Yikes!

Today we pressed the Cabernet franc. We hadn't taken any readings, and although the fermentaion had been pretty active, we thought we could leave it on the skins a little longer to get a little more flavor extraction. We tested the brix, and it was essentially zero. Then we tasted....."yikes!" said Charlie...."yuck" said Bitsy. So we decided to press. It was pretty quick and we divided the 8 gallons of juice into two 5 gallon carboys. It is really young, and dry, and fairly acidic.

Here are some pictures of the Pinot Gris and Gewurtztraminer, both as grapes and as juice. Both pressed out with some a rosey hue, especially the Pinot. Now the juice is pretty much yellow, and fermenting actively. It will be interesting to see as they clear up.

First the Pinot Gris:














and the Gewurtztraminer:

On 30 September, we pressed the Syrah. The brix in both fermentors was 10.5. We pressed 44 gallons of juice, which we put into 3-15 gallon stainless steel kegs. Took Riesling brix, and it was 19, down from 22.8 at the beginning.

On 19 October We added the Oenococcus(Leuconostoc)oenii culture for malolactate fermentation. We started the culture in apple juice; grew it up for a day or so, and then inoculated the three stainless steel kegs of syrah. Also we added the Stavin American oak cubes, 8 ounces to each keg.

On 21 October we picked up the 100 pound lots of Gewurtztaminer, Pinot Gris, and Cabernet Franc and crushed and stemmed all. The field readings were:

Gewurtz Brix 23.3 TA 0.70 pH 3.37
Pinot Gris Brix 22.4 TA 0.72 pH 3.30
Cab franc Brix 22.7 TA 0.65 pH 3.74

On 22 October we pressed the whites, and got 8 gallons of Pinot Gris, and 7.5 gallons of Gewurtz. We added the yeast: Chablis which we obtained from Wyeast, and had been growing up in apple juice for 24 hours. Added the a culture of Bordeaux yeast that we had used with the Syrah to the Cabernet franc. We had set aside about 100 ml of the yeast culture from when we were making the syrah, and refrigerated. We added to 1/4 gallon of apple juice and incubated, and came out just fine.

Took Brix on the Riesling: 7.5, tasted sweet, but very characteristic. Should be good. We racked into 3 6 gallon carboys, and 3 5 gallon carboys; reduced the airspace considerably.

Took Brix of the Syrah, and it was down to 0.0. Thinking that even in a couple of days, the malolactic had been working.

How we blend

The blend we just bottled was blended and put in the kegs in April. We think it came out really good, and you can see why when you see some of the images of us on the mix day...It was Easter Sunday and we all wore our Easter bonnets.........somehow not everyone got in the pictures, but they were appropriately attired as well.

Charlie's Angels (or Terry and the Pirates?)

Started the Riesling press at Sunday (9/24/06) morning 9 am with Charlie and his Angels, or Terry and his Pirates, depending on what you call Mister Mahan.....

The Riesling was pretty juicy, put it in 8 carboys with ample head room for fermentation; and got a yield of somewhere around 35 gallons.

Measured the Brix of the Syrah and was 21, which was down from 22 on 9/23; fermentation was going fine, but still needed to dilute to get the sugar down.

But for Charlie and the Angels, it was out on the Piazza for coffee.

Riesling

500 pounds of Riesling (WWAWA) came on September 16. Again, we were notified on Wednesday, but didn't head out to the Cellar (http://www.cellar-homebrew.com/store/catalog/) for yeast until Friday. We did learn something from the previous week; I called ahead and made sure they have the Rudsheimer that we were wanting, and they had one left.....

The fruit looked great, as you can see. The readings were good: Brix 22.8, TA 0.72 and pH 3.14. The Davis monograph would have the brix be 20.5-22, TA 8-10, and pH 3.2 - 3.4, but our previous good rieslings were not necessarily in this range. Charles, Dr Z and Elaine picked up in the morning and dropped off at the 31st Street Alley winery, and the Z's went off to exercise. We headed up to the Cellar, again, to get acid blend and a hydrometer--hadn't really been able to measure the syrah, since we had appeared to have misplaced the hydrometer. We were thinking we needed to manipulate the syrah and decrease the sugar levels before we would get too much alcohol in the must and it would not ferment to as much dryness as we would want.


Stemming and crushing was done quickly, although there was a bit of a shuffle making sure we had enough containers; the two big 44 gallon fermentors were full of the Syrah. We ended up fitting the must into the two smaller fermentors to sit overnight. We cleaned all the carboys for the next day's pressing of the Riesling. And then, of course retired to Piazza Bitsini for refreshment.

Wine Time Again

It's fall, and time for grapes. They came early this year, and we have been working hard on Syrah, Riesling, and our red blend from last year.

The syrah arrived on September 16 from WWAWA. We got the call on Wednesday evening, and had to make sure we had everything we needed. We decided, based on previous years to use Wyeast yeast (http://www.wyeastlab.com/winery/wineryprod.htm) and in particular, the Bordeaux strain. Had some fun getting it: we went to the Cellar to get it Thursday evening. They didn't have any, but Brian, the owner, called Mountain Homebrew (http://www.mountainhomebrew.com/) to see if they had any, and he would pick it up that evening on his way home, and he would bring into work the next day and we would pick it up Friday evening. Because we didn't need to add the yeast until Sunday, it would have ample time to grow up. So Charlie road his motorcycle out there Friday afternoon after work, and Brian wasn't there and there was no yeast....Charlie let them know that we needed it, (we had already paid for it) and lo and behold the Wyeast delivery came in with 8 packages of Bordeaux, but all going to one customer. Well, one of Brian's customers only got 7 packages. It was time for that customer to learn how to grow the yeast up.

So the grapes: the Brix was quite high: 27, and Jerry Warren gave instructions on how to modify by adding water, and then adding acid blend back to bring up the acid. More on that later. Total acid came in at .62, and pH was 3.56. Optimum for reds is 22.5-24.5 Brix, 6-8 TA and 3.3-3.5 pH (http://wineserver.ucdavis.edu/content.php?category=Winemaking ) But for the 16th we were most concerned with steaming and crushing. Dr Z, Miss Elaine, Charles and I got them babies crushed in less than 2 hours. Then we had breakfast at Rudy's here in Magnolia, and it was quite delightful. Headed to the farmer's market and picked up some things then back to work.

By this time it was afternoon, and it was time to bottle last year's red blend. The Zobersts were able come and join the fun.

We had done three blends in each of the stainless steel kegs:
#1: 4:1 2005 Syrah to 2004 Cabernet Sauvingnon with French Oak
#2 3:1:1:1 2005 Syrah, 2005 Grenache, 2004 Cabernet Franc, 2004 Cabernet Sauvingnon with French Oak
#3 3:1:1:1 same as above, but with American Oak.

The oak was from Stavin (http://www.stavin.com/homewines/products.htm), and worked well.

We bottled over 18 cases (just over 6 cases for each blend), so each couple got 2 cases plus a few bottles of each blend.


By this time we were hungry, and we had Creamy Sausuage Pasta, using the Faure/Mahan homemade Italian Sausage. Rounded it out with a salad and bread, and the Ziegler/Zedella's brought a couple of excellent bottles of Quilceda Creek Cabernet Sauvingon...late '80's vintages, I believe (http://www.quilcedacreek.com/). We enjoyed the meal on the Piazza Bitsini

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.