This is my first year of making wine. The wine is from a grape vine of what seems to be a cross between Isabella and Couderc Noir. I bought some lightly toasted wood chips to add to my wine. I do not want to over do the chips, so what would you recommend as to the amount of chips used per 5 gallons and how long they should be left to soak in the wine.
That reall depends on a personal taste. Chips will be spent in 2 weeks or so, so start with a small addition, leave for 2 weeks and taste and then add a bit more until you get to the taste you like. 1 ounce should be a good starting point.
Pp
Seems to me I've heard +/- 2 1/2 oz for 5 gallons. Chips give up their flavor/tannin quickly, so you would want to theif a sample after a couple days, then rack or filter you wine when you get to the desired taste. Cubes probably give you more control since the work much slower.
Good advice from pp. My current red wine from mixed FA hybrids has been oaked with a total of 260 grams (3&1/2 cups)of toasted French chips per 5 gal. Half went in before fermentation, as chips, half after, in the form of oak tea. I used the tea because it was easier to measure it out in a series of bench tests with smaller volumes. Even with the tea, the intensity of the oak changes with time, so be sure to monitor the taste several months after the addition. You may find that you wish to add a bit later, which is easy with the tea. It's my feeling that oak additions after fermentation are more prominent in the finished wine than additions before. I used to feel that fermenting with the chips gave a smoother result, but now I lean to the belief that it's mostly just weaker tasting for some reason. Best advice is to go slow and do trial additions to small quantities.
Mike,
I am assuming that what you mean by a tea is hot (100f to boiling?) water that the wood is soaked in (X amount of time?) then poured into the wine. If so at what temperature should I heat the water and how long should the wood soak?
Roy
I just rinse the chips or cubes (beans) and use them as is. I have heard of making a tea; the way it was explained to me was to use cheap vodka and the oak. The idea was to let the chips soak and just pour off the vodka. I would follow whatever Mike does since it works for him though.
I think you have a lot of control with chips or beans, just use more or less. I have noticed that heavy toast beans do not extract in the same way as medium or medium heavy; I will go back to medium heavy next order. The type of oak and toasting makes a difference; American and European are noticeably different and taste different at different toast levels too. There are a couple of variables besides the quantity.
I really don't care for the sawdust as an FYI; I like some toasting in the oak.
Joe
Joe Sallustio wrote "I think you have a lot of control with chips or beans, just use more or less."
I agree with Joe. I purchased French Oak chips from World Cooperage to use in some Chardonnay I'm making from home grown grapes. I started with the recommended dose of 7 to 10 pounds per 1000 gallons (I'm making about 7 gallons) during active fermentation . When I racked the wine off the lees I could not detect any oak flavor. So, as the winter proceeds I'll just add chips, wait a few weeks, taste and add more if needed until I have a nicely oaked wine.
Bill Frazier Olathe, Kansas
Thanks for the info, I just do not want to overdo it and have something that I will have to wait years for it to mellow out if it does.
Roy, That's about it. I put 3 cups of medium toast French chips (225 grams) into 5 cups of water and simmered for 10-15 minutes. After straining, it yielded 4 cups of strong, tannic tea. I found that refrigerating it for a day caused the bitter tannins to precipitate out, and the resulting clear liquid went was used at a rate of 1/2 or 1 cup per 5 gal carboy, depending on which style I was aiming for. There was already the equivalent of about 1 cup of dry chips in each carboy throughout fermentation. The dry chips had far less impact than the tea, but I still suspect that it's good to have some oak in during the fermentation, if only to let the yeast do something different & create added complexity. Who can tell?
HTH
Roy, That's good thinking; it's one reason I don't like the sawdust form. I not only over-oaked with it, the taste, for lack of a better term was greenish. I definitely overdid that batch. Time did not heal it, it only made it somewhat drinkable. I ended up making most of it into vinegar, which turned out really well.
Joe
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