Cold Stabilization

[peterCooper]

Ethanol melts at –114.1°C, boils at 78.5°C, and has a density of 0.789 g/mL at 20°C. ( I looked that up)

When you freeze wine it's the water that freezes first leaving the alcohol and flavor behind. There as a number of good posts on this site about Applejack that use a process of frezzing and skimming to remove water and increase the ABV to a respectable 30%+

Edited by: masta

 

[Waldo]

Where dem pictures at Joan???

 

[Joanie]

Hehehe Untaken! =)

 

[Waldo]

From the heart and through the the fingers, pictures are painted Joan...Now...where are your pictures

 

[Joanie]

Ok... Just to keep you happy, Waldo!

The necklace is hanging on the backside of this Cayuga. That SuperKleer works fast! I used it yesterday!

I went a little crazy today and racked, stabilized, and fined the Diamond (next to the Cayuga) and the Vignoles. It's amazing the difference a half hour or so makes!

The last is the stuff that was stuck to the bottom of the two carboys. I needed my spoon handle to break it up! It's hard to see but it's "crystally" and crunchy!

 

[Wade E]

Is that what sediment looks like after being cold stabilized.

 

[NorthernWinos]

The last is the stuff that was stuck to the bottom of the two carboys.  I needed my spoon handle to break it up! It's hard to see but it's "crystally" and crunchy!

Joan....I think you sure got some 'Wine Diamonds' there....Like you said it's a crystal that forms from the Tartaric Acid in the wines...aka...Cream of Tarter...guess we are not to be alarmed.

I recently made up two batches of wine using my own wine grapes...some of the steam extracted juice had hard crystals in the mason jars when I poured it into the primary.Later when I racked the wine out of the primary the sides of the buckets had deposits on the sides...rough, like a rough sand paper....Have racked the two batches yesterday to another carboy and one had little crystals and the other had a dusty residue in the bottom with the lees...like gritty...

I am afraid these wines might make crystals in the bottles...so...have been reading up on 'Wine Diamonds'..it is a sign of grapes that were ripe when picked and many 'good' wines will have it in the bottle and on the corks.

Guess you can precipitate them by cold stabilization like you did, so might have to do this to these wines to get rid of all the acid that will continue to form crystals....the last two days around here might be too cold to do it now.

Kind of fun in a way to see something different...but, I don't really want crystals in the bottles.

How long did you cold stabilize your wines????
How cold did you let them get???
At what stage of fermentaion did you do it???Edited by: Northern Winos

 

[Joanie]

I set the three varieties in my open garage Nov. 26th after it was done fermenting. It was really warm... 45 + for the first week so I really didn't count it. Probably the mean temps the next few weeks was low in the 40s. We did get one night where it got down to 15 or so and I brought them in for the night but moved them back out and they've been there until this weekend for the Cayuga and today for the other 2. The Cayuga had really defined crystals and I got yelled at by Waldo for not taking pictures! I figured the other 2 would have more crystals and would make for better pictures. This stuff actually looked like hard water and it kinda acted like it but it came off the bottom and broke up easily. All I know is that all three taste really good!! =)
Edited by: Joan

 

[bmorosco]

Sounds Great Joan!!