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Author Topic: 1st time sour solera type oak barrel question(s)  (Read 2158 times)

Offline uisgue

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1st time sour solera type oak barrel question(s)
« on: June 19, 2017, 08:54:28 pm »
My first sour project is just about sour enough to pull a portion from my 15 gallon oak barrel.  I had planned to pull about 5 gallons and replace it with fresh beer.  However, I don't have a batch ready.  What I do have is about 15 pounds of frozen plums from my tree from last season.  I'm thinking about pulling just the volume that I can replace with plums. Does this seem feasible?  I suppose the plum detritus would be in the barrel indefinitely, but I'm not sure that would be a problem.  Any thoughts?
Doug Hickey
Crescent City, CA
Symposia Brew Corps

Offline Stevie

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Re: 1st time sour solera type oak barrel question(s)
« Reply #1 on: June 20, 2017, 07:48:43 am »
Post your question on the Milk the Funk FB group. You will get experienced answers quickly.

Offline reverseapachemaster

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Re: 1st time sour solera type oak barrel question(s)
« Reply #2 on: June 20, 2017, 07:59:23 am »
The leftover plum fruit would be in there until you clean it out, which means it's also occupying space that could be used by more beer. The fermented plum juice will also always be a part of the solera. That may not be a bad thing but fruit flavors age with time and it might contribute less over time than adding in more beer.

Why not just wait until you can brew another five gallons to replace what you pull? It's not like the sour beer in the solera is going to go bad or pulling five gallons will arrest any further development in what you take out.
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Offline brewinhard

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Re: 1st time sour solera type oak barrel question(s)
« Reply #3 on: June 20, 2017, 08:42:23 am »
My first sour project is just about sour enough to pull a portion from my 15 gallon oak barrel.  I had planned to pull about 5 gallons and replace it with fresh beer.  However, I don't have a batch ready.  What I do have is about 15 pounds of frozen plums from my tree from last season.  I'm thinking about pulling just the volume that I can replace with plums. Does this seem feasible?  I suppose the plum detritus would be in the barrel indefinitely, but I'm not sure that would be a problem.  Any thoughts?

Or wait to until you have more beer to add back to the solera and then add the plums only to 5 gallons of your pull?