Other woods?

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never use cedar are pine, both contain pitch, are rosin...not good for wine, it will leach out and ruin the whole batch.
 
There's a long history of using acacia and other woods in Italy and for sherry.
I've used Spanish cedar (not the resinous red cedar) in beer and mead (1oz/6gal) and it adds a nice fruitiness and some extra tannin without the oak flavor (usefull for meads).
I also have some lychee wood that I hand split into quarters aging/seasoning right now, I'll probably spilt it into staves in a few months and give I a total of 2 years befor using it (toasted first) as cubes or segments.
 
Actually, my question is somewhat different. I am interested in sticking with oak, but making my own. What if I took a regular ol' piece of red oak from my local big box store, cut it into cubes, and dried it in my oven. Hit it with a torch for a little char, perhaps. Would this be roughly equivalent to the (American) oak cubes I can buy at my LHBS?
 
Actually, my question is somewhat different. I am interested in sticking with oak, but making my own. What if I took a regular ol' piece of red oak from my local big box store, cut it into cubes, and dried it in my oven. Hit it with a torch for a little char, perhaps. Would this be roughly equivalent to the (American) oak cubes I can buy at my LHBS?

Nope, the stuff you buy at LHBS is white oak. I have heard that red oak imparts a cat urine taste/smell (no joke).
 
Update! The apple wine I was going to use for this came out so darn good I just didn't want to risk experimenting with it. Catch 22 right? What would be the point of experimenting on one that comes out bad? ;) anyway once it have some on the rack, I'll start another big batch for the fruit woods. Our stock of home made was almost nothing, but I have lots aging now..
 

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