when good wines gone bad

[joeswine]

La Batalla Spanish red continued

bright with fruit yet a good balance of wood ...

 

[joeswine]

Kates Blackberry zin.

Vino Italiano Blackberry Zinfandel Kit​

This kit we purchased off Amazon for ~$45.00 shipped. This kit is contained the Zinfandel juice, a blackberry F-pak, labels, corks, caps, packets of yeast, sorbate, bentonite, k-met, and chitosan. This kit contains the essentials for any new winemaker (minus the basic equipment that is needed.)
What we added:
• 2 ball jars of simple syrup (each ball jar will bring the SG up .01%)
• Spring Water
• **Oak Tannin** Note: We will add this in the secondary, not primary
The steps:
• First, we added the bentonite and ½ gal. warm water and stirred until dissolved.
• Next, we added the packet of Zinfandel juice and then topped up to 6 gallon mark on our primary fermenter.
• Then, we took an SG reading. The kit as is, came to 1.070. We wanted our SG reading to be at 1.10, so we added the ball jars of simple syrup, one at a time (and took readings in between). We ended up using both jars and this brought us up to our desired SG reading: 1.09. We wanted this specific SG reading because 1. We like nice alcohol in our wine and 2. We wanted it to be well balanced. This kit contains an F-pak so the higher alch. Will balance it out- it won’t be too sweet .
• Next, we gave the bucket a good stir and added the yeast.
• The last step: We document the contents on our tag, hang it on the bucket, and drape a towel over the top. Now we wait.
Update!!
We checked the SG tonight (6/20/14) and it is at 0.98. This is dry and ready to rack to the secondary carboy. We racked it to our secondary, marked the SG reading and the date on our tag and hung it on the carboy.
Our wine is coming along!
Stay tuned...

This is a fun kit that Kate did, short flow big taste, really.
**Update**
Hello Everyone!
We haven't posted the all-anticipated posts of this economically pleasing wine kit. So tonight is the night! For those who are catching the back end of this tutorial, this is a Blackberry-Zinfandel Kit from Vino Italiano. This kit’s average price is ~$45.00.
we added the Blackberry F-pack, the clearing agent that came with the kit, the K-Met (Metabisulphate), Sorbate, stirred it up, and let it sit.
Tonight we checked-in on this wine and gave it our winemakers check-up.
Appearance: Nice dark purple color
Aroma: Berries, oak, and a slight tar smell (which is indicative of a drinkable dark, red wine)
Taste: Definitely taste the blackberry. It's right on the money. Has a light oak taste. This wine finishes sweet but not overly sickening, which is nice. The higher alcohol content (from adding the extra sugar/simple syrup in the beginning) really balances it out like we thought going into this kit.
Although this wine is definitely drinkable to the average wine drinker, I would let this one sit another month to really let the flavors come together. However, if I was invited last minute to a BBQ, this I wouldn't be ashamed of grabbing a few bottle of this to share.
This was a good purchase. It's a "filler" wine that I can share or drink while the other stuff I have is aging.
Oh, and for the count- we got 27 bottles (plus one that was not quite full- we drank that).
The total cost per bottle: $1.66. Can’t Beat that!

Cheers!
Joe and Kate

 

[joeswine]

Pino noir

Blackberry Pinot Noir​

​

We purchased a medium grade kit (~$80-$90) Pinot Noir Winexperts Kit. We wanted Blackberry Pinot Noir so we purchased 1.5 lbs. of blackberries to go with this.

The Winexperts box includes the following:
· Large bag of juice
· 1 Pack of Red star Champagne Yeast
· 2 Chaptalization Packs (bags of sugar)
· Package #2 (bentonite)
· Package #3 (Metabisulphate)
· Package #4 (Sorbate)
· Package #5 (Chitosan-(Fining Agent)
· Mesh Straining Bag
· 1 package of oak chips
Just for reference, I’m sure everyone knows by now if they have been following the posts, that you will need certain equipment to make this kit. For the newbies, I’m going to put it below so you know what you need:
· Primary Fermenter (minimum 30 Liters/7.9 US gallons capacity)
· Long stirring spoon (Plastic or stainless steel)
· Measuring cup
· Hydrometer and test jar
· Thermometer
· Siphon rod and hose
· Carboy (6 US gallon capacity)
· Bung and Air lock
· Solid Bung (if you are bulk aging)
· Unscented winemaking detergent for cleaning (we recommend One-step or any other oxygenating cleaner, including Kmet....JUST NOT BLEACH!)
· Metabisulphate Powder for sanitizing
· 30 wine bottles, thirty corks , thirty seals
· Corking machine (there are various types, we use an Italian floor corker.)
The Process:
· As always, sanitize anything that comes in contact with the wine. Including yourself. J
· Add half gallon of warm water to the primary fermenting bucket with the bentonite packet and stir until dissolved.
· Add the large juice package. (Be careful, it’s heavy!) Rinse out the bag with a little bit of spring water to make sure you get it all.
· Top up your bucket until you reach a 6 gallons. (I marked my primary before hand so I know where 6 gallons are.)
· Now, we took our SG reading and it was 1.08. We added simple syrup to bring the SG up to 1.10. Our logic is: We wanted at least 12% alc. At the finish because we know the blackberries are going to pick up the flavor at the bottom end. (The blackberries will overpower the flavor if we didn’t have a higher alch. Content. It would just be juice with not much alch.. This is how we do it, I’m sure others have their own opinion.)
· Next, we added ½ tsp of oak tannin.
· Then we added the oak chips and sprinkled yeast on top of that. Don’t stir, just let it sit.
· Then here comes the blackberry. We created a homemade F-pak out of blackberries. (We are going to write up a separate tutorial for this.) Note: an F-pack doesn’t always have to go at the end of the wine, you can add them to the beginning. An F-pack in the beginning will blend well with the wine but will not usually over-power the taste of the wine. If you add it at the end, the predominant taste of your wine will be the F-pak
· We added the F-pak to a mesh bag and tied it in a knot then added it to the primary.
· We added bellie-bands because it’s chilly in the winter. It’s about 64 degrees in here. After that, I hung my tag on the side, put a towel on top. And we wait. J

(.)
Secondary Fermentation:
Now that we fermented dry (SG reading is 1.010), now it’s time to rack it.
Notice the grape skins on top? This is the cap that formed from the grape skin packet that was provided in the Wineexpert Amarone Kit, along with the addition of California Raisins (that I added to add more body).
We racked this down to a carboy but it is pretty gassy. I’m going to let this settle out for a few days and degas some on its own. Over the weekend, I will force-gas it (If I have to) by giving it a good old-fashioned stir. Once I feel that it’s de-gassed enough, I will stabilize it with the potassium sorbate packet, K-Met Packet, and packet of Chitosan (clearing agent).

We would like to thank Winexperts for giving us the opportunity to present one of their finest wine kits they have available. We would definitely recommend this kit to the novice and experienced winemakers alike as it truly is exceptional.

We are looking forward to our next tutorial now that this one is complete. Please give us feedback and recommendations of what type of wine you would like to learn how to make.​

 

[joeswine]

austrailian sharaz vignier

This was a very nice addition to my cellar the flow is short...................

 

[joeswine]

SHIRAZ /VIOGNIER continued

follow the flow.............................

 

[joeswine]

SHIRAZ /VIOGNIER continued

just a little more to go...be patient

 

[joeswine]

Where are they now??

JUST A FOLLOW UP ON THE GREEN APPLE RIESLING AND THE CARNEVALE................. AND WHEN IT'S TIME WILL REVIEW BOTH.

 

[joeswine]

Amarone classic/ amarone style

THIS IS A LONG ONE HAVE A GLASS AND A SET...THERE ARE ALL DIFFERENT WINES IN THIS WORLD BUT AMARONE HAS A TASTE PROFILE IN THE REDS THAT IS UNTO ITSELF..FOLLOW THE PROCESS AND BE PATIENT.

 

[joeswine]

Amarone the king of italian reds

Wineexpert Amarone​

*UPDATED*​

Here is our kit that we received from Wineexpert. This kit is a Wineexpert Selection Series Amarone. This kit has the following included. (This list is a little different from the usual kit that you receive. This is a top of the line kit.)

The box includes the following:
· Large bag of juice
· Grape skin pack (You can actually see that there are grape skins in it!)
· 2 packs of Lavin RC-212
· 2 Chaptalisation Packs (bags of sugar)
· Package #2 (bentonite)
· Package #3 (Metabisulphite)
· Package #4 (Sorbate)
· Package #5 (Chitosan-(Fining Agent)
· Mesh Straining Bag
· 3 Packages of European Hungarian Oak
Just for reference, I’m sure everyone knows by now if they have been following the posts, that you will need certain equipment to make this kit. For the newbies, I’m going to put it below so you know what you need:
· Primary Fermenter (minimum 30 Litres/7.9 US gallons capacity)
· Long stirring spoon (Plastic or stainless steel)
· Measuring cup
· Hydrometer and test jar
· Thermometer
· Wine thief
· Siphon rod and hose
· Carboy (6 US gallon capacity)
· Bung and Air lock
· Solid Bung (if you are bulk aging)
· Unscented winemaking detergent for cleaning (we recommend Onestep or any other oxygenating cleaner, including Kmet....JUST NOT BLEACH!)
· Metabisulphite Powder for sanitizing
· 30 wine bottles, thirty corks , thirty seals
· Corking machine (there are various types, we use an italian floor corker.)
The Process:
· As always, sanitize anything that comes in contact with the wine. Including yourself. J
· Add half gallon of warm water to the primary fermenting bucket with the bentonite packet and stir until dissolved.
· Add the large juice package. (Be careful, it’s heavy!) Rinse this out with a little bit of spring water to make sure you get it all.
· Next, we added the smaller “grape skin packet”. It’s lumpy so you also want to rinse the bag out w/ water also, to get all the grape skins.
· Now, we take the SG reading. We’re at 1.10.
· Next, we added the smaller “grape skin packet”. It’s lumpy so you also want to rinse the bag out w/ water also, to get all the grape skins.
· Now, here comes all that Hungarian oak! We are adding 3 packets of Hungarian powdered oak (wow!).
· Here comes the fun part. YEAST! 2 packets of RC-212 yeast. Cover with a towel and wait 5-7 days, gently punching down the grape skins.
Secondary Fermentation:
Now that we fermented dry (SG reading is 1.010), now it’s time to rack it.
Notice the grape skins on top? This is the cap that formed from the grape skin packet that was provided in the Wineexpert Amarone Kit, along with the addition of California Raisins (that I added to add more body).
We racked this down to a carboy but it is pretty gassy. I’m going to let this settle out for a few days and degas some on its own. Over the weekend, I will force-gas it (If I have to) by giving it a good old-fashioned stir. Once I feel that it’s de-gassed enough, I will stabilize it with the potassium sorbate packet, K-Met Packet, and packet of Chitosan (clearing agent).

UPDATE:​

We finished bottling our super-awesome, Winexpert Selection International Amarone Kit. We are quite happy with the results. Our end result is a dark, inky-color, rich, full bodied, wine. It has a spicy-earthy, sour cherry aroma, dried fruit, bitter almond, from the huge volume of tannins.

For a kit wine that started just 2 1/2 months ago, the results are quite impressive. (We started this kit on August 22, 2013. We bottled tonight, 10/24/2013. After doing this kit, we would def. recommend this one for any true Italian red-wine drinker.

We would like to thank Winexpert for giving us the opportunity to present one of their finest wine kits they have available. We would definitely recommend this kit to the novice and experienced winemakers alike as it truly is exceptional.

We are looking forward to our next tutorial now that this one is complete. Please give us feedback and recommendations of what type of wine you would like to learn how to make.

 

[joeswine]

Chardenay cheap kit

Katie’s Chardonnay Kit​

It’s been a while since I’ve created a post of my own; I’ve been primarily helping Joeswine with the upkeep of his posts. I wanted to share this kit with everyone because I’ve tried it before and know that it turns out pretty awesome.
This is a Fontana Wine kit I recently purchased off-line. This traditionally is a 6-gallon kit but I are not making it like so. I am making this a 5-gallon kit as to keep the flavor and better balance between alcohol and wine with the contribution of the one cup of oak (which is traditional to a Chardonnay).
Ingredients:
These are all the basic ingredients that came with the kit. Please see the pictures attached.

What additional changes I’ve made:
-Changing the end volume of the wine from 6 gallons to 5 gallons
-adding the cup of oak
-At the end, by reducing the volume of concentrate, we increased the ABV without even trying.
-Personal preference: I will be adding zest of 1 grapefruit before racking. This will pick up the PH and give it a clean, crisp finish.
See the pictures for the process. J
WERE NEARRING THE FINIS WE LEFT OUR WINE IN THE COLD SINK FOR 14 DAYS AND IT CLEARED QUIT NICELY, WE KNEW RACKING BACK TO A ONE MIX CONTAINER WOULD CAUSE US TO HAVE TO RECLEAR ONE MORE TIME; THE WORK IS NOT A BIG DEAL WHAT IS, THE FINISH.

BEFORE I RACKED I TASTED THIS WINE AND LIKE I THOUGHT, THE WHITES SHOULD GO INTO A 5 GALLONS PROCESS ALSO.JUST LIKE THE REDS, THE WHITES EVEN WITH ALL THE SOLIDS WOULD HAVE NOT (IMOP) HAVE HAD MUCH TASTE, BRINGING THEM DOWN TO 5 GALLONS GAVES THESE KITS LIFE AND WITH THE SMALL AMOUNT OF TWEAKS THAT WE DID, WAS JUSTFIDE .SO WHAT WAS THE RESULTS??
SMOOTH UP FRONT WITH DECIENT FRUIT NOT OVER WHELMING BUT STILL THERE, CRISP ACIDITY WITH A CLEAN FINISH, WILL LET YOU KNOW WHAT OUR YIELD WAS WHEN WE BOTTLE AND OUR COST PER BOTTLE.

​

 

[joeswine]

coffee port or caramel port the base I believe is the same so here's the caramel, correction,that should have been a second place metal not a first.

 

[joeswine]

Rojo blanco

finished with a silver 2016 this is how it was made.

 

[joeswine]

We just broke 100,000 views thanks people again for your support.

 

[joeswine]

Torrontes continued

A really good wine and gets better with time almost a gold

 

[joeswine]

Torrontes continued

Know matter what this is an impressive wine.

 

[joeswine]

cellar masters

coffee port always a good performer follow the thinking of the judges....

 

[joeswine]

Coffee port

Cru Coffee Port Kit​

The box includes the following:
· Large bag of juice
· 2 packs of Lavin EC-1118
· 1 Coffee Port F-Pack
· Package of bentonite
· Package of Metabisulphite
· Package of Potassium Sorbate
· Package of each Chitosan-D2 and kiesesol-D1(Fining Agents)

Our additions:
· Oak Tannin (Tannic Acid)
· Instant Coffee
· Spring Water

Tools you will need:
· Primary Fermenter (minimum 30 Litres/7.9 US gallons capacity)
· Long stirring spoon (Plastic or stainless steel)
· Measuring cup
· Hydrometer and test jar
· Thermometer
· Wine thief
· Siphon rod and hose
· Carboy (3 US gallon capacity)
· Bung and Air lock
· Solid Bung (if you are bulk aging)
· Unscented winemaking detergent for cleaning (we recommend One-step or any other oxygenating cleaner, including Kmet....JUST NOT BLEACH!)
· Metabisulphite Powder for sanitizing
· 15 wine bottles, 15 corks , 15 seals
· Corking machine (there are various types, we use an Italian floor corker.)

The Process:
· As always, sanitize anything that comes in contact with the wine. Including yourself.
· Add the large juice package. (Be careful, it’s heavy!) Rinse this out with a little bit of spring water to make sure you get it all.
· We have our bucket measured to 3 gallons. The kit didn’t quite come to 3 gallons so we topped up until we reach 3 gallons.
· Add the bentonite and give it a good stir.
· Then add the oak tannin, stir, and then take your SG reading. It should read 1.10.
· We then took a PH test and it read 4.0. Typically, it should be around 3.5.
· Finally, we pitched the yeast, made up a tag, and covered it up to rest.



After it ferments dry: (Approx. 2 weeks)

• After it fermented dry (SG: 0.98) we racked it into our secondary, 3 gallon fermentation carboy.
• We had to take out approx. 1.5 wine bottles of wine out of the carboy so that we will have room for the coffee F-pack. We set that aside with an air-lock. If when we rack the wine again and we come up short and have extra air-space, we will add it.
• We checked the ph of the wine and it is at 3.5 which is perfect for this type of port.
• We added the sorbate, K-met packet, and gave it a good stir.
• Next, we added packet #1 (of the 2 packet combination) of Kieselsol and set our time for 5 minutes. After 5 minutes, we add packet #2 of Kieselsol and stirred again. (Learning tip: The reason for the 5 minute wait time is you are waiting for the molecules from packet #1 to bind to certain molecules in the wine. The second packet will bind to the molecules in the first packet and then the clearing process starts. (Positive and negative particles will attract, become heavy, and fall to the bottom of the carboy, taking the sediment with it.)
• Next, we added the Coffee F-Pak. Note: Not all of the F pack fit into my 3-gallon carboy. I should have taken out possibly 2 bottles of extra wine instead of 1.5. I put the extra F-pak in the refrigerator. When I rack this again to a final mixing bucket I will add everything to the bucket and give it a good stir.

THE TRICK IS TO LET IT SIT A YEAR ,IF YOU CAN.MY 4TH KIT AND STILL WINNING

 

[joeswine]

A winner every time ,coffee port with a twist

 

[go_mustangs]

Hi there,
I have 5 buckets (6 gallons each) of Zinfandel wine juice that I picked up from California Concentrates back in September. I basically just let it set and ferment with the natural yeast. I usually rack it to a carboy/degass/add tanin & raisins but this time around I just let it go. Can I still add tanin and raisins this late in the process? If so, would you please give me a suggested workflow? Thank you.

 

[joeswine]

Explain why your just letting a it go,is it in a carboy? How much?