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50 WINES&VINES April 2018 OAK BARREL ALTERNATIVES T o many, winemaking is 50% art and 50% science; the problem is, we don't know which 50% is which. Winemak- ers today approach the "art" of wine- making in many different ways. Some are classicists who agree with the Old World view that if something has been done in a certain way for centuries or decades, then that is the proper way to make wine and everything else is just manufacturing a product. Some wine- makers are commercial artists, where the bot- tom line rules; others in the modern art school of winemaking seize on every new technology and abandon the classic roots of the art; pop art winemakers take the craft to zany extremes just to put a product out there and see if any- one finds it interesting. My philosophical approach to winemaking could be defined as neo-classical post-modern. I want to create wines that are based on clas- sical traditions in order to get the most out of the past, but also take advantage of the pres- ent—and future—elements of the art and the science of our business. This has been my ap- proach to such elements as crossflow filtration, plastic tanks and oak alternatives. In today's world, we as winemakers should be concerned with the environmental impact of the traditional ways of making our prod- ucts, as well as the costs of maintaining those traditions. We as an industry should be look- ing for ways to make our products in an en- vironmentally sound, sustainable manner, but without sacrificing the qualities we value in our products. The primary reason for an oak barrel's ex- istence is the transfer of oak flavors into the wine. To perform its destiny, a barrel requires the finest wood; it must be grown in specific environments; the production process is labor intensive, producing a costly container—and, because of their shape, the barrel takes more square footage of warehouse space per liter of wine stored than any other type of container. Furthermore, a barrel is only good for three to four years before it loses a lot of its ability to impart its flavors into wine. One must wonder why we revere these storage containers and continue to use them. It also seems obvious that one of the important things we can do is determine how we can prolong the useful life of barrels to improve their sustainability as wine-storage vessels. Other than holding and protecting wine from the environment, a barrel's function is to regulate oxygen transfer into wine while it imparts oak flavors. To control both of these functions, a barrel must be constructed with woods that are calculated to deliver the ap- propriate constituents into the wine. Yet the wine plugs the oxygen transport, and the solu- bilization of the oak lactones decreases at logarithmic rates to the point where no ap- preciable extraction occurs after three years of wine storage, leaving 80% of available lactones tied up in the barrel's wood. Oak alternatives Resurfacing a barrel's interior will prolong the life of a barrel for its original intended use. To delay the demise of a barrel's trajectory toward a flower pot, oak alternatives have been developed to work in conjunction with older barrels as well as wines that have not seen a barrel. This concept is important to the sustainable use of barrels as wine-storage vessels. Alternatives also deliver nearly 100% of oak lactones from parts of the wood not feasible to use in constructing a barrel. Again, prolonging the sustainability of the oak for- ests for wine production. The public likes the flavors imparted by barrels. Alternatives to barreling of wine can help save the barrels for those wines that truly do need the softening that happens to wines as they age in barrels. By using barrel alterna- tives, one gets more bang for the buck, because more of the usable material is employed to get what is needed for flavors. One does not need a barrel to control oxygen management. In discussing oak alternatives, it is important to define the different types of alternative prod- ucts: staves, particles and granulate (or powder). Each of these types of oak alternatives transfers oak characteristics into the wine differently and, as a result, they must be used differently. Staves: As an oak alternative, a stave is any plank-like product that has enough depth to mimic a typical barrel stave used in the con- struction of an oak barrel. This would include the long planks strung together to ring the ETS LABORATORIES KEY POINTS The article is an updated version of the origi- nal, which ran as two parts in the April 2009 and June 2009 issues of Wines & Vines. Taking a wide view of oak alternative prod- ucts, the author explains what they are and how they work in winemaking. This article describes the economic, environmental and practical reasons that oak products beyond barrels are valuable to winemakers today. Forms and shapes of oak products are discussed, particularly how they are valu- able adjuncts to barrels, not necessarily replacements. The Art of Oak, Revisited The toasting process and extraction techniques are the keys to using oak alternatives for quality wine By Richard Carey SAME TOAST, DIFFERENT COOPERS The same wine filled two barrels from different coo- pers (both the same toast and similar size). Note the differences in the extraction of compounds.