Must Finally Arrived

[stickman]

The grapes came that way, I didn't touch them at all. Peter indicates on his site that he uses a crusher destemmer that is very gentle leaving more intact berries. I know there was a comment about buying grapes elsewhere in Chicago, but I'm sticking with Brehm, I started making wine in 1990 and I've used his must since 1999.

You're right, the drain and return is a fair amount of work, the draining is easy, takes about 15min, but you have to be careful dumping it back in. I could use a pump, but that would be too easy. I'll slow down to just a few pails twice a day once it drops below 3 brix. I usually press when dry .992 which is typically 8 to 10 days after pitching.

This morning the wine was at 12 brix, so I added the remaining third of the nutrients, the cap was 84F, wine 74F. I was curious and did a quick stab with the PH meter and got 3.60, but that number is not reliable, especially when adding nutrients and DAP. The PH swings high after adding DAP, but then drops back down after it is consumed.

 

[stickman]

Brix dropping as expected, about 5 or 6 brix depending on the pail, wine temp 77F, cap 82F, PH 3.52. The weather has been unusually warm here in the mid 70's.

 

[stickman]

The primary is winding down, now roughly 0 brix, wine temp 72F, cap 74F. Probably looking at Sunday or Monday for the press.

 

[stickman]

Pressed today at .993, the skins look like they gave all they could give.

 

[JohnT]

Thank you so much for the pictures! That looks so deep, dark, and delicious!

I know that you tasted it as it was coming out of the press. It is so easy for a glass to get under that stream... How did it taste???

 

[ibglowin]

Looking good! How much pressed wine did you end up with?

 

[NorCal]

What a great set up. Looks like some gentle handling of the fruit, with nice, clean execution.

 

[stickman]

Thanks guys, of course myself and the neighbor did a little tasting during the press. In the glass it is absolutely black, rich, slightly tannic, and with a minute of swirling you begin to pick up the aroma of the original must. Monday I did the 24hr racking, and the final yield was 38 gallons, 7gal of it was press wine, the PH of the free run was 3.67, and the press wine was 3.72. I may add a bit of acid to drop the PH to 3.5 during the next racking, which will be this evening, and we'll move it to the basement and add the oak staves and the ML culture. I'll post a few more photos maybe this evening.

 

[stickman]

The neighbor came over and we completed the second racking this evening, the wine is now in a flex tank in the basement with 4 French oak staves, 1 fire toast M+, and 3 convection toast M+, ML culture has been added. Here's a few photos; it's difficult to capture the true color under these conditions. It appears in the second shot the camera captured what I was seeing after drinking a couple of glasses....

 

[Boatboy24]

Looks really nice in the glass already.

 

[JohnT]

That looks simply awesome!

 

[stickman]

Malolactic fermentation is moving along quickly, CH16 at 67F, no nutrients.

 

[JohnT]

This year, I swiched MLB strains to CH16. Got fantastic results! CH16 is my "go to" strain going forward.

Wine is looking great. I bet you can not wait to taste it!

 

[Dentman]

great thread thanks for sharing! without getting too far off topic; can malolactic fermentation occur anytime? In other words if I had 3 carboys from juice buckets in secondary can i add CH16 to achieve MLF? My 2 whites are undergoing MLF on their own but I do not recall the reds doing it. thank you

 

[stickman]

It can occur any time, it sometimes occurs whether you want it or not, it is largely dependent on nutrients and PH as well as so2 content and temperature. Low/no so2, high PH, warm temperature, and lees present, are all positive factors. It is more difficult if the wine has been clarified and in glass with so2. You really need to test for malic to ensure it hasn't already occurred.

 

[JohnT]

Just to put my own slant on this..

Most MLB need a low SO2 environment to thrive. Also, many strains can not withstand ABV over, say, 14%.

So, for many wines, it is a race against time. with some winemakers, MLB is introduced even before yeast fermentation is complete (while ABV is low and SO2 is normally low).

The strain, CH16, though has a surprising tolerance for alcohol and can survive in environments up to 70ppm of SO2. If your wine has been bulk aging in the glass with SO2 (kmeta), then this is the strain to use.

 

[stickman]

Just a quick update. I added the ML culture on the 11th, it's only been12 days and it has moved rather quickly. I did the first chromatogram, the 5gal carboy is nearly complete, the flextank is not far behind, the other one is a gallon that I left un-inoculated and you can see the difference, I swapped some wine today to get the gallon moving. It won't be long now.

 

[stickman]

Just an update on this wine; I decided to filter, sending the wine to the tank on the rack, in preparation for bottling in the next month or so. I'll have 90 gallons moving through the winery this season and thought it would be best to move this one out. After ML completion, I racked the wine 3 times over the 10 months. The photos are from the filtration I completed last night. I sampled the wine and it is good, good balance of fruit and astringency, it seems like when I taste the wine on its own the oak is less noticeable, but when compared side by side to other wine, I detect the oak immediately. We'll know more after some time in the bottle.

 

[sdelli]

Cannot see the name on that tank.... Can you tell me the name and where you got it?

 

[stickman]

All of the tanks that I have are from Flextank, I started buying them when they first came out, and the early ones didn't come with a decal. You can see there is a spot molded into the side, but I assume they just didn't have the decals on hand at the time.