The oak chips were scrubbed, smashed up as much as possible (hammer and pliers) and put into the oven on a baking tray for 40 minutes at 150 DegC. For soaking them in the port, we used a large preserving jar. I was going to buy some ordinary port for the soaking, but in the end used some we'd made last year and not yet bottled. It tasted pretty good and was made from 3lb damsons, 3lb blackberries and 1/2 lb elderberries - all picked from hedgerows - and 1lb raisins. With a high tolerance port yeast and careful additions of sugar, I got the alcohol content up to about 20%. So 175 ml of the port went into the jar with the chips with a splash of cognac. I'm going to have to do some serious straining before bottling or there will be some serious splinters.
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