Wine Peeps is an independent wine blog dedicated to helping you get the most bang for your buck in wine. We do this through blind tastings of wine from around the world and calculations of 
Wine Word of the Week: Barrel aging
By Kori ~ February 19th, 2009.
This week’s Wine Word of the Week is barrel aging.
Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine:
Barrel maturation [the term used in this book for aging a wine in a barrel] is the wine-making operation of storing a fermented wine in wooden barrels to create ideal conditions for the components of the wine to evolve and so that the wood imparts some oak flavor. This is an increasingly common practice for superior-quality still wines of all colors and styles, providing them, as it does, with the ideal preparation for bottle aging.
Layman’s terms from Kori:
Barrel aging is the process of letting wines mature in wood barrels. During this process, the characteristics of the barrel are imparted into the wine and affect the flavor and balance of the wine.
Filed under: Wine Word of the Week
