Guest Post by Nathen Gabriel, Balcones Distilling. In 2009, Balcones Distilling released the first Texas whisky since Prohibition. With no template or rubric for how to make whisky in Texas, experimentation has always been integral to who we are as a distillery.

If you read the recent blog post about the Small Batch Toasted Barrels, you knew I was scheduled to conduct a tasting and presentation on the new collection of barrels at the 2020 American Craft Spirits Association Convention. Unfortunately, that convention has been postponed until August due to COVID-19.

A little over four years ago, we began to experiment with a barrel now known as our Wave Stave barrel; named for the unique wave-like pattern on the interior surface of each stave. Depending on the goals of an experiment, we usually monitor the maturation for a period of four years.

At Kentucky Research Center, most of our efforts are geared towards sensory analysis, customer product development and flavor discovery. However, thanks to a new piece of equipment that we acquired earlier this year, we can now study another very important aspect of barrel aged spirits: maturation dynamics.

Earlier this summer, we successfully completed our inaugural maturation class at Moonshine University. The new class, entitled “Age-ucation” was a joint effort by ISC and our good friends at Moonshine University.

In mid-April, ISC team members from around the world convened at our new Research Center located in Lebanon, Kentucky. Attendees came from as far as Germany, France, South America, and Australia. Others represented Mexico, Asia, and the United States.

In Barrel Profiling – Part 1, we touched on a few topics relating to the heat treatment of oak barrels. Specifically, we outlined the unique benefits of ISC’s barrel profiling system and the effects it can have on flavor development in oak-matured spirits. In this post, we will dive deeper by analyzing the results of a recent ISC experiment which utilized profiled barrels.

The thing about crafting good whiskey is it takes a long time – years aging in oak barrels – before it reaches full maturity. Aging whiskey in oak will always be necessary as three very important changes happen while the whiskey sits.