adding oak chips to wine

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amstaffer

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I have added french oak chips to wine approx. 1oz to 5gall. The wine is approx. 70% cab. sauv. and 30% merlot made from grapes. I have added the oak chips this past week, the wine has finished its second ferm. and been tranferred to new demi-johns. My question is how long can/should I leave the oak chips in? Any experiences out there with over oaking?
Thanks
Rookie
 
American oak chips are pretty aggressive, so it would be easy to over oak if you used American oak. The only solution I have is to taste it weekly. When it's just slightly over oaked, then rack it off of the cubes and then let it age out. It should age into a perfectly oaked flavor, since oak taste lessens a bit wtih age.
 
Besides the fact that she appears to have missed that you are using french oak, Yooper is spot on.
 
AMSTAFFER, this is where your wine theif becomes your friend, I have experiemented with boiling the chips first (like the ec kraus website recommends) Steaming them instead of boiling (guy at the home brew store recommended) etc with different results. I found with boiling them you can leave them in longer then steaming. Also the 1oz of course will be pretty light, I usually use 2oz per topped off 5 gallon carboy unless I'm doing a Pinot then I will use 1oz. Just be careful when you taste it if any chips are still at the surface you will get a stronger oak flavor as it seems to condense in the neck of the carboy. How did you prepare the chips before adding? If you put them in dry I cant help you as I have read you will get some pretty harsh tannins from dry chips as opposed to boiling or steaming, good luck and taste each week, Ken
 
Besides the fact that she appears to have missed that you are using french oak, Yooper is spot on.

Oh, Duh! Well, I'm cute, but nobody ever said I was particularly bright!

French oak is more "gentle" and it is smoother, but still can be overoaked, and then take years to age out!

The consensus, though, is to taste weekly. Not a real scientific way, I guess, but winemaking is more of an art than a science in many ways anyway.
 
Thanks for your input, I'll be tasting weekly. I boiled the chips and put them in cheese cloth, they are hanging in through the rubber airlock.
Thanks again.
 
AMSTAFFER, this is where your wine theif becomes your friend, I have experiemented with boiling the chips first (like the ec kraus website recommends) Steaming them instead of boiling (guy at the home brew store recommended) etc with different results. I found with boiling them you can leave them in longer then steaming. Also the 1oz of course will be pretty light, I usually use 2oz per topped off 5 gallon carboy unless I'm doing a Pinot then I will use 1oz. Just be careful when you taste it if any chips are still at the surface you will get a stronger oak flavor as it seems to condense in the neck of the carboy. How did you prepare the chips before adding? If you put them in dry I cant help you as I have read you will get some pretty harsh tannins from dry chips as opposed to boiling or steaming, good luck and taste each week, Ken

When you boil them do you also add the water to the wine?
 
The oak chips will be pretty much "used up" in 3 weeks, there still may be some subtle changes going on after that, but I don't think leaving the wine on 1 ounce of chips is going to over oak.
 
The oak chips will be pretty much "used up" in 3 weeks, there still may be some subtle changes going on after that, but I don't think leaving the wine on 1 ounce of chips is going to over oak.

If the 3 week thing is true, then is oaking a matter of volume of chips to the volume of alcohol and a recipe can be created based on that?
 
the 3 week thing is true.
and yes it a matter of amount of oak - otherwise people would add a few grams and save the money :)

there is no recipe for it, it depends on how much oak flavour you want, is it toasted oak or not. The sweeter the wine the less oak you can taste.
 
When you boil them do you also add the water to the wine?


I was thinking led,the reason for boiling the chips is to get rid of,the roughest tannins so I assume they go into the water, so you wouldn't add the water.
Now, why you only boils chips and no,other oak products is the question on my mind.
 
When you boil them do you also add the water to the wine?


I was told the reason for boiling the chips is to get rid of the roughest tannins so I assume they go into the water, so you wouldn't add the water.
Now, why you only boils chips and no,other oak products is the question on my mind.
 
When you boil them do you also add the water to the wine?


I was told the reason for boiling the chips is to get rid of the roughest tannins so I assume they go into the water, so you wouldn't add the water.
Now, why you only boils chips and no,other oak products is the question on my mind.
 
I oaked a plum wine, hit the desired level, removed chips, and accidentally oaked again when I meant to oak a blackberry. American oak. Disaster. I use the over-oaked wine to top off similar wines. At 2 years, the plum is almost drinkable. Lol. One of several brutal learning lessons.
 
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