Bourbon Barrel Porter handles 12-16 ounces of makers mark bourbon pretty well - because of the stronger flavor of the beer. The Amber did not seem to take that much whiskey as smoothly. I think it will blend in better over time, but like I said, I would think 6-8 ounces next time might be about right for a nice subtle irish whiskey flavor in the background. 12 ounces seemed to put it squarely in the foreground of the beer as the primary flavor - not bad, just stronger than I think it should have been.
Does anyone know how much bourbon will mellow over time. My wife bought a strong flavored bourbon which I added to my BVIP and the flavor is just two strong. It has aged about 8 months and has not mellowed much in the keg. Needing the keg space, I decided to bottle in bombers and let it age, but if it is no going to mellow much over time, I will keep a much smaller sample size.
