Whiskey Rye Ale

Man its been a long time since I used the 'Home Brew' tag!  Basically since last Fall/Winter give or take when I made the Black IPA / IBA. It's been a busy summer with great weather and home brewing has fallen by the wayside as a result.  It is what it is, this endeavor was always more of my crappy weather fallback and something I did when I couldn't be doing other stuff or I was injured.  Can't be shredding snow or dirt? Might as well make some beer.

Plus how can I in good conscious host Squamtoberfest without some home brew on offer?  Doesn't seem right.  But fear not!  I'm cutting it a bit close but I finally got the home brew gears turning again.  Going with a simple yet (hopefully) interesting recipe.  Base is just a Rye Ale using 6lbs of Rye malt and some Liberty hops with a late addition of some Sterling hops as well.  But I'm adding a little Crotchville Brewing twist, which would of course be adding some Rye Whiskey and some medium toast Oak cubes to the mix as well.

Unfortunately our local liquor store actually only really had one option for Rye, which seemed kind of odd but I guess it is nowhere near as popular as scotch and bourbon.  But I think Beam will work just fine even though its on the cheaper side it is usually pretty smooth and I think it will actually work pretty well for this application.

The plan is to soak the oak cubes in the whiskey (probably going to go with 16oz) for a day or two.  Then I'll add the cubes and the whiskey to secondary fermentation and let that all hang out for a week or two.  Should be all bottled up and conditioned just barely in time for Squamtoberfest.  I'm hoping the end product is a nice smooth/spicy Rye with a bit of smoky awesomeness.  Very much looking forward to enjoying one in front of a huge bonfire wearing overalls.

We're in secondary fermentation now, whiskey soaked oak cubes floating.