Tannin is a naturally occurring polyphenol found in plants, seeds, bark, wood, leaves, and fruit skins.

For example if you bite in the seeds of a grape your mouth will get dry and it wil taste bitter. This feeling in the mouth are called tannins. If you sip on a wine and your mouth will get dry and your lips stick to your teeth you know the level of tannins are high in the wine.

This can be two factors.

1. The grapes used in the wine.
2. The wood maturation in oak.

What are grape tannins?

Grape tannin comes from the skins, seeds, and stems of a wine grape. For this reason, red wines tend to have higher tannins than white wines because the extended contact of the grapes skins with the juice give the tannins time to dissolve in the alcohol and water in the wine.

Some types of wine have higher tannins than others. 

A example of high tannins wines are:

• Tempranillo
• Cabernet Sauvignon
• Montepulciano
• Sangiovese
• Syrah
• Nebbiolo
• Tannat

Lower tannin wine:

• Pinot Noir
• Gamay
• Carménère
• Grenache

What are wood tannins?

Wood tannins dissolve into the wine through contact. Most commonly this happens when wine is stored in wooden barrels. Oak barrels are the most popular choice because of the flavors they add to wine such as vanilla, caramel, coconut, smoke.

Oak chips and oak staves are growing in popularity because they are more affordable. These oak chips or oak staves will be put in the oak barrel with the wine.

You can differently taste the difference between aging in oak barrels and using oak chips and oak staves.

What do tannins do in wine?

If there are a lot of tannins in wine its can mean a couple of things, its a young wine, the grape used possess a lot of tannins, tannin power was used during fermentation. It basically refers to the dryness, bitterness, and astringency of a wine. Tannins are largely responsible for giving red wines a defined structure or body.

So if you got a wine with lots of tannins you can do a couple of things to lower the tannins in your wine.

• Let your wine age more so the tannins wil settle in the bottle
• Decant your wine before consuming. this will give the wine more oxygen and it will soften the tannins and your wine.
• Combine your high tannin wine with a good dinner with lots of meat.

So the positive thing about high tannins in your wine is that its got a good potential for aging and its got a good body and goes well with a lot of meat.

Next time you feel your mouth go dry and you notice you got a high tannin wine think about this blog and the tips and tricks we gave you.

Let us know what you prefer in the comments below, high tannin wines or low tannin wines.