Winemaking
Winemakers working with Barbera have a variety of ways to deal with the grape's high levels of tannins and acidity. The most common has been through blending with varieties lacking those components and creating a softer and potentially more balanced wine as a result.
In the 1970s, the French enologist Emile Peynaud recommended that Barbera producers use small oak barrels for fermentation and maturation in order to add subtle oak spice flavors and limited levels of oxygenation to soften the wine. The added oxygen would also limit the reductive quality of Barbera and limited the occurrence of off-odors of hydrogen sulfide that would occur in some examples. The polysaccharides picked up from the oak, was found to increase the richness of Barbera. At the time, his recommendation met some resistance from the tradition minded Barbera producers but the success of the "Super Tuscans" which introduced new oak barrel treatment to Sangiovese caused many producers to reconsider. In addition to the subtle oxygenation and spice notes, oak imparts to the wine ligneous wood tannins which give structure to the wine without adding as much astringent bite as the tannins derived from the phenolic compounds of the grape. This, coupled with reduced maceration time contributed to the production of softer wines. Lower yields and harvesting riper grapes with more fruit and sugar has been found to be a better balance for Barbera's high acidity.
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