Someone previously mentioned (I deleted the msg) that after less than a week, all the oakiness would be extracted from oak chips. I can't believe this is right. If it was, then why wouldn't my wines (where I fermented with perhaps 3 or 4 times the normal number of chips) be extremely oaky?

Michael: another benefit for putting oak chips into the ferment is that the extra tannin extracted helps to stabilize the colours extracted from reds. I am aware of at least one Niagara winery that has tried this, and we did this last harvest. Anyone else have any experience here?

You can purchase oak chips at most stores that sell winemaking supplies. WineArt has Oak Mor a brand of chips that are excellent. If the chips are not toasted some people put them on a cookie tray and lightly toast in the oven or Bar B Q. Add 3 to 6 grams per litter. They will eventually sink. Try to keep your carboy topped up. Most of the oak extraction occurs in 4 to 6 days, but the chips can be left in longer with little effect. Keep tasting over the first 4 days and add more if necessary. If the wine is to be aged for several years you will want more oak than a wine that you plan to drink within the next 2 years. Lailey,s 98 Cab S. will probably age very well, 98 was an excellent vintage and their Cabs are high quality. I believe that wine that is oaked with chips needs a minimum of 2 years for the oak tannins to soften unless you get creative with finings.

Michael,
This question of oak chip useage was posted on another site called Winetalk some time ago. I kept Terry Rayner's response. He is one of Ontario's best amateur winemakers, a chemist and a wine judge. The 97 Convention that he refers to is the Amateur Winemakers of Ontario Convention in Peterborough. There was a seminar on oak chip useage by a professional winemaker.

Terry wrote:
Dan asked about washing of the oak chips prior to use. I'm going to assume that you still intend to filter the wine in which case the oak chips can also act as a filtration aid. Washing, depending on the contact time, might reduce your efficiency of extraction unless you get some of the oak chips, like American, which can be somewhat larger in size than the "typical" French oak chips supplied. Some taste tests that Ludvik (ed- Furbacher) ran tended to favour the use of American oak over French in Chardonnay.

With respect to how much to use, for how long, and whether to toast or not depends on what you want from your wine. During the '97 convention there was a talk on the use of oak chips in both red and white with levels of up to 8 g/l. That to me is a bit on the high side, but levels of 3-6 g/l can be experimented with depending on the maturity of grapes used, type of fermentation and whether you malo'd your Chardonnay or not. Most of the oak chips present a high surface area so extraction is relatively rapid. Studies by the University of Guelph (I believe) did confirm extraction within a matter of about 4 days. Continued contact didn't impair the wine but also didn't add much more via the oak chip contribution.

Whether to toast or not is a good question. Since the surface area of the oak chips is so large relative to barrels and they're also quite thin it's very easy to overtoast or end up with an uneven distribution of toasting. I know of a few people who've also experienced "fires" in their ovens after relatively short heat exposure of the oak chips. That's not say don't toast, just take care in the choice of temperature, duration, and distribution of the oak chips on "your pan". By using the overoak approach on a small quantity of wine you can balance the oak flavour a little more easily than with repeated trials of addition to the bulk. The other option is to make up an oak extract in alcohol/wine and add proportions of that to your base wine. That way you could test out the impact of toasting versus not on small batch sizes.

Michael: another benefit for putting oak chips into the ferment is that the extra tannin extracted helps to stabilize the colours extracted from reds. I am aware of at least one Niagara winery that has tried this, and we did this last harvest. Anyone else have any experience here?

I'm looking for precise info regarding use of oak chips. Texts I have are unclear, (full of phases like "you must know", but leave you dangling).

I have what I hope are high quality ingredients, (French medium toasted), but I lack the info for propper use. I as of yet do not own any oak barrels, but am looking for the flavour and aromatics from oak treatment.

The product I have is under the "Winemaster" brand name, the chips are tiny fragments, and are a dark brown colour.

Presently I have in bulk glass storage several Kamil juice wines that would benefit from oaking.....but am reticent for fear of overdosing the wine.

It has crossed my mind that if I were to add say 30 grams straight into the carboys, then taste the wine once a week starting after the first month, I might get the desired effect.

Does this sound right? Is 30 grams way too much? Any info would be greatly appreciated.

I use the same brand for my 50% Cab-Sav / 50% Merlot.

I firstly sterlize the 30 Grams in boiling water, then add to a nylon stocking (borrowed from my girlfriend). Make sure to wash and sterlize that as well, otherwise wine will have funny "not exactly tannin" after taste. The nylon keeps the oak chips in a clean package. You may want to add marbles to it to keep it from floating to the top of the vat.

I add the 30 gram load right into my 20 gallon glass vat on primary fermentation and leave it there for about 2-4 weeks. You should monitor taste about once a week. I usually remove after about 3 weeks. I sometimes stretch it to 4 weeks, but be careful, especially with medium or heavy toasted chips.

(Note that some jackass posted next about the wine having "Great Legs".

With medium toast French oak, i use 50 grams per 5gallons and usually leave it for about 2 weeks, tasting it about every other day after the first week. This works for white wines very well. Hope this helps

The Okanagan Barrel Works in Oliver BC have a good supply of Oak Chips and Oaking information as well as Stainless Steel infusion tubes for oaking in glass. THese are Stainless mesh tubes that are made in a variety of sizes to fit carboys as well as old, tasteless barrels. Of course they also have barrels.

You can check out their web site and tell them I sent you (I buy my barrels there!)

Hi David: My experience with oak chips has led me to the conclusion that the duration of exposure beyond a couple of weeks is pretty much inconsequential. The variety, level of toast and quantity are more important determinants in the final flavour.

I generally find around 3-4 g/l of coarse chips does the job for most "biggish" wines providing the chips are fairly coarsely textured and medium toasted. On your next batch try adding the oak into the primary ferment.

While I can't say it comes close to barrel fermentation on whites, it certainly integrates more nicely than adding post fermentation (with reds too, then add more chips post ferment.)

In the end ther is no "formula", it really is a matter of taste. I have noticed that the overtly aggressive elements of wood tannin tend to attenuate after about 6-12 months.

Anthony's suggestion for boiling the chips is a bit of a double edged sword. On one hand you get "softness" on the other you loose much of the goodness as an oak "tea". In fact there are some folks who boil chips and then add the boiled extraction to the wine! His suggestion about the nylon works, though. Make sure that the nylon is boiled and bleached then boiled to remove pigments, colours, etc.

If you can get your hands on some polypropylene mesh and make a bag, this might be better. A final note about types of oak: American oak can be extremely aggressive and impart a lemony/rotten egg nose if used to excess. It has it's place-mostly with big red wines when you don't have a barrel.

P.S.- There is also a product called Harmonie French oak sticks which does a nice job.

When using oak chips, there are a number of things to take into consideration:
Is there a difference between French and American? Definitely, each has its own characteristic taste and aroma
Toasted vs untoasted.....always use toasted......ever buy or look into a barrel,,,,,,,,the wood is always toasted..........if you have untoasted, you can toast them yourself,,,,,,,,,broiling pan from stove over the BBQ works well, but preheat the BBQ very well to burn off any smells from the last cooking venture
Sterilize them ? No............why bother..........ever see anything growing on dry wood..........besides, if you boil them in water, you effectively lose most of the character that you are looking for
How to add,,,,,,,,,,,,just pour them into the wine............they will float for a while, but will sink to the bottom in a few days......then, as someone mentioned,,,,,,,,,,,wrap a little cheese cloth or nylon around the end of the J-tube when you want to transfer the wine. Use an elastic band to hold the cloth in place
How much to add...............use 4 - 6 grams / liter of wine.......4 gm for a white or medium red..............up to 6 gm for a more robust red
How long............if you are using chips, that are more like splinters,,,,,,,,,,2 -3 weeks will probably give you the full affect.....after that, you don't get much more out of them. If you have the larger chips, it can take 1-2 months to get the full effect

Taste the wine on a weekly basis,,,you are dealing with art now, not science..........you are making wine for your pallet..........one of the trickier aspects of this is that you get an inititial taste of oak, and in many cases, it will appear quite raw and woody. but after several months, this will meld into the wine to give the nice balanced oaky flavour. I usually oak until I think its just a little too much, then take it off,,,,,and when I come back to it in several months, will usually find its just how I like it.

Oaking: A couple add-ons to Jim Lloyd's excellent comments.

A. Sterilize: If you toast the chips, they will be sterilized. You never know "where they have been."

B. Saturation: Since the effect take a little aging to settle out, double oak half of the batch. When the oaked half is stable, blend back to your taste.

Good points Gord...........at one point, I think people thought that these chips were simply sweepings, as thats what some of them looked like.

However, today, most of them are made by passing wood thru a chipper to get the smaller pieces. Thus they have become a full scale industry for some produers. Know someone who brings in a container of them from France every year for consumption by the Ont wineries...........they don't replace their older barrels as they used to do, or not as frequently, ........dose them with good oak chips, and you get the effect of newly toasted wood, plus the oxidative aging from storage in the barrel.

Its a good deal, and is better than sending out a barrel for re-coopering, which doesn't last for very long

I have some excellent American chips from Canton Cooperage, as well as some very nice ones from France...........both completely different, but both good in their own right.

Editor's note (lfw) - I have used these chips, both French and American oak, and am amazed by the quality of the end result (including one of the two gold medals awarded to table wine at the EOAWC 2000). They are more expensive yet I am quite excited about the results (working very well with 2000 Pinot Gris...). I suggest that you email Jim about top-quality oak chips.

All too often the term sterilization is mis-used, mis-interpreted in the wine field. We talk about sterilizing our bottles, sterilizing our oak, why don't we sterilize the corks???

Sterilization means the complete destruction of life form. This happens when you destroy protein matter. The same effect as frying an egg white in your frying pan. The egg white being protein and the heat source destroying it.

In order to achieve this a temperature of 270 F at 32 lbs atmospheric pressure for a total of 3 minutes is required. Sterilization cannot be assumed without a control. Sterilization can be obtained through various techniques. There is the hot dry sterilization in which density has specific parameters. There is ethelyne oxide sterilization, although it is pretty much past unacceptable technology due to human risk factor. We now have low temperature sterilization technology which uses hydrogen peroxide as a base.

I'm not sure if the question of sterilization is pertaining. I would prefer technologies such as pasturization.

As I see it the production of a bottle of wine warrants at the minimum pasturization techniques throughout the process. That is to say why sterilize the oaks if you are not sterilizing the cork. There seems to be a lot of work that could be researched within these areas.

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