Bourbon and oak addition suggestions?

[KennyPurcell]

Next weekend I am going to add some bourbon and oak chips to an imperial stout a friend and I made last June (FG 1.023 -> 8.3%). My plan is to determine the bourbon addition amount by adding measured amount to samples until we get something we like and scale that up for addition to the 5 gal batch. I am also going to age with medium roast oak cubes for 2 weeks.

I may be wrong, but it seems like the internet consensus is 2 weeks with medium roast cubes and 10mL of bourbon addition per pint. I was wondering if any of you guys would share how you use bourbon and oak additions. Any guidance to use as we do our taste test would be greatly appreciated.

[john mills]

I have a stainless tea ball strainer I use for oak chips. The tea ball strainer holds 1 oz of chips. I place the chips in a small glass jar with a lid, and pour in the liquor of choice to just cover the chips (about 2-3 oz). I soak the chips in the liquor of choice for at least 3 days, but it can be as long as you want. Once soaked I put the chips in the sanitized tea ball and add the soaking liquor, and tea ball to the keg. Chips add flavor faster than cubes, so taste test every week till your desired oak-i-ness. My range is 2 weeks to 2 months depending on beer. If you want more liquor flavor, add that to taste to the keg too.

[ArtCox]

I use the Jack Daniel's Oak Chips, I get mine at Kroger, I know this info is a little late but I put 4oz. in the secondary..

[msjulian]

I use white oak dowel rods (Lowes) the rods have a very large contact area. I buy one rod (I think 4') and cut it in small enough lengths to fit in to a 13 x 9 pan. I boil the rods for aprox 10 -15 min for safety. Pour enough bourbon to just cover the rods. Sometimes I add small amount of vanilla bean. The last time I soaked the rods for 2 days. Drop the rods in the carboy. As John stated start tasting after a week. It really doesn't take long to start tasting the bourbon. I think my last Old Ale I only had the rods in for a week and it was loaded with flavor

I know Don H. used one of those Oak Infusion Spirals once and he said it worked really well. He was shocked at how fast and how much flavor it added to the beer. He said he could see how you could over do it quickly with those things.

The key as John said is surface area. You want a medium that gives the most surface area as possible.

Here is a really good BYO article
http://www.byo.com/stories/item/1649-wo ... -mr-wizard