Oak

[CowboyPhil]

I may get bumped on this but, I did do a search first. I am making a Chilean Merlot, it is a Medium Range kit and it does NOT come with oak in it. I want a nice oaky flavor that one would expect from a Chilean Merlot, the question is which type of oak, and how much would you add to a 6 gallon batch. I made a batch of Pinot Noir and over oaked it, it is good now (almost 6 months later) but I don't want to do that again. Any help would be helpful.

 

[Dend78]

i dont know for sure but i would guess a french medium toast chips, about 4oz for 2 weeks then taste every week there after. if you would rather more of a vanilla undertone medium toast american oak chips would be the way to go.

 

[GreginND]

I use medium toasted oak cubes. You can also get spirals that work well. I think chips will extract very fast and I tend to go for something with a little bit slower extraction (cubes or bigger). Add the minimum recommended amount of oak and let it sit for a month. Taste. You can always add more. Remember that the oak will diminish some over time so you want to hit a point that it tastes just slightly over oaked.

 

[tonyt]

Good advise above so far. Spirals give it up slower and may be your best bet not to overoak. I would get two Medium plus French spirals. Hang one at a time in carboy with fishing line. Taste every week. Each one lasts six weeks and you can pull the oak out whenever you feel. You can use one or both. Dont add the second till you remove the first. With this method you might not even use the second one or you might use the first one for the entire six weeks and pull the second after only one week. You could also use one French and one American but I would go all French. This gives you lots of control. Good luck.

 

[LeChat]

I have a somewhat related question. If a wine kit does not come with any oak in the package, does that automatically mean that no oak flavor will be present in the final wine?

 

[Dend78]

unless it comes with some crazy f-pak or pouch of oak essence i would guess there wont be any oak flavor

 

[JohnT]

Cowboy,

I recomend oak cubes.

The type of wood or toast really depends on what type of flavors you want.

A light toast will give you an almost "sawdust" or what I call "Sniffing the plank" wood taste.

A medium toast will yield nice wood flavors, but most important, it will yeild vanilla flavors to your wine. this comes from the "caramelization layer" of wood just below the char. From this layer, the wine extracts a compound called vanillan, which is very close to the flavor compound found in the vanilla bean. I do not believe that you can get these flavor profiles from spirals.

A a heavy dark toast has the potential for an even stronger vanillan extraction, but since the caramelization layer is much deeper in the wood, it will take longer to extract. Heavy toasts also yeild nice smokey/chocolate flavors. Like above, I do not believe that you can get these flavor profiles from spirals.


No matter what you decide, oaking is the best way to kick you wine up to the next level.... But that is only my opinion.

 

[CowboyPhil]

Perfect and thank you all for the great information. Now if I could find out how to get that peppery taste in my wine.

 

[WI_Wino]

Try adding a couple peppercorns to a single bottle. Test regularly. If it comes out, scale up to what your carboy is. If tastes terrible you have a bottle of cooking wine or at least limited your waste to a single bottle. Some frown upon using adjuncts in grape wine but hey, it's yours. Make it how you like it.

 

[JohnT]

Perfect and thank you all for the great information. Now if I could find out how to get that peppery taste in my wine.

For the most part, a "Peppery" taste comes from second growth clusters being included as part of the grape harvest.

Once the main grape crop developes and begins to ripen, vines will (at times) begin groing a second series of grape clusters. At the time of harvest, these second growth clusters are very small and underdeveloped. It is these second growth clusters that is the main source of peppery flavor compounds.

You could try to add a couple of pepper-corns, but I do not thing that this will be the exact same flavor you are looking for.

My advise is to try to make chillean carmenere from fresh grapes. It has been my experience that they include a lot of second growth (although this may depend on the year, the grower, and the mood of the pickers). Using fresh fruit, and taking control of your maceration (time the juice sits on the skins) help to develop more of that pepper flavor than if you went with straight juice.