Pressing syrah

The brix on the syrah was down to 10 on 10-14 (from 25 on 10-3), so we pressed. It was a Friday evening, after a week of work for all of us--we seemed to have more brain farts than on a weekend day, guess that is just one of the hazards. Had the full complement of the workers--(Z squared) x2 plus the Colonel and Bitsy--which of course is a mix of brain, brawn and beauty. Got the syrah done in three pressings.
It was beautifully colored, and definitely less sweet than on Sunday. The press resulted in almost 35 gallons, and that was divided into 3 6-gallon carboys, 3 5-gallon carboys, and a 1 3-gallon carboy.

After the work, and cleanup, had a comforting bowl of clam chowder (http://gregl.net/chowder/)
and a 1999 Cayuse Syrah from Walla Walla. As the colonel would say, "Don't get no better than this."

Week two

We had originally planned on pressing the syrah, but the fermentation was going pretty slowly. With a starting brix of 25, we were just at 18 on Sunday. We certainly could have pressed; there seemed to be very good color extraction, but generally you want to wait until it brix has dropped by 1/3. So, we decided to postpone until Friday. The grenache, however was ready to press, the brix having dropped from 21 to 3...which is quite a drop. We also wanted to consolidate the Rielsing--it certainly seems like the carboys could be fuller without the fermentation overflowing. So we moved the Rielsing, which freed up a carboy for the grenache. Then we pressed the grenache, in a single pressing. Pressing after a week of fermentation gives a higher yield of wine, and the "pie" is much drier. The juice from the grenache was quite pale-looked like a raspberry smoothie. Also it probably had a good deal of malic acid as it seemed to have somewhat of a cidery taste.



We now had extra time, so we used it to bottle last year's 'Bordeaux' blend. This blend was 80% cabernet sauvignon, 15% merlot, and 5% cabernet franc. Here's some shots from last January 29, 2005 when we tasted for the blending. We were doing some serious drinking that day, not your frivolous type drinking.
We then put in our American oak barrel, which had been used the previous year for syrah. It stayed in the barrel until September 9th, when we moved to carboys in preparation for bottling.

After 4 weeks in the carboys, the blend was quite delightful, and we bottled just over 12 cases. We also had 3 gallons of a 50-50 of the oaked blend, and unoaked cabernet sauvignon that we bottled.

That leaves us with 10 gallons of unoaked chardonnay, 8 gallons of cabernet sauvignon, and 5 gallons of cabernet franc from 2004. We are going to explore making a sparkling wine from the chardonnay; as for the reds, we can keep them for possible blending with this year's vintage. Or bottle....

Fermenting blup blup blup blup....

The fermentation is more a treat for the nose and ears. The yeasty smell is quite pleasant, and down in the fermentation tent, the "blup, blup" of the CO2 escaping the air locks is the most delightful sound. We went down twice a day to check the temperature, and stir the reds. We had the vornado on and had it the thermostat on it set to keep it at 68. The whites behaved themselves quite nicely; no overflowing carboys. The reds seemed to be fermenting nicely. We took a brix on Saturday, and the Grenache was at 4, down from 21. The syrah was a little slower fermenting, with the brix at 19, down from 25.

The plan is to press the reds on Sunday the 9th--I am a little concerned with the slowness of the fermentation of the syrah. It looks as if there is good color extraction, but seems like we should wait before we take the wine off the skins. The Grenache is ready to put in the carboy. The riesling can be consolidated; doesn't look like it is anywhere near to overflowing, and we can get rid of a little of the air in the carboys.

We still have last year's wine to bottle-there's the magnolia meritage of cabernet sauvignon, merlot, and cabernet franc that can be bottled, and the chardonnay that we want to turn into a sparkling wine. Guess that it will have to be called magnolia, since we can't call it champagne....

Got to get down and do tonight's check, and perhaps another brix reading on the syrah.

Pressing matters

Sunday, 10/2, needed to press the Riesling, and add the yeast to both the red and white and get the fermentation going. Pressing is pretty much grunt work--filling the basket press with the must, catching the free-run, pressing to get the rest of the juice out, all the time catching the juice, and running it through a sieve as we add to the container--a 44 gallon food grade plastic container in this case. Once pressed, the grape "pie" or pomace is discarded.



So the guys supply the brawn to operate the press, the girls get down and sticky, pouring the must, transferring the juice, cleaning up and discarding the pomace. It takes a number of pressings to go through the 100 gallons of must, and this year, we got a yield of 65 gallons. We added the yeast, which had been growing since Friday. We are lucky to have a small incubator just big enough for two gallon jars so we can grow the yeast under fairly well-regulated conditions. Also we added yeast nutrient, as if the yeast needed anything else to keep it happy. I suppose the microbiologist in me says well, yeah it does (all those trace elements, vitamins and amino acids)...so yeast nutient is good. The yeast we are using is Steinberg which is a "classic German yeast from the Rheingau district. Produces full bodied wines with great depth, dry smoky characteristic with a sharp finish, drier than Rudisheimer. Flocculation: medium to high, residual sugar, 0-0.75% alcohol tolerance 12-13%" Rudisheimer is what we have used in the past, and have had great results, and so-so results. Since our taste runs to a dry rielsing, the Steinberg should give us what we want. Flocculation with whites can be problem....because we ferment in a closed carboys, we don't want the fermenting wine to overflow the containers, but we want to keep the contact with air at a minimum. So, as we take the juice, after the yeast has been added, we filled our containers 2/3 full. We use 3 15-galllon stainless steel kegs, and 7 5-6 gallons glass carboys.



The red just needed to be moved into the appropriate fermentation containers: the syrah into two 44 gallon containers, and the grenache into a 15 gallon container.

Then we divided the yeast among the containers, and added yeast nutrient. For the red we are using Bordeaux, which is described as "producing a distinctive intense berry graham cracker nose, jammy, rich, very smooth complex profile, slightly vinous. Well suited for higher sugar content musts. Alcohol tolerance 14%, residual sugar 0-0.5 %" so whatever that means.....graham cracker throws me a little, but I like graham crackers. Definite plus that this yeast is good for high sugar musts, because the syrah is particularly high. We measured the brix of the must, and it is 25. Using a formula from the Davis monograph, we can figure just a smidge over 14% alcohol content. So, we should be okay with this. We also measured the brix of the Grenache at 21. So, the grenache would be less alcoholic, and take the blend down a bit, too.

Crushing and stemming to James Brown

With classic funk playing in the background, we were crushing/stemming machines. Biggest issue here was making sure we had the appropriate containers for all the wine. Good thing we have neighbors who make wine, too, so we could get an extra 44 gallon barrel. Started with the Riesling, then the syrah and the grenache. We add 1/2 teaspoon potassium metabisulfite to 10 gallons must along with 1 tablespoon pectic enzyme/12 gallons must. The 1000 pounds of Riesling resulted in the usual yield of 100 gallons of must, which fit into two-44 gallons containers, and one-25 gallon container. The syrah went into the one-44 gallon container, and one-10 gallon container, with the Grenache in a single 15 gallon container. They incubated overnight with the pectic enzyme.

Always important is the clean-up. Luckily we have Hose-Man and Squeegee-Girl always willing and able to get the garage/winery spotless.

After the work we were able to enjoy the last bottle of the 2001 Riesling, some of the 2004 Riesling, and the very excellent 2003 Syrah with our cheese, meat and bread.

Round One

The weekend was busy, although it wasn't 1700 pounds, only 1600 pounds....just 100 pounds of grenache.

The Riesling and syrah came through WWAWA, and was delivered to a church parking lot near Magnuson Park. WWAWA delivers in 500 pound bins, so there were two of the Riesling and one of the Syrah. The 100 pounds of Grenache came from California, through Lou Cella.

The measurements from the vineyard for the Syrah: Brix: 26.0, TA .59, pH 3.72
This compares with the Syrah from 2003 Brix: 23.4, TA .54, pH 3.45

Depending on the reference the optimum for reds would be a Brix around 22.5-24.5, TA .6-.8 and pH 3.3 - 3.5 (This is from a great manual that you can get at http://wineserver.ucdavis.edu/content.php?category=Winemaking) , so a little high with the sugar. We can take a reading at the beginning of fermentation and see for ourselves.

For the Riesling the vineyard readings were Brix: 23.8, total acid .71, pH 3.26
this compares with the Riesling from 2001 Brix: 23.2 total acid .69, pH 3.30 (best year)
from 2004 Brix: 22.8 total acid .72, pH 3.27 (okay)
from 2000 Brix: 23.0 total acid .84, ph 3.09 (okay)

I would say this bodes well for the Riesling, it is quite similar to the 2001 readings. The optimum readings, from the same source above for whites: Brix 20.5- 22, TA .8-1.0. pH 3.2-3.4
The brix is higher, but the Steinberg yeast we are using should ferment fairly dry, which is what we want.