I fell asleep early , so I woke up early too . <| sep |> i know this but that are the only positions i really enjoy playing so i never get autofilled <| sep |> Mine didn ' t have much oak for a while , so I left if for a while then all of a sudden it was over oaked hehe . So yeah definitely keep checking it . If for some reason it ' s going slower than your patience allows , there is a way to speed up the oaking , but it will wear your cask out a bit faster . Putting it in the freezer for a couple of days , then moving it to warm place for a couple of days . This will raise and lower the pressure inside forcing your rum in and out of the pores and basically simulating a year of pressure rise and drop . Rinse and repeat until sufficiently oaky . The problem with doing that though is you weaken the wood over time as moisture in the wood freezes and expands inside the wood ' s pores . You ' re also gambling a bit on the Cooper ' s build quality since there is a risk of it splitting . I ' ve done it a few times with mine but I consider the cask a disposable item like a plastic fermenter , knowing it ' ll wear out eventually anyway . Interesting about your cask toasting . I asked for heavy toasting and mine comes out no where near as darkE If you go the coldhot method , you ' ll need to swap out your wooden bung and tap for silicone stoppers or it ' ll leak