I finally transferred the 2019 Cab up to the bottling rack and added 30ppm SO2. The carboy has been held separate the entire time as an unoaked version, and it's interesting to see and taste the difference. This unoaked version has more lees impact and comes across with flavor and aromatics as a slightly younger wine, very nice but different. There's no mystery with the tank aged oaked version, darker and greater richness with more sweet oak vanilla in the taste and nose. Hopefully we'll bottle this in the next couple of weeks.
I have to extend a thanks to
@cmason1957 for the reminder (in a different post) about potential TCA in the wine making area.
A couple of days ago while preparing for the transfer, I was organizing the area and cleaning the demijohns and smelled something like TCA on the exterior of the glass, the demijohn basket also smelled like TCA, however this isn't the first time as I previously removed the shredded paper padding from between the glass and basket thinking that was the source. There were no odors inside the demijohn, only on the exterior which was easy to wash off, I also washed the baskets, but given I was going to be handling wine I felt it was best to remove them from the area. The plywood board I have on the rack had a stain from a previous wine spill that occurred a couple of years ago, at the time I sprayed sulfite solution and wiped with paper towels, but the wood is unfinished so the stain remained. I found this stain was also releasing a TCA like odor only noticeable if you were 12 inches away, so I deep cleaned the board with oxyclean followed by sulfite solution and baked dry in the sun, and this has reduced the odor to non detectable with my nose. I've never used any chlorinated cleaning products, but my tap water is chlorinated so I suspect that's a contributing factor. In my case, all internal surfaces of tanks and carboys have always been rinsed with chlorine free RO water, but obviously the years of wine spills and splatters on raw surfaces coupled with tap water is of greater concern.
The intent here was just to provide an additional caution about the potential for TCA in the winery, especially to those that have difficult to clean unsealed surfaces, including floors, walls, and any wood and cardboard etc. I guess I'll have to paint the concrete. Thanks again to
@cmason1957 for the timely reminder.
Now on a happier note, some photos.
![[Upgraded] 9Pcs Tree Root Growing Box with Drain Holes, Half Transparent Plant Rooting Propagation Ball & Metal Core Twist Ties, for Fast Propagation Plants (Size M)](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/514MWQxtWOL._SL500_.jpg)
