How to store and age a spirit you made at home

Ageing is where a rough spirit turns into a good one

A spirit that comes off harsh at the start is not automatically a failure, because a lot of what makes a commercial whisky or a dark rum taste the way it does happens after the making rather than during it. Time in contact with wood, and time sitting quietly in the dark, will soften something that was sharp when you bottled it, and it costs nothing except patience.

One thing to get out of the way first, since this post assumes you've made the spirit rather than bought it. Distilling at home in Australia needs an excise manufacturer licence from the ATO, and that's a federal requirement, so it's the same wherever you live. If you've flavoured a bought neutral spirit instead, none of that applies to you and everything below still does.

What to keep it in

Glass is the default and it's the right answer more often than people expect, because it gives nothing back to the spirit and it lets you see what you've got. A demijohn works for a batch you're resting, and plain glass bottles work for anything you want to keep as it is, particularly a gin or a vodka where the whole point is that nothing else gets in.

Stainless is the other neutral option and it keeps air out well, so it suits a high strength spirit you're holding before you do anything with it. Plastic is the one to avoid for anything you're keeping any length of time.

Oak, without owning a barrel

Almost nobody at home has a barrel and you don't need one. Oak chips or an oak soaker sitting in the spirit will do the same job in a fraction of the time, because a small amount of wood in a jar has far more surface area against the liquid than a barrel does against its contents.

That speed cuts both ways, so taste it every week or two rather than setting a date and walking away. Wood keeps giving and a spirit that was lovely at 3 weeks can be over-oaked and bitter by 8 if nobody is checking on it.

If you'd rather not deal with wood at all, the oak flavourings do the same thing in a controlled way and you can stop exactly where you want to.

Where to keep it

Cool, dark and steady is the whole of it. Big temperature swings push the spirit in and out of the wood harder than is good for it, and light does slow damage to anything sitting in clear glass on a sunny shelf. A cupboard on an inside wall beats a shed roof by a long way, and if the only spot you've got is the shed, dark bottles help.

Split the batch and settle it properly

The best thing you can do with your first aged spirit is put half of it on oak and leave the other half plain, then taste them side by side. You learn more from that one comparison than from reading about it, and you end up with a reference point for everything you make afterwards.

Filtering and bottling

If you've aged on chips you'll want to get the bits out before bottling, and a fine mesh or even a paper coffee filter handles that. Carbon filtering is a separate job and it's for cleaning up a neutral spirit rather than for tidying an oaked one, so don't run your carefully oaked whisky through carbon or you'll strip out what you spent 2 months putting in.

Shop related products

• Still Spirits Mellow Oak Spirit Flavouring 50ml. This gives you the oak character without the wait.
• Still Spirits Oak Cask 50ml. Use this one for a heavier barrel note.
• Still Spirits Universal Z Carbon. This cleans up a neutral spirit before you go anywhere near wood.
• Still Spirits Top Shelf Whiskey Essence 50ml. Go here if you want the whiskey profile on a bought base.

Did you know we also hold Sam Willards oak soakers in bourbon, whiskey and rum, bourbon barrel chips, glass demijohns and spirit bottles in the shop that never make it onto the website. Give us a ring on (08) 8536 4333 to check what's on the shelf.

Where to go next

The homebrew range carries the rest of it, and Brewhilder will help you work out how heavy an oak you actually want.

Worth reading next: What you need to make spirits at home, gear and licence and How to infuse a bought spirit at home.

Oak is the ingredient I am least to be trusted with, because I always think it needs another week.