Hello from Down Under

[Andy K]

Hi all,

Hello from Australia,

We’ve recently started a distillery here in Melbourne and are making mainly gins and vodka.  We are somewhat in the minority over here in that we make our own base spirit from scratch, which everyone tells us is crazy and says we should buy it in from one of the large, industrial producers - but we’ve tried that stuff and to be honest, prefer ours!!  And it’s more about the craft for us than the “profitability”.  We produce from rainwater collected and filtered off our own roof, grow as many of the botanicals on site as we can, have built the column, reflux, probe holders, condenser and parrot ourselves from recycled copper, only use Aussie made bottles and use a 20Kw solar system to power the operation.  So we’re treading lightly, focusing on best quality rather than profit and having a lot of fun in the process..

We’ve also just come into possession of 10,000 litres of wine - good wine - 8,000 litres of cab merlot (16 year old and been looked after under CO2 for all of it, in the dark and temperature controlled) and 2,000 litres of Pinot Noir (5 year old and kept under the same conditions as the cab Merlot)….

We’ve done some trials and confirmed no issues with sulphur on both of the wines, stripped both and then ran a “spirit” run (no copper packing but everything from the boiler lid to the parrot spout is copper other than the 90 degree elbows at the top) on both - drawing off at around 65-70% abv, keeping the flow rate so that this ABV is maintained as the run progressed.  

100L samples have yielded about 20 litres of product (that’s 20 of each) with ABV averaging at about 65…..

We’ve been “harsh” with the cuts and put 12 litres each into glass and added some medium toasted American oak blocks to see how it colours and ages (I know its not a barrel but it’ll give us some idea….)

After a month the cab merlot derived product is really looking and tasting fantastic.  Really smooth….

So to my question…

Oak barrels.  Do I go with new ones?  Or do I try and find old ones that have had wine in ? How many times?  Can I use ones that have had other spirits in?  What’s the advice of other brandy makers?

Thanks for reading so far - I know I’m from the other side of the pond but having read through a few posts i like the atmosphere of this group and there’s plenty of expertise to listen to.

Thanks in advance

Andy

 

[Shinenorth]

Hi Andy,

Love the story from start to finish from you! 
regarding brandy, with my distillation experience and learnings from others. Stay away from new barrels. I say the same with rum, unless you want to take away a lot of the distinctiveness. With my brandy, I went with barrels I wanted my brandy to get similar flavors from. So in my instance, our brandy came off very floral and bright. I opted for a barrel that had previously aged Portuguese sherry. Specifically orange sherry that had similar characteristics as the brandy I distilled. French oak is my choice for brandy, as it’s less aggressive with flavor takeover. 

[Kindred Spirits]

Welcome to the forums!

Nice to hear about your commitment to the craft of the process as well. I would definitely agree with @Shinenorth about staying away from new barrels, with one exception. The only time I might suggest adding a brandy or rum into some new barrels would be at a very low entry proof for some blending stock. There are some nice flavors that can come out of those barrels and then they work excellent as second use barrels for future brandies/rums. 

In terms of barrels used for other spirits it depends on the character of your spirit being produced, but typically you can use other barrels just fine. If unsure of what to use I would recommend getting a variety of types and see what turns out the best a few years down the line. 

If you need help with anything else, this forum is a great resource with a lot of knowledgeable people on it.

[Andy K]

Thanks shinenorth and kindred spirits - will have a look around here.  I live in the Yarra Valley, which is the wine producing centre of Victoria ( some excellent Pinot noirs ) there’s got to be someone with some older, triple used ones I can get cheap to trial things.   I’m only going to get 1200 litres absolute max so don’t need many…5 should do it…

Regards

Andy