Barrel left unattended 2.5yrs

[Ajmassa]

Hey everyone. Been a while. I miss the hell out of this place. Life’s been a rollercoaster and I’m lookin forward to the process of getting myself all set up and makin some wine again.

Anyway I’m almost on the other side of a very long frustrating stressful divorce (women. Ppffsh. Amirite?). and ive been temporarily relocating all my gear. It’s been so long I forgot what I had goin. Everything’s been sitting unattended. No so2 additions. Too much headspace etc. I expected all to be drain worthy. Especially the barrels since the angels never stop taking their cut

Well the demijohn? Dead
Carboys? Dead
Little barrel? Dead
30L barrel? (Which actually had some of better quality wine inside) NOT DEAD?

I didn’t have time to taste it yet. Just gave everythint the old sniff and eye test. But I’d be lying if I just said “not dead” Sonofabitch smelled incredible. It looked incredible. Maybe I’m overly optimistic idk. We’ll see. I don’t even remember what’s it in it tbh. Either Malbec or cab. From 2020. Need to See if my notebook survived the war. Everything’s scattered in various garages right now. I’ll be getting more today. And I’ll be goddamned if I leave that commercial sink. That baby is comin w me!

I haven’t been able to enjoy this hobby for entirely way too long. So eager to get myself organized, set up, making some wine and shitposting on the forum again.
I miss it so much. The wine AND the forum. It goes hand in hand for me. It kept me centered. I am unapologetically a dork about it. Here’s to a new chapter. Saluté

 

[winemaker81]

Welcome back!

 

[Rice_Guy]

Good luck on the oxidation, yeah life gets in the way sometime.

 

[ChuckD]

Welcome back! I hope you can salvage that 30L barrel. A little something to hold you until you new wines are ready.

 

[sour_grapes]

Welcome back, Andrew! Glad to have AJ back.

Can you please fax me one of those Amoroso's rolls?

 

[ibglowin]

Welcome back and glad your doing OK!

 

[Ajmassa]

Good luck on the oxidation, yeah life gets in the way sometime.

Eh. I already wrote everything off long ago. So anything salvaged at all would be a W. I’m gonna try to find some time over the weekend to do a proper test.

Welcome back! I hope you can salvage that 30L barrel. A little something to hold you until you new wines are ready.

I can’t lie. The thought of having something active to tend to gets the juices flowing lol. I feel like an addict slipping into relapse right now! No actual expectations tho.

Welcome back, Andrew! Glad to have AJ back.

Can you please fax me one of those Amoroso's rolls?

I was”sour grapes” myself for a long while there I must admit. Kinda avoided the forum. It just made me resentful since I was forced to be an outsider looking in. But whatever. Something as stupid as this convo right now is jolting the winemaking bug right back into my veins. I can’t wait to overdose on grapes, on a wine room build, stupid *** experiments, soending tons of money. Ya know, the usual.

And what’s a fair trade? Amaroso for an Amarone? (I actually already had the pleasure of a Paul Amarone) Is that Wisconsin cheese all it’s cracked up to be? Im not a cheese guy….but I could be?

And thnx for the welcome. Im waaaay overdue

Welcome back and glad your doing OK!

Well tbh I’m a hot mess right now. But appreciate the optimism lol. Tho in all seriousness I’m finally past all the chaos. So despite being a hot mess I still feel like a million bucks. It’s all potential from here.

To quote Cat Stevens, “now I’ve got to find me a honey, to help me spend my money”

 

[Ajmassa]

The crusher destemmer that was a part of endless classic WMT threads from @JohnT sadly did not survive. When I “left” I had the damn thing in a million pieces doing a full refurbish. But it was so old and beat up I was already contemplating just buying a new one anyway. the refurbish ended up being way more labor intensive than I anticipated. I was grinding off all the paint (taking forever) and was going to powdercoat myself. And was in the process of assembling an oven with an extension. Kinda nuts I know. (Tho I just wanted an excuse to powder coat and buy a home setup). Came down to time. She was ready to croak at any moment tho. RIP.
I was more concerned about the stand/shoot I made anyway.

I bought a SS shoot/stand that I absolutely despised. Was so wobbly. Hopper was so high. Hated everything about it. So I gypsy rigged it into a sturdy, lower mobile unit. Thats lookin good and begging for a new C/T to rest on top.

 

[David Violante]

Welcome back AJ!!! Good to have you back on here!

 

[CDrew]

Wow. A blast from the past. Glad you made it back. You can always make more wine so don’t sweat it. Your best wine is ahead of you. Plus, you’ll have a full forum of enablers.

 

[wineview]

Hey everyone. Been a while. I miss the hell out of this place. Life’s been a rollercoaster and I’m lookin forward to the process of getting myself all set up and makin some wine again.

Anyway I’m almost on the other side of a very long frustrating stressful divorce (women. Ppffsh. Amirite?). and ive been temporarily relocating all my gear. It’s been so long I forgot what I had goin. Everything’s been sitting unattended. No so2 additions. Too much headspace etc. I expected all to be drain worthy. Especially the barrels since the angels never stop taking their cut

Well the demijohn? Dead
Carboys? Dead
Little barrel? Dead
30L barrel? (Which actually had some of better quality wine inside) NOT DEAD?View attachment 107294

I didn’t have time to taste it yet. Just gave everythint the old sniff and eye test. But I’d be lying if I just said “not dead” Sonofabitch smelled incredible. It looked incredible. Maybe I’m overly optimistic idk. We’ll see. I don’t even remember what’s it in it tbh. Either Malbec or cab. From 2020. Need to See if my notebook survived the war. Everything’s scattered in various garages right now. I’ll be getting more today. And I’ll be goddamned if I leave that commercial sink. That baby is comin w me!

I haven’t been able to enjoy this hobby for entirely way too long. So eager to get myself organized, set up, making some wine and shitposting on the forum again.
I miss it so much. The wine AND the forum. It goes hand in hand for me. It kept me centered. I am unapologetically a dork about it. Here’s to a new chapter. Saluté

I wondered what happened to Jersey Fresh.

 

[Ajmassa]

I wondered what happened to Jersey Fresh.

And you’ll continue to wonder! I can’t in good conscience put that on the internet!

Welcome back AJ!!! Good to have you back on here!

Thanks bud. It’s feels good. Early on Id get goofed on for my “fake internet wine friends”. For me winemaking my entire life was always centered around family. Tho it was limited. Crush day. Press day. Bottle day. Having WMT is a game changer. at this point, for me, there is no winemaking without this forum.

And obviously as more time passed with my “fake internet wine friends” they became real life friends. And even some who arenot local we became USPS/FedEx friends.

Wow. A blast from the past. Glad you made it back. You can always make more wine so don’t sweat it. Your best wine is ahead of you. Plus, you’ll have a full forum of enablers.

Ayo! I know I’ll be in NorCal trip at some point in the next couple years. And when I do get over there, aside from the redwoods, the vineyards, and hopefully a bigfoot tour-(I’m a total bigfoot nerd) you know damn well we are gonna have ourselves a night!

 

[sour_grapes]

And obviously as more time passed with my “fake internet wine friends” they became real life friends. And even some who arenot local we became USPS/FedEx friends.

And at least two of them even went to the same high school as you!

 

[David Engel]

Sorry to hear of your family woes, been there done that, you will recover. Cant wait to here about your taste test.

 

[MiBor]

Welcome back @Ajmassa!

Time heals all wounds.

Please let us know how the contents of the bigger barrel taste, when you get to it. I've heard of a similar situation with a forgotten 15 gallon barrel that sat hidden for 3 years and the wine inside was outstanding when the owner found it.

 

[mainshipfred]

Hey AJ, hope the worst is behind you and you will be able to move on. I thought there was something going on and feel like a bad internet friend for not calling or texting you.

 

[Jovimaple]

Welcome back!

 

[JohnT]

So sorry to hear about the crusher/destemmer. Hopefully, you got your money's worth out of it.