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BARRELS Lighter Touch for Better Integration New barrels and toasts offer options for winemakers' oak programs By Andrew Adams Highlights • Coopers are offering more barrels featuring tight-grain wood, lengthier seasoning times and new toasts to provide more options for subtle oak flavors. Several coopers reported that winemakers ordering barrels for the 2013 vintage were looking for products that offered subtler oak flavors and better integration. B alance has been a muchcontested word in the wine industry lately, but that debate has largely focused on ripeness in the vineyard. In the cellar, however, winemakers are mindful of finding the right balance between oak and wine. In seeking ways to differentiate their products and help them stand out in the cooperage crowd, barrel suppliers have launched new items and toasts that they say help showcase the fruit characteristics of wine while giving it the structure of new oak with subtler, nuanced oak flavors. New toasting technology Jim Boswell, president of The Boswell Co. in San Rafael, Calif., sells French and American barrels and oak barrel alternatives and has been in the barrel business for more than 30 years. He said the new Éclat barrel from French barrel alterna46 W in es & V i ne s DEC E M be r 20 13 tive pioneer Vinea represents what he considers an actual innovation in cooperage. "The Éclat is something that has never come down the pike before," he told Wines & Vines. French cooperage veteran Jean-Christophe Varron founded the Vinea line of barrel alternatives in 1994. Vinea, which is distributed in the United States by Boswell, still uses fire-toasting for its products, while most barrel alternative companies use convection heat or employ a ceramic heating element for toasting. Varron, however, took the concept of using a ceramic heating system and applied it to barrel toasting. He said Varron's new machine lowers a heating element into the unfinished barrel and toasts the entire interior surface. Boswell could only describe the process in general terms, as Varron is keeping a tight lid on the new toasting system, even refusing to release photos of it. • mong the more interesting new A products, Vinea claims the ceramic toasting method used for its Éclat barrel offers a consistent, uniform toasting that could mean shorter aging times. • onnellerie Vicard is offering two new T barrel toasts for lighter wines and wineries that seek to release their wines sooner and its new G7 barrel. The machine provides temperature control and uniform heating that applies even toasting through the barrel stave. "This is a very interesting concept that you can toast the entire depth of the wood and you have uniformity," he said. Boswell said the absence of an open flame means there's less smoky flavor imparted to the wood and almost zero chance of the staves blistering during the toasting process. What this new approach means for wine aging remains to be seen. Varron partnered