Still Spirits Cedar Oak Profile, what it does
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Oak is doing more work in a whisky than most people realise, and it's not just colour. It's the dryness at the back, the bit of tannin that stops the whole thing tasting sweet and flabby, and it's the reason a spirit straight off a still tastes raw while the same spirit out of a barrel tastes finished. The catch, of course, is that a barrel takes years and takes up half your shed.
What Cedar Oak Profile gives you
Still Spirits Cedar Oak Profile is the dry end of the oak range. It leans woody and a little austere rather than sweet, so it's doing the job of the tannin instead of the job of the vanilla, and that distinction matters when you're picking between the oak options on the shelf. If you want oak that reads as caramel and butterscotch you want a different one, and I've put the alternatives in the links below.
Like the rest of the profile range it's a blending component, so it's designed to go into a spirit you've already flavoured rather than to be a spirit on its own.
It's worth saying, because somebody always asks. Flavouring a bought neutral base isn't distilling and there's no ATO excise licence in it at all. If you're distilling the base yourself that's a federal manufacturer licence through the ATO, and it's a separate question to this one.
How to use it
Follow the dose on the bottle first time round and treat everything after that as your own experiment. Oak is a bit more forgiving than the fruit side is, so you can push it a touch harder before it turns on you, but it'll still go bitter and dry if you get carried away and there's no undoing that. Give it a few days in the bottle before you judge it, because oak character keeps knitting together for a while after you have mixed it.
Where it earns its keep
- A whisky that tastes sweet and young. A dry oak note is exactly what's missing and it'll pull the whole thing back into balance.
- A rum that needs backbone. Molasses sweetness with nothing behind it gets cloying fast.
- Blending against a sweeter oak. Run it alongside a mellow oak or a cask profile and you can set the dryness wherever you want it.
- Anything you plan to drink neat. Dryness is what makes a spirit sippable rather than mixable.
Shop related products
- Still Spirits Cedar Oak Profile. The dry oak profile, and the subject of this post.
- Still Spirits Mellow Oak. The softer, rounder oak if dry isn't what you're after.
- Still Spirits Oak Cask. Barrel character in one bottle, and a good first oak to try.
- Still Spirits Top Shelf Whiskey Essence. The base essence most people build these onto.
Did you know we also keep the 1125ml spirit bottles and the Sam Willards oak soakers in the shop. They are not on the website, so give us a ring on (08) 8536 4333 to check what is on the shelf.
- Getting oak flavour into a home spirit without a barrel
- Still Spirits Oak Cask, what it does and how to use it
- 3 ways to age and flavour whisky at home
Not sure which one suits what you actually drink? Brewhilder will narrow it down, or have a look through the homebrew collection.
I'm the sort who leaves things on oak far longer than the label suggests, so I set a reminder these days.
Candeece
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