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| Barrels Stacked in a Aging Bodega |
Jordan
Bushell from Hennessy speaks about the meticulously planned aging process of
Cognac. "The first flavor
concentration is through distillation. The second concentration is through the
angel's share". Hennessy uses
two types of aging warehouses to manipulate brandy in different ways. The
company's dry cellars have an annual angel's share 4% on new barrels, while the
angel's share in its humid cellars can be as little as 0.5%. The humid cellars,
therefore, are where the very old Cognacs are kept, maturing at a slow rate
without too much of the precious liquid evaporating away.
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| Classic Aging Bodega |
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| Filling the Barrels |
Hennessy also groups
its barrels into categories depending on how long they've held maturing brandy
and how much impact they'll have on spirits aging in them. Barrels used for up to one year are in
Category A, while Category E indicates barrels that have already been in use
for 20 to 35 years. Different marques of Cognac will age through different
combinations of barrel categories and placement in different cellars.
Furthermore, Hennessy does not simply age a VSOP Cognac a little longer to get
the XO marque; it ages the spirit in a different combination of barrels and
cellars for each blend.
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| Good Labeling of the Barrels |
Overall, these
three articles give you an idea of how complicated the chemistry of aging
spirits can be, how advanced the scientific understanding of it is, and how
much data can contribute to the decision-making in spirits production. But at
the end of the day, someone with a trained palate rather than someone trained
in chemistry will make the final decision on which products make it to market.
Like I said at the end of yesterday’s edition, people will be buying these
spirits, people looking for sensory experiences and not real interested in
scientific data.
