Wine Oak Barrel Chips

[Cheshire_Cat]

Hi All, last weekend I was at a winery and got a bag of oak chips from a barrel the wine maker chopped up. Thought I could possibly use them in my first sour beer in a couple months. So a couple questions.

1) Should or could I use them?

2) If so, what kind of beer? I was thinking a Flanders Red or Brown. They are American Oak, medium toast, used for Zinfandel wine.

[Whitebeard_Brewer]

Hi All, last weekend I was at a winery and got a bag of oak chips from a barrel the wine maker chopped up. Thought I could possibly use them in my first sour beer in a couple months. So a couple questions.

1) Should or could I use them?

2) If so, what kind of beer? I was thinking a Flanders Red or Brown. They are American Oak, medium toast, used for Zinfandel wine.

If he doesn't chime in here on his own, shoot JP a PM.....he can prob give you the best answer!!

[Quin]

If he took the barrel out of production, it probably used up its "oakiness." So you wouldn't get a lot of oak flavor, but it could be used as a medium for transferring brett or bacteria from batch to batch.

[BarefootLion]

Was thinking just what Quin said, probably not too much oak character left. But to contribue some of that wine character could be good, and of course bugs love to hang out on oak.