Zinfandel grapes -> wine! A new member's introduction via a 75L of red deliciousness.

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tjmeyer said:
True! But there are lots of kinds of sour. I was referring to the tell-tale acetic acid bitter/sour that doesn't really age out like strong malic or tartaric acids do. 👊

Clarified on the data post, thx!
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Tartaric is not that bad, high malic can be really rough and abrasive. It’s easy to tell if a malolactic fermentation has finished by taste.

I have had white wines made from grapes that were probably picked a bit early and since they don’t go through malo they can be super sour sometimes
 
Couldn't help myself 😂 so I pulled a wine thief worth out to taste it. It has already darkened, but still very bright red. Currently it is high tannin, low acid, high alcohol, and sweet (sweet in a dry way, fermentation is totally complete). It has notes of sweet currant, something flowery almost like a gin, and can't smell anything but alcohol for now. Very impressed with how this turned out, I think I'm going to move RP-15, Assmanshausens, and Bm4x4 into regular you rotation in the winery for reds.
 

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tjmeyer said:
Couldn't help myself 😂 so I pulled wine thief worth out to taste it. It has already darkened, but still very bright red. Currently it is high tannin, low acid, high alcohol, and sweet (sweet in a dry way, fermentation is totally complete). It has notes of sweet currant, something flowery almost like a gin, and can't smell anything but alcohol for now. Very impressed with how this turned out, I think I'm going to move RP-15, Assmanshausens, and Bm4x4 into regular you rotation in the winery for reds.
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That’s Zinfandel for you, particularly that sweet but dry note that usually shows up in my Zinfandel fermentations.

The alcohol will calm down eventually. And as I said RP-15 is the go to yeast for quality Zinfandel. I also like it for Syrah and for Cabernet. BM4x4 tends to produce more red cherries and floral more of what you find in a well made barbera as it is an Italian yeast.
 
tjmeyer said:
Data 3/19/24
Temperature
RP-15:
74.2°F and 68°F ambient. (23.4°/20°C)
BM 4x4:
75.3°F and 68°F ambient. (24.1°/20°C)


Brix
RP-15:
Measured at ~16°Brix.
View attachment 111152

BM 4x4:
Measured at slightly higher than 16° so I'm going to estimate 16.5°Brix.
View attachment 111150

SG
As fermentation continues, Brix can be inaccurate, so I find occasional SG readings helpful even through they're a lot more effort.
RP-15:
Significantly more foamy, so was hard to read. Image was taken after about 5 minutes of settling. With the foam still in the way, I'm going to estimate 1.052.

View attachment 111161

BM 4x4:
Foam settled right away, has a more creamy texture. Also going to take that read to be 1.052.
View attachment 111160

Additions
I added 8g of FermFed to the RP-15 and 12g of Fermaid K to the BM 4X4 mix. Used a simple kitchen food scale, a small bowl, and a protein shaker bottle. Added just enough well water to allow the power to rehydrate (doesn't take much at all) and shake to break up clumps. The following are the images of the process in order:
View attachment 111154View attachment 111155View attachment 111156

Look, Feel, and Taste
View attachment 111153
View attachment 111151

Looks are very healthy across both. No negative comments or visible problems.

Feel is vastly different. The BM 4X4 forms incredibly dense, intense foam with bubbles so tiny you can't really see them individually. It's so dense and thick that I've confused it with the surface of the wine more than once, but it is just foam, not a solid forming. I've seen similar foam on great wines before, so I'm not at all worried. It is in stark contrast to the more common loose and aggressive bubbles of the RP-15. It forms large bubbles and is loud when agitated.

Taste is also very different already--neither of them taste like wine yet, however. The RP-15 has a pleasant woody tang. The BM 4X4 has a surprisingly long aftertaste that isn't present in the RP-15. I don't detect any of off flavors or smells in either.
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this is a helpful post to winemakers. Well done!
 
tjmeyer said:
Perhaps this is where that gin-like quality is coming from. It's not unpleasant and adds a complexity I didn't expect.
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I did a split fermentation one year with the same syrah must in 3 containers totally different wine in each fermentation used D-21,BM45 which is the main strain in 4x4 and RP-15 and each was wicked different. I liked the D-21 the most had darker fruits, a richer rounder body more mellow tannins. BM45 was like cherry cola aggressive tart acidity mild tannins, notes of oregano and thyme was very different almost polar opposite. RP-15 produced brighter dark fruit notes, a fuller body, smooth but noticeable tannins and a flinty minerality.

I like splitting up musts and doing trials if I can to see how the wines differ with different yeasts.
 
I continue to be impressed with this wine. Just took a sample and it was crystal clear! So I took a sample from a lower sample valve--also crystal clear! Welp, I don't see a reason to not bottle at this point. Since this isn't going in to the barrel, and it tastes plenty oaky to me from the past 3 months on a medium+ toast, I'm going to go ahead and bottle today and get them away from oxygen as much as possible.

Data 5/10/2024
This 100% Zinfandel is tasting great! It still needs some time and aging, but it appears to have clarified on its own very nicely. This will certainly be a wine that needs to allowed to breath before enjoying! I think this will be ready to drink by Christmas.

Edit: this is not a finished wine, yet! It is bottled but needs significant aging and more settling of fine particulates. I don't think I made that clear enough. These bottles are intended for education purposes and wine makers, not a consumer expecting a finished wine. Please don't sample until 2025 unless you want to taste what an immature wine should taste like, which is perfectly valid too.

Bottling
Added 1g / gallon Sodium Metabisulfite. Yes, Sodium. I tested a touch of salt and it tasted great!
Mixed well.
Used 57x 750mL bottles with slightly less than 1 gallon extra that I kept to the side.

Shipping
If you would like a bottle of this forum experiment, please let me know! Unfortunately shipping prices have gone through the roof, and I really can't afford to ship these for free. I'll price each shipment individually, but be ready for 1 or 2 bottles to be upwards $30 in shipping--yes, it's outrageous, but I don't set the prices, UPS and FedEx do.
Please send me your address or UPS Pickup location and I will reply with a custom quote. DO NOT post your address publicly.

Thank you all that participated or enjoyed reading! I really had a blast doing this. Maybe in future, if there's interest, WMT can host a community wine making series again! I think scheduling zoom meetings (or YouTube or Discord or something) for each step could be really informative for live questions and such. Post here if there's interest in that sort of thing and what you might like to see next time.
 

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tjmeyer said:
I continue to be impressed with this wine. Just took a sample and it was crystal clear! So I took a sample from a lower sample valve--also crystal clear! Welp, I don't see a reason to not bottle at this point. Since this isn't going in to the barrel, and it tastes plenty oaky to me from the past 3 months on a medium+ toast, I'm going to go ahead and bottle today and get them away from oxygen as much as possible.

Data 5/10/2024
This 100% Zinfandel is tasting great! It still needs some time and aging, but it appears to have clarified on its own very nicely. This will certainly be a wine that needs to allowed to breath before enjoying! I think this will be ready to drink by Christmas.

Bottling
Added 1g / gallon Sodium Metabisulfite. Yes, Sodium. I tested a touch of salt and it tasted great!
Mixed well.
Used 57x 750mL bottles with slightly less than 1 gallon extra that I kept to the side.

Shipping
If you would like a bottle of this forum experiment, please let me know! Unfortunately shipping prices have gone through the roof, and I really can't afford to ship these for free. I'll price each shipment individually, but be ready for 1 or 2 bottles to be upwards $30 in shipping--yes, it's outrageous, but I don't set the prices, UPS and FedEx do.
Please send me your address or UPS Pickup location and I will reply with a custom quote. DO NOT post your address publicly.
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Glad the wine turned out although yikes at sodium metabisulfite I always use potassium metabisulfite just because sodium can negatively impact wines but in your case you tested it but generally speaking I recommend people do not use sodium metabisulfite.

Also dang that is expensive shipping, I don’t pay anywhere near that with FedEx for shipping wine. We could ship an entire case for around that from our winery.
 
tjmeyer said:
What are you paying? Legally compliant shipping (signature on delivery, using an alcohol shipper account) on FedEx is giving me around $27-30.
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It does vary depending on where it’s going, but we even deliver some of the wine locally ourselves. Saves on costs I would have to dig into shipping costs and get back to you.
 
@tjmeyer, I'm surprised you bottled this quickly.

I looked into shipping again. USPS doesn't ship alcohol. UPS only ships commercially. FedEx supposedly ships only commercially.

Something to consider is if the receiving state is reciprocal, e.g., it may be legal for you to ship but it may not be legal for the receiver to get the package.
 
winemaker81 said:
@tjmeyer, I'm surprised you bottled this quickly.

I looked into shipping again. USPS doesn't ship alcohol. UPS only ships commercially. FedEx supposedly ships only commercially.

Something to consider is if the receiving state is reciprocal, e.g., it may be legal for you to ship but it may not be legal for the receiver to get the package.
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Correct! UPS is typically the cheapest and easiest and does commercial shipping for sold and non-sale wine. All wine shipments come with stipulations like paying for 21+ signature fees.

Non sale wine can be shipped to any US state address but is intended for things like education, competitions, Iab samples etc (this applies to WMT) but you need to have a federally recognized winery to do it, aka a TTB license.

For sale wine shipping is highly annoying and requires a state license for each and every state you're shipping to and from, with each receiving state having different direct to consumer (D2C) laws.

I bottled it, but it isn't done!! This wine is not for sale and not intended for consumers, but for wine Makers. The best way I could think of to secure the wine for further learning without bulk aging was to just bottle it now. It still needs to settle out finer particulates, age, and oxygenate some. It is not a done wine by any stretch, but it is safely on it's way and secured behind good corks with very little head room 👍. At this point in the process I see no reason why wine makers shouldn't play with it as 98% of the eventual flavor profile is already determined. It's just safer in bottle.

I would be interested to try fining a bottle, then recorking it to see the difference in a year. I might do that.
 
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tjmeyer said:
Non sale wine can be shipped to any US state address but is intended for things like education, competitions, Iab samples etc (this applies to WMT) but you need to have a federally recognized winery to do it, aka a TTB license.
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Interesting.

tjmeyer said:
I would be interested to try fining a bottle, then recorking it to see the difference in a year. I might do that.
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What would you fine it with?
 
tjmeyer said:
Just a test to see how each turns out could be interesting. One with Kieselsol/chitosan, one with isinglass, one with a fining filter. I have suspicions about filtering, but I'm unsure how the Kieselsol one would turn out.
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I conducted a test last year, using K&C on two different wines. The result was that the use of K&C reduced nose and introduced a slight bitterness.

I'll use bentonite on whites and fruit wines, but not on reds, as it strips color. Generally I use a lower dose than indicated.

Filtering? I did that many moons ago, but decided it wasn't worth it. In recent years I barrel age reds for a year, then bottle.
 

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