As a Chicago based manufacturer of stainless steel wine barrels, we are always excited to see other Chicago companies bringing innovations to the world of wine and spirits. The latest innovation brings oak aging behind the bar or at home, and it just got a whole lot quicker. Joel Paglione of Chicago, has created Oak Bottle, a wooden vessel with a charred interior that lets you age wine, beer and spirits in two to 48 hours. It’s so efficient that within two hours, you’ve added oak flavor to the wine and it hasn’t over-oxidated and the wine hasn’t gone flat yet. It makes it taste as if it’s been aged for years in an oak barrel. Many winemakers believe that what makes a truly great wine great is more a matter of what occurs in the vineyard than what happens inside the winery or distillery. We agree, the winemaker or distiller can only highlight flavors and aromas that already exist, not invent flavor. That is what the art of oaking is all about. For centuries, winemakers and distillers have used oak to bring out the best in wine and spirits. The biggest problem aside from the cost of oak barrels is the amount of time it takes for the oaking process to work. This is where the Oak Bottle comes in. Using a simple volume to surface area equation it’s easy to understand how a vessel with more surface area touching less volume can infuse the wine or spirit quicker. The goal of the Oak Bottle is to make the oak infusion process simple, fast, and cost effective so that just about anyone can become a winemaster from the comfort of their own home. The traditional use of 59 gallon oak barrels for wine making was impractical and expensive. In the past only the best winemakers had access to cooperages who made the best oak barrels. Oak Bottle is currently running a Kick Starter campaign to ramp up manufacturing. For more details or to purchase an Oak Bottle, visit their website: http://oakbottle.com/

With Skolnik’s headquarters stainless steel wine drum manufacturing located Chicago, we are always excited to hear about new and exciting things coming from the wine industry in our own region. As recently reported in Wines and Vines, a Minnesota grower has developed new varieties of cold climate grapes. It is common knowledge that it gets cold—very cold—in Minnesota every year, and not just during winters with unusual polar vortexes. Yet wild grapes such as Vitis riparia survive temperatures that drop to -30° F and lower without suffering from dead buds and split trunks. The challenge to growers has been to breed new varieties with resistance to extreme cold as well as the ability to produce grapes that can be made into high-quality wines. Tom Plocher, a grape breeder living northeast of Minnesota’s Twin Cities recently named two red varieties, Crimson Pearl and Verona. While both are cold hardy and have excellent wine potential, they have different attributes in the vineyard and the winery. The benchmark variety for the two grapes is Petite Pearl, a sister grape of Crimson Pearl, which Plocher named in 2009. Petite Pearl and Crimson Pearl were the results of crosses in 1996 between MN 1094 and ES 4-7-26. MN 1094 is a University of Minnesota hybrid with a genetic background of vinifera, riparia and other species. Winter temperatures in 1993 and 1996 dropped to -40° F, and most hybrid grapevines died, except for MN 1094. ES 4-7-26 is a cross Elmer Swenson selected from seedlings of his variety called St. Croix. Contact Skolnik if you wish to learn more about our stainless steel wine barrels.