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fermenting Bourbon Barrel Fermentation

Been getting into making hot sauce from store-bought peps. First batch turned out so good that I almost cried (and not just from the heat). Experimented with different combinations of additives such as apple cider viegar vs. white vinegar and lemon juice vs. lime juice.
 
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That was using mason jars, but I've already graduated to using a used bourbon barrel (Got one for cheap since a buddy of mine works at a local distillery :party:) . Scraped out some of the loose charcoal (shoulda kept the char chunks but I didn't think of that at the time...). Sanded the inside of the barrel but I kept about 1/16 of an inch layer of char, and rinsed it about 5 times. It still retained a pungent odor of whiskey and white oak. I was careful to do because 1. I want to keep char flakes from getting into the final product, of which I intend to use the entirety of, pulp and all...and 2. because I don't want the bourbon/oak flavor to overpower the peppers.
 
Unfortunately, when filling the barrel with water to make the staves expand after having been dried out, I made the mistake of waiting too long to replace the barrel lid. When the time came to lid the barrel after putting the peps in, I couldn't get the lid back inside(there's grooves inside the barrel towards the top the staves that locks the lid in place)... Not a huge deal though as I would want to be able to check on the fermentation periodically anyways and you can't just take the lid out of a barrel after the wood has expanded from liquids and locked it in place. Just made sure the vegetation was submerged in the brine and rested the lid on top of the barrel instead and covered with foil/rubberband. Eventually I want to make a custom lid that has more accomodating features for pepper fermentation. 
 
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Pepper list (bourbon barrel):
 
  1. Finger Hot
  2. Jalepeno
  3. Black Jalepeno
  4. Serrano
  5. Red Fresno
  6. Habanero
  7. Banana Hot
  8. Mini & Long Sweet Peppers
(Also added some garlic cloves and onion)
 
I'd like to ferm for 3 months. Hopefully nothing will go wrong, but this is an experiment first and foremost so I am prepared for the worst.
 
Any questions or suggestions/tips, please let me know!
 
 
 
 
Wow! Way to dive in head first!

How many pounds of peppers you got in there?

I’ve never fermented in a wood barrel before so I could be way off but from my understanding of how it works, you may be better off fermenting a salted mash rather than brine. You’ll get evaporation through the barrel, with a mash this will concentrate the flavors, but with a brine I’d be concerned with losing too much brine and run the risk of a lot of your peppers not being submerged.


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7[SIZE=11.6667px] 1/8  pounds, should be enough for about 15 10oz. bottles if I keep the pulp(would be only about 12 10oz. bottles if I didn't include the onion and garlic). If I get too much char flakes I'll probably just extract the liquid with cheese cloth. I did wanna do a mash but[/SIZE]
 didn't wanna risk the possibility of getting char flakes in the produce and then having to ditch the pulp. I have the water level pretty high and the produce submerged pretty far beneath the surface, but I will check periodically in case of a lot of evaporation. I'm guessing adding extra brine in that case would not be good for the ferment, so in the event that happens I would probably just end the ferment early. Water level looks the same after a few days though.
UnNatural said:
Wow! Way to dive in head first!

How many pounds of peppers you got in there?

I’ve never fermented in a wood barrel before so I could be way off but from my understanding of how it works, you may be better off fermenting a salted mash rather than brine. You’ll get evaporation through the barrel, with a mash this will concentrate the flavors, but with a brine I’d be concerned with losing too much brine and run the risk of a lot of your peppers not being submerged.


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Wow, this is a great experiment! 
 
I caution you to trust your nose. If it smells bad, it's bad and toss it out.
 
Fermentation is an anaerobic process so keeping the peppers under the brine is essential to avoid any non-friendly bugs from taking hold while the lactobacillus gets to work converting the sugars into lactic acid. To maximize your chances of success, I would look to introducing some lactobacillus in quantity rather than relying on the naturally occurring stuff on the peppers. You can do this by adding some of the liquid from another ferment (or live Kimchi/sauerkraut juice). This may be even more important if you're using store bought peppers as there is no telling what cleaning/disinfecting they've been through.
 
Good luck!
 
SpicySpice said:
7 1/8  pounds, should be enough for about 15 10oz. bottles if I keep the pulp(would be only about 12 10oz. bottles if I didn't include the onion and garlic). If I get too much char flakes I'll probably just extract the liquid with cheese cloth. I did wanna do a mash but
 didn't wanna risk the possibility of getting char flakes in the produce and then having to ditch the pulp. I have the water level pretty high and the produce submerged pretty far beneath the surface, but I will check periodically in case of a lot of evaporation. I'm guessing adding extra brine in that case would not be good for the ferment, so in the event that happens I would probably just end the ferment early. Water level looks the same after a few days though.
Good luck! Complete guess on my part so I could be way off. Would love to see the progress on this.


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Siv said:
Wow, this is a great experiment! 
 
I caution you to trust your nose. If it smells bad, it's bad and toss it out.
 
Fermentation is an anaerobic process so keeping the peppers under the brine is essential to avoid any non-friendly bugs from taking hold while the lactobacillus gets to work converting the sugars into lactic acid. To maximize your chances of success, I would look to introducing some lactobacillus in quantity rather than relying on the naturally occurring stuff on the peppers. You can do this by adding some of the liquid from another ferment (or live Kimchi/sauerkraut juice). This may be even more important if you're using store bought peppers as there is no telling what cleaning/disinfecting they've been through.
 
Good luck!
 
Thanks, luck would have it that when doing my homework beforehand I found that adding lacto from a previous ferment would help kickstart it, so that's what i did from the getgo! Added about 2 cups from my previous glass jar experiment..
 
Very cool! I've thought about doing this as well, but never had the courage to ferment in anything besides sterilized glass carboys. It's been a month I see. How is it going?
 
How do you keep everything below the surface of the brine with that much head space? This looks amazing and I definitely want to follow the progress on it.
 
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