Giving the Cold Shoulder to your Wines

[MedPretzel]

This is a joint effort from last year regarding cold-stabilization of wines. I have included (in quotes, except for mine)relative statements and have added pictures of our various posters about this method.


Northern Winos said:

Here are some photos of the Wild Plum and White Wine Grape wine that stayed a cloudy 'Pepto' pink color for months. After getting courage from folks on Wine Fourms it went outside into the cruel world...the cold temps did wonders for it. It is still not clear, but a far sight better than before.

Northern Winos said:

The wine has been stable [not fermenting] for a few months. It had Sparkloid & Bentonite but remained very cloudy. I have not used Potassium Sorbate yet. Kind of like the flavor, so probably won't sweeten it, tho I haven't tasted it since it cleared like this, wonder if the flavor changed???...will try it today. I have a solid bung on it because it has been out in freezing temps and has had a cardboard box over it, touching the bung. Could have put some EverClear in the airlock, but went this way, didn't think it would matter much as I was planing on pitching the batch. The temps today will reach 61*F [16*C] and by Monday night it will be 18*F [-7*C], so the carboy will be coming indoors soon, at which point I will rack it to a clean carboy and put an airlock back on it, and probably stabilize it. Guess after that just watch for more sediment, might age it in gallon jugs in the root cellar

I've put some of my wines outside to try this method.... It's scary to put my babies outside in the cold for so long. I've been checking on them every 1-2 hours to make sure they're okay!

Bilbo-in-Maine said:

George recommends 40-50 degrees F in one of his articles. I read somewhere else that commercial wineries get it close to freezing (an alternative stabilization method to k-meta and sorbate I think). I assume Northern Winos is already stable and has been trying to get ornery suspended matter to precipitate out. Here is what George had to say:
"Stabization and Fining - Once you have stabilized your wine, its time to bring the temperature down, it you can. Cooling it helps particles floating in the wine to form crystals and precipitate down to the bottom of the wine. As you rack the wine, these crystals are left behind with the rest of the lees (sediment). 40° to 50° is ideal, but unless you have a basement and live in a cold weather climate, this option is not available to most of us."

One thing to keep in mind is that if there is still CO2 in solution that you are trying to bleed off, it will come out much more slowly at lower temperatures as Masta has addressed so well elsewhere.

bill

I put them on my porch (north side of house):

Left to right: Test-threw everything together-batch, Mint/Balm, Niagara....


These were too "naked" for me, so....

I covered them up with a flannel sheet.


Bilbo-in-Maine said:

The reason I mentioned slow loss of CO2 at cool temperature is because I have let 6 gallons of Mezza Luna Red sit for 4 additional weeks past its earliest bottling date in a space in the low 40's. I thought I had "whipped the snot out of it", to use Tim Vandergrift's phrase. Last night I pulled several cups into a sanitized bottle and shook it and was not happy to see how much gas is still in the wine - lots of foam and the distinctive pop.

I want to bottle it in a week and so contacted George, who advises me to rack off the lees, add 1/4 tsp. k-meta and whip it some more just before bottling. I'll certainly do that, and meanwhile I will check samples of my other newer carboys with a shake test before cooling them. I obviously understirred the Mezza Luna.

Other writers have expressed problems they've had getting a sense that all their stirring with their Fizz-X's isn't getting much done. I take many additional minutes with stirring over and above what the kit instructions recommend. George says stir, and then stir some more. If we choose not to put suction to the carboys but just let them sit over time, probably that should be done in a warm environment, before cooling. Just my thought...

Bill

Masta wrote:

The freezing point of wine with a ABV of 13-14% is roughly 22 degrees F. The glass should not break unless it is exposed to a rapid temperature change.

Here's a pic: Cold-stabilization, day 3. Yesterday, the temps went up to 40+ and down to 30. Today, the same.

Bilbo-in-Maine wrote:

Martina - What did you end up doing for fluid in the airlocks?

Vodka.


Cold stabilization: Day 5:
Temps at about 28*F on the porch.

Bilbo-in-Maine wrote:

Can you report on how you feel cold stabilization has worked? I think several of us are doing it - you were one of the first to set yours outside. I had only had mine in an unheated entryway in the low 40's back several weeks ago, but I'll bet temperatures below freezing do more work.

Bill

Icarry them from underneath. I pick them up by the neck and grab the bottom. Sort of like this (old photo, not that warm outside or in the house for those clothes!):

Once I get a good grip at the bottom, the other hand holding the neck goes at the bottom as well, and I carry them that way. Good workout. Like I said in another post, some days they feel a lot heavier than others.

5 gallons is what I can handle well, it's 6 where I start getting unsure of myself.


I have a carboy strap, but honestly, it takes more work trying to shimmy those things around a (usually) full carboy. I also have a carboy handle, but I'm leery about moving a carboy just with one of those things. 55-65 pounds of weight just on the neck? Nope - not in the cards for me. I personally feel that that would be SCREAMING "Break the neck!" If someone else has a better way, I'm up for it. This is just how I do it.

Now to the cold stabilization: Yes, it is working. I have read that you need to leave the carboys outside for a week to ten days. It's day 6 now, and I will check on them in a little bit. I'm very impatient, so I think it's taking a long time. I thought that there was a big change between day 1 and day 3, but not a big change from day 3 to day 5. The temps on the weekend were hovering at 45 degrees F during the day, so it might have been the warmer temperatures.


It definitely has helped some, but I'm not totally convinced as the original "pepto-bismol" wine of this post. I'm half-way through this, so it'll be interesting to see at day 10 (or even 12, if I'm patient enough).


Northern Winos wrote:

I feel it sure worked on my 5 gallons of 'Petpo-Pink' cloudy Wild Plum wine that I set outside. I don't think it would have cleared that fast without the cold treatment. Friends had made wine out of these tart wild plums and they said it never cleared, other forums said it took 2 years. My first photo was after 24 hours, it was dramatic. I had gone out to take a 'before' photo and was 24 hours too late for that shot. Our temps fluctuated a lot, from 26*F-61*F. I think the fluctuations are the good part. After 10 or 12 days I brought it inside for good, the temps were to drop to 17, plus I felt the cold had done all it could. It has since been racked, stabilized and sweetened up a bit, it turned out to be very tasty and presentable. I strongly believe in COLD STABILIZATION, but my wine was exceptionally cloudy. Matrina's looked pretty good on day one, but for sure the Niagara showed some remarkable changes through her photo-journal. I think if your having typical Northern fall temperatures, then make use of our Natural Resources and give it a try. Till next time....Cheers!!!

Day 7:


It sure is cold!

The sad thing is, is that I see actual (I think) ice crystals in my wine. Since I've never done this, it seems scary. The carboys are covered up, so they are a little warmer, I would think. It's supposed to warm up over the next few days, so.....





Here's a pic of the three wines.

On the niagara (on the right) you see these black/grey areas of darker things towards the shoulders of the carboy. That's what I think are ice crystals. There is a lot more sediment on the sides than in the previous pics.





Well, I put them down in the basement again. I got scared.

And since I am going out of town for a few days, I didn't want them to be irreversibly ruined. Reversibly ruined is another thing.

I racked the mint/balm into a new carboy to warm it up a little faster. Boy, those carboys were cold!!!


The airlocks were actually okay. Nothing was wrong with them. It seems as though I caught them in time. We had record-breaking temps last night, which our idiot weather-people couldn't forecast. It was not expected, to say the least, but it seems the wines made it through the whole ordeal okay.


New post:


The crystals were still there.

The wine looked horrible. I moved it onto the table, and nothing moved. The (sorry) crap that was on the sides of the carboy yesterday were still there.

So, I thought I'd give it a try and rack the darn thing.


When I started to rack, I freaked.

That was STILL there! But it didn't move as the level of the wine in the carboy was lower.

"Aha!" I thought. This must be tartaric crystals that every book talks about!

That was what was left. It was a salty sound when I swooshed the carboy with the left over muck at the end of racking.





And then I looked at what I racked into the new carboy:

Mr. Green Mouse looked happy and approved of me racking today. But he also thought, "hey, you didn't add any,"

So, as you see, I put them in the pill crusher and crushed them.

We added it to the wine, topped it up with some chardonnay (from a kit), and now all we can do is wait.

Moral of the story: Don't freak out.



New Post:


Here's what CJJ Berry says about tartaric acid:





"Is that found in the grape (or raisins, sultanas and currants) and is said to improve the vinous character of the wine, but is often unstable, being thrown out of solution in the wine as tartrate crystals. Incidentally, although tartaric is the principal acid in grapes, there is usually a high proportion of malic also.





The acids are not confined to these fruits and are often found alongside one another in varying quantities, a little citric where malic predominates, and vice versa, for instance." (page 42 CJJ Berry's First Steps in Winemaking)





Terry Garey says (p. 182) to "chillproofing" wines:


"...the wine is stored at a temperature just above freezing for a period of about two weeks. This allows part of the tartaric acid to precipitate out, and it helps to smooth high-acid wines. It also aids in stabilizing the wine."


Considering we had 13 degrees F on that day, I think the two weeks was drastically shortened.

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<TD ="bold">jobe05 wrote:

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<TD ="text">Never seen that happen in my limited time making wine, but in my vast reading..... I may have read it, but have never seen it. Does it have any better, or ill effects on the wine? Itcertainly looks likethe cold did it some good.</TD></TR></T></T></TABLE></TD></TR></T></T></TABLE></TD></TR></T></T></TABLE>


Well, I've never seen it either. Like I said, I totally freaked out this morning. Sort of panic-ed.



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<TD ="text">Cold stabilizing





Cold stabilizing causes tartaric acid to precipitate as potassium bitartrate crystals when the wine is being chilled. Because the procedure works on tartaric acid, it will only work effectively on grape wines. The wine must be fermented out.
You can cold stabilize the wine by placing it in a cold spot (between -4 and 5 deg C) for a week or two. The wine will get cloudy and crystals will form on the bottom of the carboy. Wait untill the sediment has settled and rack when the wine is still cold. For best effect you can add a small amount of potassium bitartrate first, so that the crystals will form more easily.</TD></TR></T></T></TABLE></TD></TR></T></T></TABLE></TD></TR></T></T></TABLE>


http://www.geocities.com/mipeman/acids.html- a source that is not used enough. I love this website.


So, are there ill-effects? I don't think so. I have also read that the crystals do not make the acidity go down. The crystals are the salts of the acid (ugh, I'm not a chemist, so I'm just spitting out what I've been told) and not the acid itself. (huh?!?

) It should not affect the pH of the wine (3.63 at last weeks' reading).


I tasted the crystals (yes, I'm like a kid. I have to put everything in my mouth!), and they just tasted nasty. The niagara juice was bought from a local vineyard (http://www.debonne.com) and so far, so good. I also bought 6 gallons of concord juice there (4 bucks a gallon each wine).


Oh yes, my wines aren't that high in alcohol - about 13%. Yes, a little stronger than "normal" wines, but I also like to top off with water (this one I didn't, so 13.58% (SG 1.090) is what this one is), so I think I get the SG down to a "normal" level. I also had the wines on the north side, covered from below in a towel, from the sides and on top with a flannel sheet. Still, they were happy to come inside, I think.

Talk about bottle shock!

I think we've all learned something about cold stabilzation with this post. This is what I think we can safely say (correct me if I'm wrong):

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   <LI>The "cold treatment", in conjunction with fluctuating temperatures, works well on fruit wines that don't clear or to quickly get the "gross lees" out of the way.
   <LI>Cold stabilization in temps that are hovering around freezing works well in grape wines.
   <LI>Cold stabilization works on grape wines in that it may form tartaric crystals (I like the "wine diamonds"), even at temperatures which hover around the 40's.
   <LI>You need to at least wait a week before you bring the wine back in, if temperatures are around freezing.
   <LI>If the temps drop way below freezing, bring the wine inside.
   <LI>Make sure you put in vodka or high-proof alcohol in the airlock so the water/sulfite solution doesn't freeze.
   <LI>Wines that are 13.58 or higher in alcohol can withstand pretty cold temperatures.
   <LI>Don't freak when you see crystals in your wine. Think of them as products of "high-quality" grapes.
   
   </LI>

Can I just say, I think it was a good thing that I cold stabilized!

jojo wrote:

Martina - You are my inspiration.

Wish me luck!

jojo wrote:

I think it's a goner. I shouldn't have chanced it. I had it covered too.


The temp this morning showed 11 degrees.


I brought it in and it's an iceberg.

Northern Winos wrote:

Yikes!!!!! Thaw it slowly and put a towel under it, that carboy is going to frost and sweat once it gets into the warmth.....know about thawing cold stuff up here in the North....It will probably be okay....good luck!!!!

jojo wrote:

Well she has thawed completely and looks clear with some sediment on the bottom about a quarter inch of puffy cloud like stuff. The basement isat 45-50 degrees, so im leaving it near the window. I have my handy acid fruit chart for the next time.

jojo wrote:

Before the crystals showed up in your carboy, was there evidence of separation on the bottom of the carboy at all? The reason I ask is that another forum mentions a separation, but not forming crystals on the glass.

No, mine did not separate. It was just hard crystals on the side of the carboy. Moving the carboy from side-to-side didn't make them fall off either. They were also left at the the bottom after racking. They did not disappear (at least noticeably) when warm water was put in the carboy to rinse the carboy out.





Well, that's it for the cold-stabilization saga of 2005. Let's see what 2006 brings us!





Happy fermenting!Edited by: MedPretzel