Make Your Own Bourbon! Part 1
Artist's rendition of our new booze-making enterprise. I'm the fat one who looks like The Skipper from Gilligan's Island standing next to the cowboy overcompensating with a Tommy gun.
That's right folks. We're going into the booze-making business and NOBODY CAN STOP US, SEE? Look out Maker's Mark! Watch your back Buffalo Trace! The Boozebloggers are coming for you...very, very slowly. WITH THESE!
It's not the size that matters. It's how you booze it.
Yep, we're making our own Bourbon! ....1 liter at a time.... (At this rate you should see Boozeblogger Bourbon on the shelves sometime before the economy improves...haha...get it?)
We found these little beauties online at Oak Barrels Ltd which is run by a nice lady from Texas named Cinda who sells barrels like these to people who want to conduct mad-scientist-like "boozeperiments." Oak Barrels Ltd sells new, charred oak barrels at a VERY reasonable price which you can use to age your own spirits and to make other cool things like homemade wine, vinegars, and cider. WE immediately saw their potential for both personal Bourbon creation and future world domination...it's just the kind of guys we are.
We're not going to give away our super secret bourbon recipe just yet. But suffice it to say that it will include LARGE amounts of vodka...and that's just for the planning phases. Before we get to all that though we want to walk you through the first steps toward creating your own personalized booze with these barrels.
Step 1. Curing the barrels
Just like a full-size whiskey barrel these little guys are made up of a series of "staves" which are really just planks made from Oak. The staves are laid into a pattern and then forced together by pure pressure. Only then are the six galvanized hoops you see around the outside applied. There is NO glue involved in the making of these barrels at all, their ability to hold spirits without leaking comes ONLY from pressure. This is why you have to "cure" the barrels with hot water before using them. The hot water causes the staves to expand just enough to close off any gaps that might have existed. Oak Barrels Ltd orders their barrels on a weekly basis from a third generation cooper which means your barrels have usually been made within the same month you ordered them and they rarely have ANY problems with leakage. Which means you can keep those greedy, drunken angels from getting a drop!
What you'll need.
OF COURSE I didn't do this in my bathroom...That would just be weird...Pay no attention to that toilet-paper roll...
Another handy feature you get from Oak Barrels Ltd is the miniature wooden stand. Without it filling these little things would be damn near impossible. The next part is the hardest: like the grape-eating wino said to Mitch Hedberg - "you have to wait." But not for very long. We just filled our barrels and we're pretty sure there is no leakage happening at all. (That or we're just so excited to be making our own hooch that we're hallucinating.) Oak Barrels LTD actually has a replacement policy for any barrels that leak for more than a 7 days but, like I said, it probably won't take anywhere NEAR that long before you can get down to business. After you're SURE the barrels aren't leaking anymore you can drain the water and fill them with your favorite spirit. (One of the best things we've heard of is buying a cheaper Blanco Tequila and aging that. Since these barrels are so very small it won't take any time at all. One person we know of said it only took about a WEEK to go from Blanco to a Reposado-like aging...see here)
NOW WE WANT YOUR HELP! Do you know about bourbon making or any other kind of home brewing? Leave us a comment and some bright ideas about what we could do with these barrels. We've got some idea about how we're going to (hopefully) create a nice bourbon but we're really just making this up as we go along. So pass this link around to your friends on the interwebs and let us know if you come up with any good ideas. We'd really love to have some input from you guys (and girls) about what goes into these things.
IF YOU HAVEN'T YET...go check out Oak Barrels Ltd. We are just a small website and the owner, Cinda, has been really nice to provide us with these barrels and the chance to create something unique to share with all of you. We wouldn't push these things if we didn't believe in the product. Just so you know, nobody has ever paid us a dime to say nice things about them on this site. We just love supporting small businesses and the people behind them and we really love the idea of making our own spirits.
STAY TUNED FOR PART 2!
OH! And check out this awesome video about how bourbon barrels like these are made!
