Wine Barrel Science
 Ever wonder how different containers shape the character of wine while it ages?
Stainless-steel tanks produce crisp wine and put fermentation more in the control of the winemaker, whose choice of temperature determines the crispness. Oak of any type imbues wine with soft tannins and a detectable measure of the wood’s attributes. It relies on the unsupervised interplay between wine and wood.
Not all oaks are alike, however. Each yields a distinct flavor, although the older the barrels, the less pronounced the differences become.
- New oak produces unmistakably oaky wines with strong flavors.
- Old oak has a much subtler impact because so much of the wood’s complex character has already been absorbed.
- American oak encourages butteriness, vanilla notes and fruit flavors while often yielding pronounced oaky tones.
- French oak, which uses a different species of oak and barrel construction, imparts a gentler, honey-infused flavor and allows more of the grape’s inherent makeup (sometimes called varietal character) to blossom.
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