2023 White Wines - finally!

[crushday]

This season I'll be journaling my winemaking experience for three white varieties from Red Mountain AVA in Washington state. On Friday afternoon, October 6th, I'll be headed out. I work until noon on Friday this week. This should get me to the vineyard approximately 3:30pm. I'll be back on the road by 4:15pm and home by dark. Because it will be 46 degrees overnight, I won't have to crush in the dark, which I've done in the past. The next morning, I'll crush.

This year, I'm getting 500 pounds of Viognier and 250 pounds each of Marsanne and Roussanne. From these grapes I'll be making two white wines and pitching Fresco yeast:

1. 100% Viognier (bacteria used will be Enoferm Beta) - I'm hoping for 20 gallons of finished wine 100% and 10 gallons dedicated to the blend below.
2. A blend of Marsanne, Roussanne and Voignier that I'll name and label TreBella at bottling. This should produce 35-40 gallons of finished wine.

The Saturday morning plan right now:

1. Crush the Viognier (current Brix is 24) into a food grade plastic drum and let it macerate overnight, add Kmeta to 25ppm (current pH is 3.35)
2. Crush the Marsanne (current Brix 24.3) and Roussanne (current Brix is 24.1) into a food grade plastic drum and let it macerate overnight, add Kmeta to 25ppm (current pH is 3.37)

The Sunday morning plan right now:

1. Press the Viognier lightly to no more than 1 bar (hydraulic press)
2. Press the Marsanne and Roussanne lightly to no more than 1 bar (hydraulic press)

I'll post pictures and commentary throughout.

 

[CDrew]

Following. Looking forward to progress.

 

[ibglowin]

What couldn't find any better fruit? LOL

Should make for a nice food friendly wine!

 

[CDrew]

Your grapes sound ideal/perfect! That's an ambitious project. I used Fresco for a Riesling that turned out great, so I think you will be pleased.

Any red wine this year?

 

[BarrelMonkey]

Sounds great, good luck! I think I commented in another thread that I did't think a home scale bladder press would be up to the job of pressing whole clusters. But at least one person has reported success (see here). Might be worth a try - though if you want to macerate overnight it might be a moot point.

 

[crushday]

Update:

Ready to roll…tomorrow. I plan to take Interstate 5 and State Highway 18 to Interstate 90. I’ll intersect Interstate 82 past Ellensburg and onto Benton City to the vineyard (3.5 hours unobstructed driving).

My way home will be taking State Highway 12 over White Pass to Interstate 5. I’m trading 30 extra miles for NO TRAFFIC, which for sure will be brutal the closer I drive to the Seattle Metroplex.

A couple amendments:

1. Upping my Viognier to 750 pounds from 500. The Marsanne and Roussanne stay the same.
2. After crush (Saturday), on Sunday I'll press the juice off the skins.
3. On Monday I’ll pump the juice to the fermenters and pitch the yeast at 60 degrees. I’ll need to warm it a bit.

I’m planning on keeping the ferment low and slow, and expect it to take 5-6 weeks as to maintain aromatics and varietal distinctions.

 

[sour_grapes]

Good luck, George!

 

[Snafflebit]

Nice. Two macrobins of grapes, better take the curves slowly.

I am very interested to know how the maceration changes the wine.

 

[ibglowin]

Sounds like a good plan and looks like you'll have great weather through the weekend to work on crushing/pressing without any threat of rain!

 

[crushday]

Update:

Got home at 8pm - uneventful drive. Crush tomorrow!

A few pics from the day…

 

[crushday]

Update:

I started setting up at 8am. Temp was 48 degrees outside. At 8:30am, I turned on the crusher/destemmer. I turned it off at 9:15am. We were done cleaning up at 10am.

Here's the particulars:

Viognier: 780 pounds, Brix 24.3, pH 3.34
Marsanne: 280 pounds, Brix 24.1, pH 3.41
Roussanne: 360 pounds, Brix 24.4, pH 3.43

In talking to the owner of the vineyard and telling him my plan, I mentioned that I was macerating overnight from the crush. He grimaced. I asked him about the reaction. He told me the Marsanne oxidizes easily. Since I have friends from Montana coming over this afternoon and staying for dinner, I cannot change my plans, unless I want to bear the wrath of Mrs. Crushday... No man wants that from their Mrs. So, I'll keep my plan.

To mitigate the affects of O2, I sulfited to 50ppm (instead of previous 25ppm) and crushed the Marsanne first so it's at the bottom of the fermentor. Incidentally, in preparation for this strategy, I loaded the Marsanne last so it would be on top of the bin. I'll begin pressing at first light Sunday morning.

Here's a few pics:

 

[Rice_Guy]

Great photos, especially your chute from the truck to crusher!

The most obvious defect from oxidation is browning. My look as a seven gallon wine maker is that I can’t prevent it so just accept it.
Yeah there is some loss of aromatics but civilians usually don’t name the issue. Even in the vinters club folks either think it is as good as theirs or are polite and won’t say anything. Off topic but have you tried thiol cleaving yeast to increase the aromatics? Last month I added Phantasm / TR313 to a white was flabbergasted at how aromatic the ferment was and the disappointed at .996 it tasted “normal”.

 

[crushday]

Off topic but have you tried thiol cleaving yeast to increase the aromatics?

No I haven’t, nor have I even heard of it. I’ll check it out, thanks!

 

[ibglowin]

Nice looking setup George!

 

[crushday]

Update:

I pressed the juice off the grape matter this morning. A couple key learnings:

1. Pressing at 1 bar left a bunch of juice in the must
2. Pressing at 2 bar and 3 bar produced the same results. Even a 3 bar, there was undamaged whole grapes from the crush. The last picture was taken after pressing at 3 bars.

I figure I gave up 6 gallons of wine from each tank. I'm ascertaining this from the weight of the basket after the press.

The juice volume for the Marsanne/Roussanne was right at 45 gallons.
The juice volume for the Viognier was 50 gallons.

A few pics:

 

[winemaker81]

Use rice hulls. It makes a tremendous difference

 

[CDrew]

Update:

I pressed the juice off the grape matter this morning. A couple key learnings:

1. Pressing at 1 bar left a bunch of juice in the must
2. Pressing at 2 bar and 3 bar produced the same results. Even a 3 bar, there was undamaged whole grapes from the crush. The last picture was taken after pressing at 3 bars.

I figure I gave up 6 gallons of wine from each tank. I'm ascertaining this from the weight of the basket after the press.

The juice volume for the Marsanne/Roussanne was right at 45 gallons.
The juice volume for the Viognier was 50 gallons.

I noticed this as well when pressing my Rose. I started out with over 100 pounds of grenache and ended up with less than 5 gallons of new wine. So going forward I'll overestimate the amount I need.

I'd have to play around with setting the crushing rollers closer together, or just accept that there's more waste.

 

[BarrelMonkey]

Use rice hulls. It makes a tremendous difference

I tried that for the first time yesterday (Syrah). Pressed wine tasted like grass and hamster cage so I abandoned it after the first press load. Hopefully the other three pressings (not tomention the free run) will dilute out the grassy flavor.

But in general I think you just have to expect that white must is always going to be wetter than the equivalent red must (which of course has undergone fermentation before pressing)...

 

[winemaker81]

I tried that for the first time yesterday (Syrah). Pressed wine tasted like grass and hamster cage so I abandoned it after the first press load.

I had no flavoring from rice hulls, nor (to my understanding) should we. All my 2022 pressings were fine immediately afterward, and are fine now (some bottled over the summer, the remainder in November).

 

[crushday]

Update: I just finished pumping clean juice to four 100L Speidels. I need room for foam as Fresco yeast indicates "Foam Production".

Temperature is 63 degrees average on each of the four tanks so I pitched the yeast tonight. Last time I used this yeast I had activity in the airlock overnight. I'm hoping that a quick layer of CO2 begins to protect the wine from oxidation.

Oh, and here's a picture of my new pump. @Busabill nicknamed her, Shelby...

This thing really moves the wine at 15 gallons a minute (full speed).