A pox on oak

That is all.

OK Mr. Jilted Lover, so what wine alienated you tonight?

Been feeling this way for months! I just get angry sometimes.

Pretty much agree wine-wise. Supportive but invisible is my preference. Sadly, there already is a Pox and it isn’t pretty.

RT

Be sure to report back on how that steel-tank Musigny and Haut Brion work out for you.

Sorry but we are busy drinking unoaked CdP, Chablis and Champagne…

If you mean an overuse of new oak, I can get on board.

Happy that sort of narrow range works for you

For me, it’s not that they used oak, but that too many winemakers seem to regard residual oak flavors as a legitimate component in a mature wine (“Think of it like a seasoning in a soup.”); I particularly hate it in white wines and it’s what’s basically put me off Califronia chardonnay, with only a few exceptions.

If I can taste it when the wine’s past it’s adolescence, it’s been overused. IMO.

Last week I blind tasted a few Cabs. All were aged 13-20 years. It was interesting to see that the character of a prominent '97 cult Napa cab was primarily oak-derived. In other words, the fruit was just a vehicle for delivering oak flavors.
It’s disheartening but an reminder that some people really love oak.

Either my palate changed or many winemakers started really laying on the oak around 9-10 years ago. An egrigious example is Beringer PR Cab which I used to love but that all changed with the 2001. I rarely buy Cali Cabs anymore. Besides, back in the day (I started cellaring in 1995) you could get a great bottle of Cali Cab for less than $30. I really liked many 2003 Bordeaux including Fombrauge, D’aiguile and Les Grands Chenes ( yeah I know how that translates) but I found the 2005 versions undrinkable. In fact it was the 2005 BDX vintage or more precisely the WA scores and notes on these wines that made me realize that my reality was too different from Uncle Bobs to continue my subscription. I had cut him some slack on the Aussie thing and the 2004 Spanish thing and those 2001 and 2002 Cali Cabs, but the 2005 BDX just made me realize that winemakers were playing to the critic. Now I buy mainly Rhones.
All that said, I’ve tried many 2007 CDP which many here have critiqued as too oaky, New World, Aussie or Zin-like and I don’t get that. More fruit driven and extracted than other vintages, but to me its CDP fruit. I’m sitting on my Janasse VVs for a few years, however. I’m a little afraid to try it!

It doesn’t, but recently I noticed that I was drinking more and more unoaked stuff, that was as good or better than the oaked version.

Oak has become the one-size-fits-all answer, a little more balance would do a lot of good in the wine world.

It does seem to be like “catnip” for many wine drinkers, and perhaps to some extent - RMP.

RT

You seriously think Musigny needs oak to taste good?

I like oak and I cannot lie…

I find myself less tolerant of oak than I used to be, although I don’t consider myself an oakophobe. I think many wines end up better with some new oak than without. Pinot, Cab, and Zin seem to handle new oak better than many other varieties. Others, like Grenache and Syrah, I think do better with little or no new oak, though I know many people love oaky Syrahs. But there’s no hard and fast rule for any of this - it all depends largely on what will work well with a given lot of fruit, and that will depend on the vineyard, the vintage, and other factors. The choice of specific coopers with specific wines can have a significant impact too, as can toast levels, length of air-drying, forest, grain, etc.

Having tasted through a load of wines the past two days at Family Winemakers tasting in San Francisco, it illustrated to me again that it’s not always how much oak shows through in a wine but how well integrated it is. Some wines I tasted had noticeable oak but it was still beautifully balanced with fruit, acid, etc., while others - in a number of cases with a smaller percentage of new oak used - were way out of balance, with the oak masking everything else and not very pleasant.

I know some people who would disagree, but I find that some wines that show too much oak when young (to me, anyway) do integrate that oak in time. I’ve had a number of wines that I thought were overly oaky in their youth that came into beautiful balance years later. But of course I’ve had others in which the oak always stuck out like a sore thumb and never came into balance.

Again I find that it’s all about balance - it’s not simply the amount of new oak (or the alcohol percentage) but how well all the components of a wine work together. If the oak, fruit, alcohol, acid, etc. are all in balance and harmonious, you’ve got a good wine - and potential for a great wine - but of course that balance is often not present. And I would agree that too much new oak is a component that too often sticks out and throws off the balance of a wine.

This is one of those topics I love to talk about . . .

I think most of us can agree that we’ve been ‘fooled’ by wines we were convinced had a boatload of new oak only to find out that there was 0% new oak used; and vice versa, there have been many wines that contained 100% new oak that did not lead one to believe this was the case.

The use of new oak certainly can be ‘problematic’ if that’s what stands out the most in what you’re drinking, but let’s not forget that wines are being consumed so much earlier than in the past, and therefore many wines are not being allowed to ‘integrate’ more completely.

With the pendulum swinging back, you’ll now find more winemakers talk about using only ‘neutral oak’ because they don’t want the oak to be ‘overpowering’ . . . . but everyone’s definition of ‘neutral oak’ is different. To some winemakers, anything other than brand new would be considered ‘neutral’ whereas to others, anything over about 2-3 years would be. As with almost all things wine related, there is no black and white answers.

For my wines, I really prefer a combo of 2-3 year old barrels, with some older ones used for some of my Mourvedre and Grenache. I personally like the fruit to shine through, but I’m fortunate to work with vineyards and varieties that allow this to happen. This is not always the case.

Does new oak make a wine taste or smell ‘better’? Depending upon the variety, vintage and site, it certainly can - just go barrel tasting some time and you’ll easily be able to note new vs. older barrels. But as with most things wine, this is purely subjective - one thing I love about wines . . . because there are very very few absolutes.

Cheers.

I’ll be interested in what others have to say about the topic.

Perhaps was a typo and was meant to be, “A Pax on Oak.” –

I think winemakers (myself included) have sometimes misjudged the wine more than misjudged the oak. Take Kevin’s example of 1997 Cabs as an example. A huge crop year – that has, IMHO, shown a hole in the middle when it comes to fruit concentration as the wines have aged. Early in their lives they seemed to have integrated the oak better, when the fruit was fresher, but not so with time. I think a vintage with less crop may have faired better with the oak additions.

Adam Lee
Siduri Wines

It’s all part of a fiendish plot to de-forest France!

Larry is exactly right in that the problem with reds is that many are just drank too young. I know I harp on this far too often, but most robust variety reds are not fully integrated in the first year or so after bottling. A lot of the anti oak crowd would not be so passionate about the issue if they didn’t drink a big cab immediately upon release.

To me the larger problem is with whites like chardonnay that are typically drank young. I’m getting that if a chard is 100% malo, 100% new oak, over 14.2% alcohol, it is a no buy, period. I’m not sure if it’s the 100% new oak or how the new oak interacts with the other two, but, imo, it’s a diaster in most cases.