Red wine has no flavor or body

[NCBrewer]

I have been making wine from kits & fresh grapes for about 15 years. I currently have 5 gallons of a DeChaunac grape that I fermented out about 3 months ago. I went to bottle it just before Christmas after I had cold stabilized it. I was very disappointed when I tasted it. It had very little flavor or body. It was fermented with the hulls about 2 weeks and then racked from a plastic fermenter into a glass carboy. I don't think that there is any problem like an infection or anything, just not a very good wine. I had made this grape wine before from the same vineyard and it turned out pretty good. The sugar content was low and I had to add several pounds of sugar to bring it up to 22 brix.

Any suggestions / recommendations of how I can bring some character to this otherwise blah wine? I thought of adding oak chips and dried elderberries but I am not sure this will be enough.

Thanks for any advice,
AB in HR, NC

 

[Rocky]

NCB, What is the current SG of the wine? If it is low, i.e. around 0.995 or less, you could add concentrated juice or an f-pack. It will sweeten the wine somewhat, and it will also improve the flavor and body. I assume you have added potassium metabisulfite and potassium sorbate to the wine, right? Whatever you do, make sure you bench test the addtions before adding them to the entire batch.

 

[AlFulchino]

3 mos from fresh grapes to bottle is pretty fast....how long did you wait to bottle the first dechaunac wine you made...it may be a time thing here and some time for development may be in order...it could also be the amount or rain last yr greatly affecting things

 

[NCBrewer]

NCB, What is the current SG of the wine? If it is low, i.e. around 0.995 or less, you could add concentrated juice or an f-pack. It will sweeten the wine somewhat, and it will also improve the flavor and body. I assume you have added potassium metabisulfite and potassium sorbate to the wine, right? Whatever you do, make sure you bench test the addtions before adding them to the entire batch.

Rocky,
I have not added any metabisulfite or potassium sorbate as I was not quite ready to bottle yet. I may add some grape juice concentrate to it to get more flavor and body. I have added oak and I'll wait and see what that does for it.

Al,
Yes 3 months is a bit early to bottle but I was in kind of a hurry. The DeChaunac I did a few years ago was in a carboy for just under a year before I bottled. I do suspect that it just wasn't a great year for that grape. I also have some diamond from the same vineyard that is OK.

Thanks for your comments and suggestions.

 

[Turock]

3 months is way too young on any wine,let alone a red. Very hard to evaluate green wines.

Did you add any water to the ferment? Many young winemakers do this because they are following recipes. The only people who need water additions are those doing warm weather grapes with high brix. Cold weather grapes should get no water additions. If using water to adjust PH, stop doing that and start using calcium carbonate, instead. However, you can get diluted flavors if the vineyard had a big rain just before harvest. This is something we fight almost every year. We'll have a nice dry late summer, then when it's time to pick we get big rains. It dilutes the grapes if they get a chance to take up a lot of water.

If you are making a red wine with these grapes, you can do a warm ferment. That brings out the color,body, and better flavor.

You'd be amazed at the difference in taste if you just let this sit in the carboy for a year. The other problem with bottling so young is that unless you fully degassed this wine, you might start blowing corks. We never degass. We just let the carboys age and they degass themselves.

The other thing that gets you more color is to press your grapes. You might want to buy a small press, one of these days. When we finally bought one, we were surprised at the color---and how much more wine you can get.

 

[theprodigy]

I have been making wine from kits & fresh grapes for about 15 years. I currently have 5 gallons of a DeChaunac grape that I fermented out about 3 months ago. I went to bottle it just before Christmas after I had cold stabilized it. I was very disappointed when I tasted it. It had very little flavor or body. It was fermented with the hulls about 2 weeks and then racked from a plastic fermenter into a glass carboy. I don't think that there is any problem like an infection or anything, just not a very good wine. I had made this grape wine before from the same vineyard and it turned out pretty good. The sugar content was low and I had to add several pounds of sugar to bring it up to 22 brix.

Any suggestions / recommendations of how I can bring some character to this otherwise blah wine? I thought of adding oak chips and dried elderberries but I am not sure this will be enough.

Thanks for any advice,
AB in HR, NC

How do you add and what exactly will the elderberries do to the wine? My reccomendation would be to blend wines if you have that option. If not see if you can buy a little juice of something else from a local home winemaker. You should be able to fix some of the holes in the wine if you blend with the right wine. Even a little bit could do world of difference.

 

[Runningwolf]

yes, that's cool ))

Binben, sorry to see you go so soon but you've just been voted off the island!

 

[Wade E]

NCB, Im suspecting that the grapes were picked too early or during a very wet season hence the low sugar and low flavor.

 

[NCBrewer]

How do you add and what exactly will the elderberries do to the wine? My reccomendation would be to blend wines if you have that option. If not see if you can buy a little juice of something else from a local home winemaker. You should be able to fix some of the holes in the wine if you blend with the right wine. Even a little bit could do world of difference.

To be honest, I don't know. Many years ago I did a kit wine that included dried elderberries. I think they add both color and some flavor. As I said it was a long time ago.

 

[George_A]

You can try to improve your wine adding wine raisins. They will add body and flavor to wine by thickening it.
Wine raisins are made from vinifera wine grapes. As the grapes shrivel, sugars, acids, tannins, flavors, extract and other grape compounds concentrate. Additionally various reactions occur within the grapes themselves creating more complexity.
I recommend that your wine undergo an extended maceration on the raisins, (double fermentation method, used in Italy for Ripasso style wines) just to make sure that all of the complexities and goodness from the skins , seeds and stems ends up in the wine.

 

[keverman]

My question exactly. I just finished my first attempt at wine...ever. I have Marquette grapes, and fermentation proceeded FAST and WARM, and I was a little underprepared for that. MLF went beautifully, but I still need to cold stabilize to bring the TA down a little. I tasted the wine before MLF and in spite of sharp acid, I could detect "red berries" in the background. After MLF, nothing at all. No descriptors/aromatics. I was very worried....but perhaps just still needs to re-develop it's character? (First post ever, too, so thank you for your comments!)

 

[Johnd]

My question exactly. I just finished my first attempt at wine...ever. I have Marquette grapes, and fermentation proceeded FAST and WARM, and I was a little underprepared for that. MLF went beautifully, but I still need to cold stabilize to bring the TA down a little. I tasted the wine before MLF and in spite of sharp acid, I could detect "red berries" in the background. After MLF, nothing at all. No descriptors/aromatics. I was very worried....but perhaps just still needs to re-develop it's character? (First post ever, too, so thank you for your comments!)

The last post in this thread is 5.5 years old, but I’ll take a shot at your issue. Most importantly, your wine is in infancy stage, and if well made, will be going through numerous chemical and physical transformations as it ages, and it will improve, so don’t judge too harshly at the present time.

I’ve had young, previously fruity wines in barrels taste of nothing but oak with gripping tannins, only to have the fruitiness return 6 months later. Today, in bottles at 1.5 years old, it’s still improving. Time is your friend and will eventually tell the whole tale...... and welcome aboard!!!

 

[keverman]

Thanks, John! I saw the date on this thread the second after I posted, so I really appreciate your reply. I was hoping that was the right answer. I watched one video on pressing that showed the guy sticking his glass in for a taste and commending on the varietal character. Since mine was barely palatable at that point, and with no benchmark, I thought something might be amiss. It looks beautiful and the numbers are all spot on. It has behaved just as expected at every turn, so I'm optimistic! Cold stabilization is next. Cheers!