Have you ever tried a spirit that otherwise would be bourbon but was aged in barrels that already had been used previously for aging bourbon? By law the resulting product can’t be called bourbon. But consider: what if a bourbon manufacturer uses the same mash, yeast, stills, warehouse for aging – they just reused one of the barrels?
It still would basically be bourbon, but with a difference: an earlier volume of bourbon had been in that barrel for a few years. During that time the aging bourbon moved in and out of the wood taking some of the flavorful organic molecules from the charred wood. (That’s what turns new make into tasty whiskey.)
When that same barrel is used again, with new make from the same distiller then the second round will not be as flavorful. Most of the delicious organic molecules already have been absorbed by the first batch. So sure, that’s a legitimate reason to distinguish between something aged in a new barrel and a used barrel.
However there’s an affordable and clever way around this limitation, a very simple technology: Take the already used charred bourbon barrel: scrape off a thin layer of wood from the inside. Then either toast or re-char the barrel.
Sometimes this process is called STR, Scraped/shaved, toasted & recharred.
Because of the scraping some new, uncharted wood is closer to the surface. The new toasting makes the same wonderful chemical changes again: more delicious organic molecules are developed, and now the barrel can be used a second time.
Now, by American law we can’t call whiskey aged in this reinvigorated barrel “bourbon,” but we can certainly still make it and sell it. There’s a great way to compare:
Check out Michter’s Bourbon and then Michter’s American whiskey. The American whiskey is from a scraped, re-toasted barrel. I did a side-by-side a few years ago and was pleasantly surprised to find how similar they were.
It’s so much cheaper to do this than to create new barrels.
Now, this next bit here is not my main point, but just a related idea: I’d love to see more distillers do the same. That might help alleviate the shortage for some of the more highly sought after bourbons. I’d happily purchase a Buffalo Trace Weller Antique American Whiskey, and I’m pretty sure it would taste close to their sister bourbon.
Interestingly, I have read that this process is being used by some Scotch whisky distillers: Kilchoman, Annandale, Kingsbarns, Nc’nean, Cotswolds, Penderyn, Kavalan and others.
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