Barrel - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

A barrel or cask is a hollow cylindrical container, traditionally made of vertical wooden staves and bound by wooden or metal hoops. Traditionally, the barrel was a standard size of measure referring to a set capacity or weight of a given commodity. A small barrel is called a keg

Keg

A keg is a small barrel.Traditionally, a wooden keg is made by a cooper used to transport items such as nails, gunpowder., and a variety of liquids....

.

For example, a beer barrel had originally a capacity of 36 gallons (136.3 l) while an ale barrel a capacity of 32 gallons (121.1 l). Wine was shipped in barrels of 31.5 gallons (119.2 l).

Modern wooden barrels for wine-making are either made of French common (Quercus robur) and white oak (Quercus petraea) or from American white oak (Quercus alba) and have typically these standard sizes: "Bordeaux

Bordeaux

Bordeaux is a port city on the Garonne River in the Gironde department in southwestern France.The Bordeaux-Arcachon-Libourne metropolitan area, has a population of 1,010,000 and constitutes the sixth-largest urban area in France. It is the capital of the Aquitaine region, as well as the prefecture...

type" 59.4 gallons (224.9 l) and "Cognac

Cognac

Cognac is a commune in the Charente department in southwestern France. It is a sub-prefecture of the department.-Geography:Cognac is situated on the river Charente between the towns of Angoulême and Saintes. The majority of the town has been built on the river's left bank, with the smaller right...

type" 79.2 gallons (299.8 l).

Barrels are only one type of cooperage. Other types include, but are not limited to: bucket

Bucket

A bucket, also called a pail, is typically a watertight, vertical cylinder or truncated cone, with an open top and a flat bottom, usually attached to a semicircular carrying handle called the bail. A pail can have an open top or can have a lid....

s, tubs, butter churns, hogshead

Hogshead

A hogshead is a large cask of liquid . More specifically, it refers to a specified volume, measured in either Imperial units or U.S. customary units, primarily applied to alcoholic beverages such as wine, ale, or cider....

s, firkin

Firkin

A firkin is an old English unit of volume. The name is derived from the Middle Dutch word vierdekijn, which means fourth, i.e. a quarter of a full-size barrel.Nor need you mind the serial ordealOf being watched from forty cellar holes...

s, keg

Keg

A keg is a small barrel.Traditionally, a wooden keg is made by a cooper used to transport items such as nails, gunpowder., and a variety of liquids....

s, kilderkins, tierces, rundlets, puncheon

Puncheon

Puncheon is a tool or instrument for piercing or punching, such as those used for impressing designs onto coin dies. The "barrel" meaning is thought to derive from the fact that it would have been marked by use of a punch to denote its contents....

s, pipes, tuns, butts

Butt (unit)

The butt or pipe is an old English unit of wine casks, holding two hogsheads ....

, pins, and breakers. Someone who makes barrels is called a "barrel maker" or cooper
Cooper (profession)
Traditionally, a cooper is someone who makes wooden staved vessels of a conical form, of greater length than breadth, bound together with hoops and possessing flat ends or heads...

. Modern barrels and casks can also be made of aluminum, stainless steel, and different types of plastic, such as HDPE.

Barrels have a variety of uses, including storage of liquids such as water and oil, fermenting

Fermentation (wine)

The process of fermentation in wine turns grape juice into an alcoholic beverage. During fermentation, yeast interact with sugars in the juice to create ethanol, commonly known as ethyl alcohol, and carbon dioxide...

wine

Wine

Wine is an alcoholic beverage, made of fermented fruit juice, usually from grapes. The natural chemical balance of grapes lets them ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes, or other nutrients. Grape wine is produced by fermenting crushed grapes using various types of yeast. Yeast...

, arrack

Arrack

Arrack is a distilled alcoholic drink typically produced in South Asia and South East Asia, made from either the fermented sap of coconut flowers, sugarcane, grain or fruit depending upon the country of origin...

and sake, and maturing beverages such as wine

Wine

, cognac, armagnac

Armagnac (drink)

Armagnac is a distinctive kind of brandy or eau de vie produced in the Armagnac region in Gascony, southwest France. It is distilled from wine usually made from a blend of Armagnac grapes, including Baco 22A, Colombard, and Ugni Blanc, using column stills rather than the pot stills used in the...

, sherry

Sherry

Sherry is a fortified wine made from white grapes that are grown near the town of Jerez , Spain. In Spanish, it is called vino de Jerez....

, port

Port wine

Port wine is a Portuguese fortified wine produced exclusively in the Douro Valley in the northern provinces of Portugal. It is typically a sweet, red wine, often served as a dessert wine, and comes in dry, semi-dry, and white varieties...

, whiskey and beer

Beer

Beer is the world's most widely consumed andprobably oldest alcoholic beverage; it is the third most popular drink overall, after water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and fermentation of sugars, mainly derived from malted cereal grains, most commonly malted barley and malted wheat...

History

The barrel was most likely invented in the Balkan area. Even though Herodotus

Herodotus

Herodotus was an ancient Greek historian who was born in Halicarnassus, Caria and lived in the 5th century BC . He has been called the "Father of History", and was the first historian known to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a...

mentions palm-wood casks used in shipping Armenian wine to Babylon

Babylon

Babylon was an Akkadian city-state of ancient Mesopotamia, the remains of which are found in present-day Al Hillah, Babil Province, Iraq, about 85 kilometers south of Baghdad...

in Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia is a toponym for the area of the Tigris–Euphrates river system, largely corresponding to modern-day Iraq, northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey and southwestern Iran.Widely considered to be the cradle of civilization, Bronze Age Mesopotamia included Sumer and the...

, the barrel as we know it today was most likely developed by the Celts.
The Celts arrived in the 23rd Century BCE in an area known today as the Burgundy - France, coming from the Balkans and regions north of the Danube River.

Around 350 BCE they were already using watertight, barrel-shaped wooden recipients that were able to withstand stress and could be rolled and stacked.
The name “tonneau” (also called “barrique”) comes the Latin “Dolium

Dolium

A dolium is a large earthenware vase or container used in ancient Roman times for storage or transportation of goods.-Description:...

” which means rounded.

The technique of bending wood into shape through heating they most likely borrowed from boat building, where it was used to bend planks for ship’s hulls as early as the ancient Egyptians

Egyptians

Egyptians are nation an ethnic group made up of Mediterranean North Africans, the indigenous people of Egypt.Egyptian identity is closely tied to geography. The population of Egypt is concentrated in the lower Nile Valley, the small strip of cultivable land stretching from the First Cataract to...

and Phoenicians. The barrel, apart of serving as a recipient for wine and other liquids such as water, vinegar and oil, was also used for the storage and transport of precious metals, nails, powders, ocher and sulfur, as well as for the preservation of fish, olives, mustard and other sweet, salted or pickled foods.

In Asia

Asia

Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...

and Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

, liquids like oil

Oil

An oil is any substance that is liquid at ambient temperatures and does not mix with water but may mix with other oils and organic solvents. This general definition includes vegetable oils, volatile essential oils, petrochemical oils, and synthetic oils....

and wine

Wine

were mostly carried in earthenware vessels. The Greeks

Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...

and Romans

Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....

kept their wines and other liquids in large vases called “Cadus” or Amphora

Amphora

An amphora is a type of vase-shaped, usually ceramic container with two handles and a long neck narrower than the body...

e, sealed with pine

Pine

Pines are trees in the genus Pinus ,in the family Pinaceae. They make up the monotypic subfamily Pinoideae. There are about 115 species of pine, although different authorities accept between 105 and 125 species.-Etymology:...

resin

Resin

Resin in the most specific use of the term is a hydrocarbon secretion of many plants, particularly coniferous trees. Resins are valued for their chemical properties and associated uses, such as the production of varnishes, adhesives, and food glazing agents; as an important source of raw materials...

.

The Romans began to use barrels in the 3rd century AD, as a result of their commercial and military contacts with the Gauls

Gauls

The Gauls were a Celtic people living in Gaul, the region roughly corresponding to what is now France, Belgium, Switzerland and Northern Italy, from the Iron Age through the Roman period. They mostly spoke the Continental Celtic language called Gaulish....

.
That the Italian wines of the time were no competition for the nectar of the “Gaulois”, can not be more clearly illustrated than with a quote from Diodore, a contemporary of Julius Caesar

Julius Caesar

Gaius Julius Caesar was a Roman general and statesman and a distinguished writer of Latin prose. He played a critical role in the gradual transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....

, who wrote:
"The Italian merchants exploit the Gallic passion for wine. On the boats which follow the waterways or by wagons which roll across the plain, they transport wine, from which they make fantastic profits, going as far as trading one amphora for one slave, in such manner that the buyer brings his servant to pay for the drink."

Towards the end of the era of Augustus

Augustus

Augustus ;23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14) is considered the first emperor of the Roman Empire, which he ruled alone from 27 BC until his death in 14 AD.The dates of his rule are contemporary dates; Augustus lived under two calendars, the Roman Republican until 45 BC, and the Julian...

, the Allobroges

Allobroges

The Allobroges were a Celtic tribe of ancient Gaul, located between the Rhône River and the Lake of Geneva in what later became Savoy, Dauphiné, and Vivarais. Their cities were in the areas of modern-day Annecy, Chambéry and Grenoble, the modern of Isère, and modern Switzerland...

of the Rhone

Rhône

Rhone can refer to:* Rhone, one of the major rivers of Europe, running through Switzerland and France* Rhône Glacier, the source of the Rhone River and one of the primary contributors to Lake Geneva in the far eastern end of the canton of Valais in Switzerland...

valley had selected a vine species that was acclimatized to their region. This "Allobrogic" variety bore frost resistant grapes, thus pushing back the northern limits of vine cultivation by several hundreds of kilometers.
At the same time, in the plains of Aquitaine, in the Gaillac

Gaillac

Gaillac is a commune in the Tarn department in southern France.-Geography of Gaillac:Gaillac is a town situated between Toulouse, Albi and Monatauban. It has gained a large amount of recognition due to the wines that bear the towns name. The Tarn river runs along the border of the town by the...

region, another vine variety - "Biturica"

Vitis

Vitis is a genus of about 60 species of vining plants in the flowering plant family Vitaceae. The genus is made up of species predominantly from the Northern hemisphere. It is economically important as the source of grapes, both for direct consumption of the fruit and for fermentation to produce...

- made the Bordeaux

Bordeaux

prosper.

The wines from the Gallic province were highly appreciated in Rome, and the progression of the vine worried the Romans to such an extent that, in 92 A.D., the emperor Domitien decided to destroy the Gallic vineyards.
Around the same time, Pliny the Elder

Pliny the Elder

Gaius Plinius Secundus , better known as Pliny the Elder, was a Roman author, naturalist, and natural philosopher, as well as naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and personal friend of the emperor Vespasian...

noted - in the regions near the Alps

Alps

The Alps is one of the great mountain range systems of Europe, stretching from Austria and Slovenia in the east through Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Germany to France in the west....

- the appearance of an exceptional recipient specially conceived to hold and mature wine: the wooden barrel, which became inseparably associated with wine, from its fermentation to its transport.
Archaeological research has found cooper’s tools and wooden seals dating from as early as 100 B.C.

For nearly 2,000 years barrels were the most convenient form of shipping or storage container for those who could afford the superior price. All kinds of bulk goods, from nails to gold

Gold

Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au and an atomic number of 79. Gold is a dense, soft, shiny, malleable and ductile metal. Pure gold has a bright yellow color and luster traditionally considered attractive, which it maintains without oxidizing in air or water. Chemically, gold is a...

coin

Coin

A coin is a piece of hard material that is standardized in weight, is produced in large quantities in order to facilitate trade, and primarily can be used as a legal tender token for commerce in the designated country, region, or territory....

s, were stored in them. Bags and most crates were cheaper, but they were not as sturdy and they were more difficult to manhandle for the same weight. Barrels for the transportation for bulk goods slowly lost their importance in the 20th century, with the introduction of pallet

Pallet

A pallet , sometimes called a skid, is a flat transport structure that supports goods in a stable fashion while being lifted by a forklift, pallet jack, front loader or other jacking device. A pallet is the structural foundation of a unit load which allows handling and storage efficiencies...

-based logistics and containerization

Containerization

Containerization is a system of freight transport based on a range of steel intermodal containers...

, however, they are still of great importance in the elaboration of wines and spirits.

Starting in the late 19th century, barrels were largely superseded by corrugated fiberboard boxes for storage and transport of dry goods, and in the mid 20th century, steel drums

Drum (container)

A drum is a cylindrical container used for shipping bulk cargo. Drums can be made of steel, dense paperboard , or plastics, and are generally used for the transportation and storage of liquids and powders. Drums are often certified for shipment of dangerous goods...

began to be used for the storage and transport of fluids such as water

Water

Water is a chemical substance with the chemical formula H2O. A water molecule contains one oxygen and two hydrogen atoms connected by covalent bonds. Water is a liquid at ambient conditions, but it often co-exists on Earth with its solid state, ice, and gaseous state . Water also exists in a...

, oil

Oil

s and hazardous waste

Hazardous waste

A hazardous waste is waste that poses substantial or potential threats to public health or the environment. According to the U.S. environmental laws hazardous wastes fall into two major categories: characteristic wastes and listed wastes.Characteristic hazardous wastes are materials that are known...

Water storage

Water barrels are often used to collect the rain

Rain

Rain is liquid precipitation, as opposed to non-liquid kinds of precipitation such as snow, hail and sleet. Rain requires the presence of a thick layer of the atmosphere to have temperatures above the melting point of water near and above the Earth's surface...

water from dwellings (so that it may be used for irrigation or other purposes). This usage, known as rainwater harvesting

Rainwater harvesting

Rainwater harvesting is the accumulating and storing of rainwater for reuse before it reaches the aquifer. It has been used to provide drinking water, water for livestock, water for irrigation, as well as other typical uses. Rainwater collected from the roofs of houses and local institutions can...

, requires (besides a large rainwater barrel or water butt

Rainwater tank

A rainwater tank is a water tank used to collect and store rain water runoff, typically from rooftops via rain gutters...

), adequate (water-proof) roof-covering and an adequate rain pipe

Plumbing

Plumbing is the system of pipes and drains installed in a building for the distribution of potable drinking water and the removal of waterborne wastes, and the skilled trade of working with pipes, tubing and plumbing fixtures in such systems. A plumber is someone who installs or repairs piping...

Oil storage

The standard barrel of crude oil or other petroleum

Petroleum

Petroleum or crude oil is a naturally occurring, flammable liquid consisting of a complex mixture of hydrocarbons of various molecular weights and other liquid organic compounds, that are found in geologic formations beneath the Earth's surface. Petroleum is recovered mostly through oil drilling...

product (abbreviated bbl) is 42 US gal (34.9723 imp gal; 158.9873 l). This measurement originated in the early Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...

oil field

Oil field

An oil field is a region with an abundance of oil wells extracting petroleum from below ground. Because the oil reservoirs typically extend over a large area, possibly several hundred kilometres across, full exploitation entails multiple wells scattered across the area...

s, and permitted both British and American merchants to refer to the same unit, based on the old English wine measure, the tierce.

Earlier, another size of whiskey barrel was the most common size; this was the 40 US gal (33.3 imp gal; 151.4 l) barrel for proof spirits, which was of the same volume as 5 US bushels. However, by 1866 the oil barrel was standardized at 42 US gallons.

Oil has not actually been shipped in barrels since the introduction of oil tanker

Oil tanker

An oil tanker, also known as a petroleum tanker, is a merchant ship designed for the bulk transport of oil. There are two basic types of oil tankers: the crude tanker and the product tanker. Crude tankers move large quantities of unrefined crude oil from its point of extraction to refineries...

s, but the 42-US-gallon size is still used as a unit for measurement, pricing, and in tax and regulatory codes. Each barrel is refined into about 19.74 US gal (16.4 imp gal; 74.7 l) of gasoline

Gasoline

Gasoline , or petrol , is a toxic, translucent, petroleum-derived liquid that is primarily used as a fuel in internal combustion engines. It consists mostly of organic compounds obtained by the fractional distillation of petroleum, enhanced with a variety of additives. Some gasolines also contain...

, the rest becoming other products such as jet fuel and heating oil, using fractional distillation

Fractional distillation

Fractional distillation is the separation of a mixture into its component parts, or fractions, such as in separating chemical compounds by their boiling point by heating them to a temperature at which several fractions of the compound will evaporate. It is a special type of distillation...

.

The current standard volume for barrels for chemicals and food is 55 US gal (46 imp gal; 208 l).

Beverage maturing

An "aging barrel" is used to age wine; distilled spirit

Distilled beverage

A distilled beverage, liquor, or spirit is an alcoholic beverage containing ethanol that is produced by distilling ethanol produced by means of fermenting grain, fruit, or vegetables...

s such as whiskey, brandy

Brandy

Brandy is a spirit produced by distilling wine. Brandy generally contains 35%–60% alcohol by volume and is typically taken as an after-dinner drink...

, or rum

Rum

Rum is a distilled alcoholic beverage made from sugarcane by-products such as molasses, or directly from sugarcane juice, by a process of fermentation and distillation. The distillate, a clear liquid, is then usually aged in oak barrels...

; Tabasco sauce

Tabasco sauce

Tabasco sauce is the brand name for a hot sauce produced by US-based McIlhenny Company of Avery Island, Louisiana. Tabasco sauce is made from tabasco peppers , vinegar, and salt, and aged in white oak barrels for three years. It has a hot, spicy flavor...

; or (in smaller sizes) traditional balsamic vinegar

Traditional Balsamic Vinegar

Traditional Balsamic Vinegar a type of balsamic vinegar produced in Emilia Romagna region of Italy. Unlike "Balsamic Vinegar of Modena" , Traditional Balsamic Vinegar is produced from cooked grape must, aged at least 12 years, and is protected under the European Protected Designation of Origin ...

. When a wine or spirit ages in a barrel, small amounts of oxygen

Oxygen

Oxygen is the element with atomic number 8 and represented by the symbol O. Its name derives from the Greek roots ὀξύς and -γενής , because at the time of naming, it was mistakenly thought that all acids required oxygen in their composition...

are introduced as the barrel lets some air in (compare to microoxygenation

Microoxygenation

Micro-oxygenation is a process used in winemaking to introduce oxygen into wine in a controlled manner. Developed in 1991 by Patrick DuCournau, working with the exceptionally tannic grape Tannat in Madiran, the process gained usage in modern winemaking following the 1996 authorization by the...

where oxygen is deliberately added). Oxygen enters a barrel when water

Water

or alcohol

Alcohol

In chemistry, an alcohol is an organic compound in which the hydroxy functional group is bound to a carbon atom. In particular, this carbon center should be saturated, having single bonds to three other atoms....

is lost due to evaporation

Evaporation

Evaporation is a type of vaporization of a liquid that occurs only on the surface of a liquid. The other type of vaporization is boiling, which, instead, occurs on the entire mass of the liquid....

, a portion known as the "angels' share". In an environment with 100% relative humidity

Humidity

Humidity is a term for the amount of water vapor in the air, and can refer to any one of several measurements of humidity. Formally, humid air is not "moist air" but a mixture of water vapor and other constituents of air, and humidity is defined in terms of the water content of this mixture,...

, very little water evaporates and so most of the loss is alcohol, a useful trick if one has a wine with very high proof. Most beverages are topped up from other barrels to prevent significant oxidation, although others such as vin jaune

Vin jaune

Vin jaune is a special and characteristic type of white wine made in the Jura wine region in eastern France. It is similar to dry fino Sherry and gets its character from being matured in a barrel under a film of yeast, known as the voile, on the wine's surface...

are not.

Beverages aged in wooden barrels takes on some of the compounds in the barrel, such as vanillin

Vanillin

Vanillin is a phenolic aldehyde, an organic compound with the molecular formula C8H8O3. Its functional groups include aldehyde, ether, and phenol. It is the primary component of the extract of the vanilla bean. It is also found in Leptotes bicolor, roasted coffee and the Chinese red pine...

and wood tannins. The presence of these compounds is dependent on many factors, including the place of origin, how the staves were cut and dried, and degree of "toast

Toast

Toast is bread that has been browned by exposure to radiant heat. This browning reaction is known as the Maillard reaction. Toasting warms the bread and makes it firmer, so it holds toppings more securely...

" applied during manufacture. After roughly three years, most of a barrel's flavor compounds have been leached out and it is well on its way to becoming "neutral." Barrels used for aging are typically made of French or American oak, but chestnut

Chestnut

Chestnut , some species called chinkapin or chinquapin, is a genus of eight or nine species of deciduous trees and shrubs in the beech family Fagaceae, native to temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere. The name also refers to the edible nuts they produce.-Species:The chestnut belongs to the...

and redwood are also used. Some Asian traditions (e.g. Japanese sake) have been known to use Japanese cedar

Cryptomeria

Cryptomeria is a monotypic genus of conifer in the cypress family Cupressaceae formerly belonging to the family Taxodiaceae; it includes only one species, Cryptomeria japonica . It is endemic to Japan, where it is known as Sugi...

, which imparts an unusual, minty/piney flavor. In Peru and Chile, a grape distillate named "Pisco

Pisco

Pisco is a colorless or yellowish-to-amber colored grape brandy produced in winemaking regions of Chile and Peru. Pisco was developed by Spanish settlers in the 16th century as an alternative to orujo, a pomace brandy that was being imported from Spain...

" is either aged on oak or in earthenware

Earthenware

Earthenware is a common ceramic material, which is used extensively for pottery tableware and decorative objects.-Types of earthenware:Although body formulations vary between countries and even between individual makers, a generic composition is 25% ball clay, 28% kaolin, 32% quartz, and 15%...

, in which case the minerals from the fired clay leach into the liquor, giving it a unique flavor.

Beer

Beer

s are sometimes aged in barrels which were previously used for maturing wines or spirits.

Wine

Some wines are fermented "on barrel," as opposed to in a neutral container such as a steel or wine-grade HDPE (High density polyethylene). Wine can also be fermented in large wooden tanks, which - when open to the atmosphere - are called "open-tops". Other wooden cooperage for storing wine or spirits range from smaller barriques to huge casks, with either elliptical or round heads.

The tastes yielded by French and American species of oak are slightly different, with French oak being subtler, while American oak gives stronger aromas. To retain the desired measure of oak influence, a winery

Winery

A winery is a building or property that produces wine, or a business involved in the production of wine, such as a wine company. Some wine companies own many wineries. Besides wine making equipment, larger wineries may also feature warehouses, bottling lines, laboratories, and large expanses of...

will replace a certain percentage of its barrels every year, although this can vary from 5 to 100%. Some winemakers use 200% new oak, where the wine is put into new oak barrels twice during the aging process. Bulk wines are sometimes flavored by soaking oak chips in them instead of barrel aging.

Whiskey

Laws in several jurisdictions require that whiskey be aged in wooden barrels.

The law in the United States requires "straight whiskey

Straight whiskey

Straight whiskey is whisky created by distilling a fermented cereal grain mash to create a spirit not exceeding 80% alcohol content by volume and then aging the spirit for at least two years at an abv concentration not exceeding 62.5% at the start of the aging process.Filtering and dilution...

" (with the exception of corn whiskey

Corn whiskey

Corn whiskey is an American liquor made from a mash made of at least 80 percent corn.The whiskey is typically run off to high proof and cut to not less than 40 percent alcohol by volume. It does not have to be aged; but if so, it is aged in new uncharred oak barrels or in barrels previously used...

) must be stored for at least 2 years in White Oak containers, and that Bourbon (in specific) must be aged in new, charred white oak

White oak

Quercus alba, the white oak, is one of the pre-eminent hardwoods of eastern North America. It is a long-lived oak of the Fagaceae family, native to eastern North America and found from southern Quebec west to eastern Minnesota and south to northern Florida and eastern Texas. Specimens have been...

barrels as one of several necessary conditions which have to be met before the whiskey can be labeled as a Bourbon whiskey.

International laws require any whisky bearing the label "Scotch

Scotch whisky

Scotch whisky is whisky made in Scotland.Scotch whisky is divided into five distinct categories: Single Malt Scotch Whisky, Single Grain Scotch Whisky, Blended Malt Scotch Whisky , Blended Grain Scotch Whisky, and Blended Scotch Whisky.All Scotch whisky must be aged in oak barrels for at least three...

" to be distilled in Scotland

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

and matured for a minimum of three years and one day in oak casks.

By Canadian law, Canadian whiskies must "be aged in small wood for not less than 3 years".

Sherry

The sherry

Sherry

Sherry is a fortified wine made from white grapes that are grown near the town of Jerez , Spain. In Spanish, it is called vino de Jerez....

is stored in 600-litre casks that are made of North American oak, which is slightly more porous than French or Spanish oak. The casks, or butts, are filled five-sixths full, leaving "the space of two fists" empty at the top to allow flor to develop on top of the wine.

Brandy

Maturing is very important for a good brandy

Brandy

Brandy is a spirit produced by distilling wine. Brandy generally contains 35%–60% alcohol by volume and is typically taken as an after-dinner drink...

, which is typically aged in oak casks. The used wood for those barrels is selected because of its ability to transfer certain aromas to the spirit. Cognac only ages in oak casks made from wood from the Tronçais and more often from the Limousin forests.

Tabasco sauce

Since its invention in 1868, the pepper mash used to make Tabasco sauce

Tabasco sauce

is aged for three years in previously-used oak whiskey barrels.

Angels' share

"Angels' share" is a term for the portion (share) of a wine or distilled spirit

Distilled beverage

A distilled beverage, liquor, or spirit is an alcoholic beverage containing ethanol that is produced by distilling ethanol produced by means of fermenting grain, fruit, or vegetables...

's volume

Volume

Volume is the quantity of three-dimensional space enclosed by some closed boundary, for example, the space that a substance or shape occupies or contains....

that is lost to evaporation

Evaporation

Evaporation is a type of vaporization of a liquid that occurs only on the surface of a liquid. The other type of vaporization is boiling, which, instead, occurs on the entire mass of the liquid....

during aging in oak barrels. The barrels are typically French or American oak. In low humidity

Humidity

conditions, the loss to evaporation may be primarily water

Water

. However, in higher humidities, more alcohol

Alcohol

than water

Water

will evaporate, therefore reducing the alcoholic strength of the product. In humid climates, this loss of ethanol is associated with the growth of a darkly colored fungus, the Angels' Share fungus

Baudoinia compniacensis

Baudoinia compniacensis or Angels' Share fungus is an ascomycete fungus found on a wide range of substrates in the vicinity of distilleries, spirits maturation facilities, and large bakeries. The fungus is a habitat coloniser with a preference for airborne alcohol...

, Baudoinia compniacensis, on the exterior surfaces of buildings, trees and other vegetation, and anything else that happens to be nearby.

Other uses

Due to the traditional barrel's distinctive shape and construction method, the term has been used to describe a variety of other related or similar objects, such as the gun barrel

Gun barrel

A gun barrel is the tube, usually metal, through which a controlled explosion or rapid expansion of gases are released in order to propel a projectile out of the end at a high velocity....

(with the term growing out of the fact that early cannon

Cannon

A cannon is any piece of artillery that uses gunpowder or other usually explosive-based propellents to launch a projectile. Cannon vary in caliber, range, mobility, rate of fire, angle of fire, and firepower; different forms of cannon combine and balance these attributes in varying degrees,...

were built from staves of metal hooped together, similar to a barrel) and barrel organ

Barrel organ

A barrel organ is a mechanical musical instrument consisting of bellows and one or more ranks of pipes housed in a case, usually of wood, and often highly decorated...

.

The English idiom

Idiom

Idiom is an expression, word, or phrase that has a figurative meaning that is comprehended in regard to a common use of that expression that is separate from the literal meaning or definition of the words of which it is made...

over a barrel means to be in a predicament or helpless in a situation where others are in control: "I have no choice in the matter — my creditors have me over a barrel." The phrase is said to originate from two 19th century practices: rolling drowning

Drowning

Drowning is death from asphyxia due to suffocation caused by water entering the lungs and preventing the absorption of oxygen leading to cerebral hypoxia....

victims over a barrel to clear their lungs of water, or flogging someone who is bent over a barrel.

Some kinds of food, such as pork

Pork

Pork is the culinary name for meat from the domestic pig , which is eaten in many countries. It is one of the most commonly consumed meats worldwide, with evidence of pig husbandry dating back to 5000 BC....

, were stored in barrels in larder

Larder

A larder is a cool area for storing food prior to use.Larders were commonplace in houses before the widespread use of the refrigerator.Essential qualities of a larder are that it should be:*as cool as possible*close to food preparation areas...

s before the era of refrigerators. This practice generated a political term, pork barrel

Pork barrel

Pork barrel is a derogatory term referring to appropriation of government spending for localized projects secured solely or primarily to bring money to a representative's district...

, in which earmarks

Earmark (politics)

In United States politics, an earmark is a legislative provision that directs approved funds to be spent on specific projects, or that directs specific exemptions from taxes or mandated fees...

for particular people or locations were labeled "pork-barrel" spending.

A chair can also be made out of a barrel.

Shape

Barrels often have a convex shape, bulging at the middle. This constant bulge makes it easier to roll a well-built wooden barrel on its side, changing directions with little friction. It also helps to distribute stress

Stress (physics)

In continuum mechanics, stress is a measure of the internal forces acting within a deformable body. Quantitatively, it is a measure of the average force per unit area of a surface within the body on which internal forces act. These internal forces are a reaction to external forces applied on the body...

evenly in the material by making the container more spherical.

Casks used for ale

Ale

Ale is a type of beer brewed from malted barley using a warm fermentation with a strain of brewers' yeast. The yeast will ferment the beer quickly, giving it a sweet, full bodied and fruity taste...

or beer

Beer

have shive

Shive

A shive is a wooden or plastic fitting used in ale casks. It is found on the curved side of the cask, arranged so that when the cask is on its side and the keystone is at the lowest part of the rim, the shive will be the highest point of the cask....

s and keystone

Keystone (cask)

A keystone is a small wooden or plastic fitting used in ale casks.For some years wooden casks have been effectively obsolete, with the majority now being aluminium or stainless steel, and a few sturdy plastic ones beginning to appear. Nevertheless, the standard tap is still designed to be hammered...

s in their openings. Before serving the beer a spile

Spile

A spile is a small wooden peg used to control the flow of air into, and carbon dioxide out of, a cask of ale.Cask ale is served without externally-supplied carbon dioxide or nitrogen...

is hammered into the shive and a tap into the keystone.

The iron rings holding a wooden barrel together are called "hoops" and are generally made of galvanized iron. The "head hoop" or "chime hoop" is the hoop nearest the extremes of a barrel, the chime being the rim and the head being the flat circular top or bottom of the barrel. The "bilge hoops" are those nearest the bilge, or bulging center, while the "quarter hoop" is located between the two. The stopper used to seal the (bung)hole in a barrel is called the bung

Bung

A bung is truncated cylindrical or conical closure to seal a container, such as a bottle, tube or barrel. Unlike a lid which encloses a container from the outside without displacing the inner volume, a bung is partially inserted inside the container to act as a seal...

and mostly made of silicone.

Sizes

A barrel is one of several units

Units of measurement

A unit of measurement is a definite magnitude of a physical quantity, defined and adopted by convention and/or by law, that is used as a standard for measurement of the same physical quantity. Any other value of the physical quantity can be expressed as a simple multiple of the unit of...

of volume

Volume

Volume is the quantity of three-dimensional space enclosed by some closed boundary, for example, the space that a substance or shape occupies or contains....

, with dry barrels, fluid barrels (UK beer barrel, U.S. beer barrel), oil barrel, etc. The volume of some barrel units is double others, with various volumes in the range of about 100 –.

English wine casks

Pre-1824 definitions continued to be used in the US, the wine gallon

Wine gallon

A wine gallon is a unit of capacity that was used routinely in England as far back as the 14th century, and by statute under Queen Anne since 1707. Britain abandoned the wine gallon in 1826 when it adopted imperial units for measurement...

of 231 cubic inches being the standard gallon

Gallon

The gallon is a measure of volume. Historically it has had many different definitions, but there are three definitions in current use: the imperial gallon which is used in the United Kingdom and semi-officially within Canada, the United States liquid gallon and the lesser used United States dry...

for liquids (the corn gallon of 268.8 cubic inches for solids). In Britain

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

the wine gallon was replaced by the Imperial gallon.
The tierce later became the petrol barrel.
The tun was originally 256 gallon

Gallon

s, which explains where the quarter, 8 bushel

Bushel

A bushel is an imperial and U.S. customary unit of dry volume, equivalent in each of these systems to 4 pecks or 8 gallons. It is used for volumes of dry commodities , most often in agriculture...

s or 64 (wine) gallons, comes from.

Brewery casks
Although it is common to refer to draught beer

Draught beer

Draught beer is beer served from a cask or a pressurised keg.-History of draught:Until Joseph Bramah patented the beer engine in 1785, beer was served directly from the barrel and carried to the customer. The Old English word for carry was dragen which developed into a series of related words,...

containers of any size as barrels, in the UK this is strictly correct only if the container holds 36 imperial gallons. The terms "keg

Keg

A keg is a small barrel.Traditionally, a wooden keg is made by a cooper used to transport items such as nails, gunpowder., and a variety of liquids....

" and "cask" refer to containers of any size, the distinction being that kegs are used for beers

Draught beer

intended to be served using external gas cylinders. Cask ale

Cask ale

Cask ale or cask-conditioned beer is the term for unfiltered and unpasteurised beer which is conditioned and served from a cask without additional nitrogen or carbon dioxide pressure...

s undergo part of their fermentation process in their containers, called casks.

Casks are available in several sizes, and it is common to refer to "a firkin

Firkin

" or "a kil" (kilderkin

Kilderkin

The kilderkin is an old English unit of volume equal to half a barrel or two firkins. It was used as standard size for brewery casks. The word kilderkin comes from Dutch for a small cask. The kilderkin has historically been in the general range of 16 to 18 gallons. Based on the current imperial...

) instead of a cask.

The modern US beer barrel is 31 US gallons (116.34777 litres), half a gallon less than the traditional wine barrel. (26 U.S.C. §5051 http://fatty.law.cornell.edu/uscode/search/display.html?terms=barrel%2031%20gallons&url=/uscode/html/uscode26/usc_sec_26_00005051----000-.html)

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

History

Water storage

Oil storage

Beverage maturing

Wine

Whiskey

Sherry

Brandy

Tabasco sauce

Angels' share

Other uses

Shape

Sizes

See also

External links