Influence of Wood Heat Treatment Temperature and Maceration Time on Vanillin, Syringaldehyde, and Gallie Acid Contents in Oak Wood and Wine Spirit Mixtures

Abstract

Oak wood plays a very important role in spirit aging. A study using HPLC was, therefore, carrled our on the influence of the temperature of wood trealment on phenolic compounds of spirits in conctact with wood. lt was found that hight temperatures favor lignin decaed, thus increasing benzoic aldehyde contents. Study of the influence of maceration time showed that periods of more than24 hours do not cause significant changes in the phenolic derivative contents of spirits