Oak chips and Blackberry wine
Treb1973
My question is this;
I have a 4 gallon batch of Blackberry that I started in February of this year
from Vintners Harvest wine base. It has developed into an outstanding (in my
opinion) semi dry red wine. I am using Oak chips in a Merlot and it seems to
be slowly improving the not-so-great taste/bouquet.
Will the end result of using Oak chips in the Blackberry be desirable?
How long should I age w/ the Oak?
Is "Oaking" recomended/advisable with other fruit wines? (strawberry plum etc.)
At this time oak barrels are way too big and a bit too costly for my winemaking
budget and space. Although in the near future I hope to invest in at least one
barrell after my wife and I get into a house and OUT OF this little condo!!
steve_small
I've put oak chips in my blackberry wines with success. In fact
if you look at Stanley Anderson's book "Winemaking" (author and
title from memory but close enough) you will note that in
his "Blackberry Bordeaux" recipe he calls for "sinatin-7" which
is a liquid oak extract. That stuff sounds a bit like liquid
hickory smoke for your bar-b-q (uggh), but I took it as a
documented endorsement for oaking blackberry wines.
My answer to the question what fruit wines to oak would be to
consider what type of grape wine the fruit wine lines up with.
In other words if you are making a white wine like peach, kiwi
or mango then oak would not be called for. If you are making a
hearty red - blackberry, blueberry, elderberry, etc. then oaking
may be appropriate.
Experiment, experiment, experiment. By the way I tend to fine
that the flavour profile of the oak chips tends to fade over
time. This will encourage me to put more and more in... until
one day I over do it.
until then ... having fun... steve small
* Sent from RemarQ http://www.remarq.com The Internet's Discussion Network *
The fastest and easiest way to search and participate in Usenet - Free!
amic...@earthling.net
treb...@aol.com (Treb1973) wrote:
> I have a 4 gallon batch of Blackberry that I started in February of
this year
> from Vintners Harvest wine base. It has developed into an
outstanding (in my
> opinion) semi dry red wine. I am using Oak chips in a Merlot and it
seems to
> be slowly improving the not-so-great taste/bouquet.
>
> Will the end result of using Oak chips in the Blackberry be desirable?
>
> How long should I age w/ the Oak?
>
> Is "Oaking" recomended/advisable with other fruit wines? (strawberry
plum etc.)
The oaking of fruit wines depends a lot on the desires of the maker,
as well as the style of wine being make. IMHO, most fuit wines and
most fruit wine styles don't lend themselves well to much (if any)
oaking. That said, I'm not a big fan of oaking (as that suggests).
However, the 'darker' styles of wine make from fruit can create wines
which are very suitable to oaking. Of those, a dark black berry wine
is probably one of the best choices for a fruit wine which oaks well.
I just bottled a Himalaya Black Berry based on about 1.75 gallons of
fruit per 5 gallons of wine. I very nearly split the batch and oaked
part of it. If the fruit ratio was much lower, I think the wine, while
still 'dark' in color might start to be too low in body support much
oaking. If the fruit ratio is much higher, the wine would start
reaching for the oak chips all by itself 8-}. I once made red (dark
eastern) rasberry wine, using about 4 lbs of fruit per gallon. The
result was just terrible as a wine, it was horribly dark, chewy, and
really carried a strong taste of chewing tobacco. However, when it
was blended with a champagne (10-25% wine/75-90% champagne), it created
a nearly perfect fresh rasberry taste, flavor, and aroma to the
champagne. I'm afraid this wouldn't have worked very well if the wine
had been oaked. The object is, if you have a lighter more fruity style
wine, you may want to let the wine stand alone, but if you have a
fuller body wine, you may want to use oak to add to the complexity and
character. I had a fairly light, and semi-dry strawberry wine from
Michigan. It was very slightly oaked, and it was one of the best fruit
wines I've ever had. The hint of oak added to much it was hard to
believe. We bought the last 3 cases they had at the winery shop.
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
steve_small
I am contemplating making a raspberry wine soon. I have 5-6 lbs
of raspberries in the freezer. I have got very mixed messages
regarding
using this fruit for wine. Terry Garey puts it forward as her
first recipe and definitely seems enamoured of it. Stanely
Anderson
suggests that it makes a nice topping for ice cream (I do not
consider this a rousing endorsement). Most authors of recipes for
raspberry wine suggest it can be overpowering and the taste of
the fermented berry is very different than the fruit. I made a
raspberry/cherry wine (20%/80%) in '98 and although pleasant the
two flavours are still fighting it out over who rules. Your
notes also
suggest that some care needs to be taken to produce something
really enjoyable.
So I guess my question is - what do you think of raspberry wine,
what ratio of fruit/gallon would you recommend? I would use
jack's
recipe as a guide - and finally has anyone made "framboise"
and/or have a recipe for this. I seem to recall finding a french
fruit wine
website with a recipe for it, but I think I've lost the
connection.
Steve
jackkeller
enough. In my last batch, I used too many raspberries (I would guess I
used about 4-1/2 lbs) and ended up blending it with a gallon of white
mustang--at which point it was darned near perfect! Indeed, we had some
of it last night....
Can't help you with the "framboise" recipe....
Jack Keller, The Winemaking Home Page,
http://www.geocities.com/NapaValley/1172/
amic...@earthling.net
> Steve, I usually use 3 lbs per gallon and it comes out plenty strong
> enough. In my last batch, I used too many raspberries (I would guess
I
> used about 4-1/2 lbs) and ended up blending it with a gallon of white
> mustang--at which point it was darned near perfect! Indeed, we had
some
> of it last night....
The color is difficult to match, because of the variation of berry
colors among the 200 or so Rasberry Varieties. The 'perfect' amount
is also nearly impossible to recommend, because of variations in
personal taste and desired wine styles. Lastly, the amount of color
(and flavor) extraction from the fruit depends greatly in my experience
depending on the crush and fermentation methods/techniques/styles used.
For all Rasp fruits (Rasberries, Black Berries, etc), I usually freeze
the fruit, twice. Cold press the fruit while still partly frozen by
hand, with a (wet) mashing action (with the juice). Then, press off the
free juice. Then, I usually add the pulp to hot water, around 150-165F,
using about 50% of the total added water (or volume) for the batch.
After about 20 minutes, I strain and press again. Cooling the total
volume of water as soon as I'm done. After letting all the liquid cool
and stand, the seeds will settle, and the juice can be racked off.
I then adjust sugars, acids, volumes, add pectic enzyme & ferment.
I'm about to bottle a batch from last season, using the very light
(really nearly white and pink Red Rasberries which (appear) are common
to the NorthWest US. I used 2#/Gallon, and the resulting color is
a glowing medium fire engine red. The body is probably medium to
light, and the rasberry character is pretty good. I think I got a
pretty good extraction of color and rasberry essence from the fruit.
You probably could get even more with the addition of fermentation
on pulp. You could use more fruit, and without multiple freezing and
then 'cooking' of the fruit (in hot water), the extraction of color and
flavor could be less.
What I'm saying is, you can use more or less fruit than 2#-3# a gallon
and end up with a lighter (closer to a light white zin) wine OR a deeper
(darker wine) more full bodied wine (approaching a merlot), depending
on the extraction you get, based on the preparation of the fruit and
the pressing methods.
Like Jack, I made a 'high' rasberry concentration batch. In my case,
I used 5#/G. Likewise, it was too dark for me to enjoy, and was no
longer at all like rasberry. But, blended, it was great.
jackkeller
heat treatment sets the color and double pressing extracts as much as
can be reasonably extracted. Excellent method for making a difficult
wine with a minimum of fruit.
Jack Keller, The Winemaking Home Page,
http://www.geocities.com/NapaValley/1172/
r_d...@smtind.com
I have made several batches of Raspberry - typically 3 gal batch from 96OZ can of Vintners harvest prior to final rack I add about (4oz) light toast American Oak for about 1 week I think it adds nice character and has become one of my families favorites I like best when wait at least 5-6 months from bottling
but you don't have too wait that long