Author Archives: Erroll

Racking The Chardonnay

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I’ve had about six gallons (23 liters) of Chardonnay fermenting in two 5-gallon (19 liter) carboys since 10/17/07. That’s when I took delivery of my purchased grapes, 100 lb of Chardonnay and 100 lb of Merlot. I pressed the Merlot on 10/22/07, and racked the Chardonnay a few days ago.

Up to this point, I’ve kept the free run separate from the press wine and I analyzed both of them before I racked.

Free Run – Specific Gravity (SG): 0.992, pH: 3.57, Titratable Acidity (TA): 7.5 g/L
Press – SG: 0.991, pH: 3.72, TA: 7 g/L

Virtually identical except for the pH, which is noticeably higher in the press wine. I decided to rack some of the free run into a 1-gallon jug, and combine the rest of the free run with the press wine in a 5-gallon carboy. The carboy needed topping up, and I used some of my 2005 Riesling and a bottle of “topping wine,” odds and ends form different batches that I combined into a single wine bottle.



Apple Wine Recipe: Surprising increase in acidity

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I racked my apple wine on 11/15/07. It analyzed out as:

Specific Gravity (SG): 0.996, pH: 3.56, Titratable Acidity (TA): 7 g/L

So it had fermented out in less than ten days, but the thing that surprised me was the TA. It rose from 5.5 to 7 g/L when I was expecting it to drop. The wine has only just finished fermenting though, so its probably got quite a bit of carbon dioxide (CO2) dissolved in it. That CO2 will give rise to some carbonic acid and a higher TA. I honestly don’t know if that’s enough to explain the high acidity, but I’ll let it be for a while. As it ages, the CO2 will bleed off and I’ll test (and taste!) it again.



Calibrating A pH Meter: Maybe The New Buffer Solution Will Do

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I racked and measured four batches the other day, and it gave me the opportunity to size up my new buffer solution. I recorded TA values for three of those batches while I was still using my old buffer solution to calibrate my pH meter, and they shouldn’t have changed much. Here are the data:

Name Old Buffer New Buffer
Rhubarb Wine 4/22/07: 6 g/L 11/10/07: 7 g/L
Oregano Wine 8/12/07: 6 g/L 11/10/07: 5.5 g/L
Grocery Store Chablis 8/23/07: 7 g/L 11/10/07: 6 g/L

The old and new measurements are all within 1 g/L. Since I’m measuring my liquid volumes with the plastic syringe that came with my cheap acid test kit, not pipettes or burettes, I don’t think I can claim accuracy better than 1 g/L. So I’m not going to say the new buffer is great, but any error its causing is pretty small.

Racking, Topping Up, And No More Headspace

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Maybe getting caught short, when I racked my mead the other day, was a blessing in disguise. Having half a gallon of mead in a 1-gallon jug, with all that head space threatening to oxidize it, motivated me to rack four other 1-gallon batches. Some of these had been sitting on lees longer than I would like, and it felt really good to look at them, bright and clear with no sediment, in their new containers.

Looks great, smells great, but tastes bland

My Produce Department Chablis is coming along nicely. The aroma is terrific, and it’s bright and clear with the color of a great rose. That’s why the taste is so disappointing. It’s not that there’s an off taste or flaw, but that there’s not much flavor at all. It’s way too early to give up on it, so I’ll put it back in the wine closet and give it some time.

Specific Gravity: 0.990, pH: 3.60, Titratable Acidity: 6 g/L

Oregano Wine: A good first impression

It’s clear, almost colorless, without much aroma, but it’s got a nice flavor. So what does oregano wine taste like? It’s early yet, but it doesn’t taste of oregano. In fact, it reminds me a little of rhubarb wine. Anyway, this is my first oregano wine, and so far, so good!

SG: 0.990, pH: 3.80, TA: 5.5 g/L

The recipe I’m using calls for 3 tsp acid. So far, I’ve added 1 tsp and neutralized some of that to restart a stuck fermentation. So I added another tsp (about 4.9 grams) of tartaric acid. That ought to raise the TA to 6.8 g/L.

Speaking of rhubarb …

I make rhubarb wine every year, from my backyard rhubarb patch, and this is last year’s vintage. I like to let rhubarb wine age for two years, and it can improve for five or more years, but this one is pretty good now.

SG: 0.991, pH: 3.41, TA: 7 g/L

Apple Mead: Last but not least

When I made apple wine this year, I used a juicer on the apples and fermented the juice. Last year, I chopped up the apples and used dry sugar extraction to get the juice out. That means I cut up the apples and put them in a bucket. I covered them with sugar, which “pulled” the moisture out of the apples, and I fermented that. I used the spent apples to make a mead by pouring a honey water mixture over them and pitching yeast. It had a lot of sediment, and I really should have racked earlier. But it’s no worse for the wear, and I’m looking forward to bottling it.

SG: 0.996, pH: 3.33, TA: 6 g/L

Do things happen for a reason? Yes, but sometimes the reason is bad planning

Maybe it’s a good thing I didn’t rack these when I should have. After all, I had a way to use up some of the mead that was half-filling that 1-gallon jug. Or, maybe it was a good thing I didn’t have a half-gallon jug when I racked the mead because that nudged me to rack these wines. Sometimes good intentions are all you need to get you where you want to go. Sometimes they need a little help.

Simple Homemade Sanitizer

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One constant in the din of conflicting advice about winemaking is the importance of sanitizing your equipment. It’s so thoroughly agreed upon and so often mentioned, “sanitize all your equipment then …” that its rarely discussed. If you’re just starting out, how do you know what to use? Homebrewers transitioning to winemaking might be tempted to use bleach.

Don’t use bleach

This isn’t a good idea, because bleach can sometimes give way to “cork taint.” You’ll know it as an off odor and people will talk about it in different ways. If someone is says a wine is “corked,” or talks about TCA or 2,4,6-trichloroanisole they’re talking about a fault in wine that can be traced back to bad natural cork (or bleach!).

DIY Sanitizer for Winemaking

You can’t go wrong by buying a commercial sanitizer like star san or idophor, but I make my own out of citric acid and potassium metabisulfite (K2S2O5). It’s simple, cheap, and effective. Just dissolve three tablespoons (about 45 ml) of citric acid and three tablespoons K2S2O5 in one gallon of water. It gives off a very strong odor so only do it in a well ventilated area (and if you’re allergic to sulfite, go with a commercial product).

This recipe is from Daniel Pambianchi’s Techniques in Home Winemaking, a great book on making wine from grapes. He advises keeping it for only a few weeks because it becomes less effective over time. I believe the use of citric acid, which is optional and enhances the K2S2O5, and a long contact time of 15 minutes can extend it’s useful life to as much as six months.

To use, immerse tubing, stoppers, airlocks, or whatever you want to sanitize for 15 minutes. Pour the unused sanitizer back into the glass jug and keep it tightly stoppered. Discard after six months.

Adding sulfite to your wine

This solution is great when you want to sanitize your winemaking equipment with sulfite, but not for adding sulfite to wine. You need a different concentration for that. See this post on measuring sulfite for winemaking additions.

Racking, Topping Up, And That Extra Little Bit

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When I rack a wine or mead, I try to have empty containers of various sizes ready. The idea is to end up with the smallest number of full containers and the least amount of waste. I use 1-gallon jugs, half-gallon jugs, wine bottles (half, standard, and magnum), beer bottles, and even 8 oz (240 ml) coke bottles. That usually works out pretty well, but I was caught short when I racked my mead the other day.


A 1-gallon jug half-filled with mead.


All that headspace is dangerous, and I really could’ve used a half-gallon jug. What can you do when you just don’t have the right sized containers handy? First I reached for the sulfite. I normally go by the rule of thumb of adding a 1-campden-tablet equivalent every other time I rack. If I added sulfite at the first racking, for example, I would skip it the second time. This was one of the times I skipped the sulfite, so the 5-gallon carboy with the oak did not get any. But I sulfited this 1-gallon jug, and at double the normal rate. That doesn’t make it ok, but it might buy me a little time. Part 2 of my plan is to rack other wines and meads in the next day or two and combine this mead with them. I might use it to top some of them up, or combine extras from many different batches, including this one, into one container.

So work with what you have, but then put a “plan B” into action right away.

A Simple Mead Recipe: Acid and oak

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How much acid?

I looked in on my mead the other day. It was clearing and had thrown some sediment. It was dry, with a specific gravity of 0.996. The pH, at 3.39, was low enough to protect the mead, but the titratable acidity was only 3.5 g/L. Titration will overstate the amount of acid in mead, so that 3.5 g/L figure is really an upper limit. Still, it’s better to have incomplete data than no data. If I were aiming for 7 g/L, that would mean adding 3.5 g/L. I don’t think I want to (more than) double the acid all at once, so I decided to at about 1.3 g/L, which should raise the TA to 4.8 g/L. How did I come up with 1.3 g/L? It just so happens to be 1 tsp/Gallon, which I have found, by tasting, to improve lifeless meads. I’ll test, and taste, again later to see if it needs more.

How much oak?

I decided to oak this batch of mead, and for me that means adding oak chips. I’ve been curious about barrels, but I don’t think they’re worth the trouble and expense. I’ve found that 1 g/L of oak chips adds enough character to white wines without overpowering them. For this batch of mead, I’ll actually use about 1.3 g/L. There’s that magic number again.

Oak on the scale

It turns out that the smallest increment that my kitchen scale will measure is 25 grams, and 25 grams in 5 gallons (19 liters) is about 1.3 g/L.

Toasting the oak

Whether it’s in the form of barrels or chips, oak is usually toasted before it’s used in winemaking. Barrels may be toasted by an open flame, but I’ll put my oak chips in the oven and broil at 400F (204C) for 45 minutes.

Toasted oak chips

Here’s how they look when they’re done. The oak chips in the casserole, on the right, were toasted. The ones on the left were not.

Now we wait some more

I added the 25g of toasted oak chips to a new sanitized carboy. Then I dissolved 25g of tartaric acid, and added that to the carboy. After I siphoned the mead off it’s sediment and into the new carboy, it looked like this.

Oak in the mead

You can see the oak chips floating on top in the neck of the carboy. In time, they’ll sink to the bottom. Oak chips are normally left in wine or mead for a few weeks, but I prefer to use a smaller amount and leave them in for a long time – six months to a year. This way, I’m more fully extracting the flavor and tannin from the oak. After that, I’ll test and taste to see if it needs more acid, then rack off the oak.

Calibrating A pH Meter: Buffer Solution

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What is a buffer solution?

You need to calibrate your pH meter for it to work properly, but to do that, you need to immerse it in a solution of known pH. Buffer solutions are the way out of that little chicken and egg problem. These are made of precisely measured ingredients that combine to form a solution of known, and highly stable, pH. It would be pretty tough for most home winemakers to make their own buffer solution, so it’s a good thing that they’re widely available at homebrew shops.

Not all buffers are created equal

I was out of pH 4 buffer, and bought some more from a local shop. The first difference I noticed, between the new and old solutions, was the color – the new one was pink and the old one was colorless. There were two other differences, though, that were more significant. Each solution came with a temperature table that indicated the precise pH, to two decimal places, at a given temperature. The old solution listed the pH from 0C to 95C in 5 degree increments, and over that wide range the pH varied from 4.00 to 4.22. The new solution listed the pH at 20C (pH = 4.02) and 30C (pH = 4.99). The detail and temperature stability of the old solution gave me a lot of confidence. The new one is … pink.

How to shop for buffer solution

My pH meter had been pretty steady, often needing no adjustment at all between uses. When it had drifted, it was only by 0.02 or 0.03. So I was taken aback to see my pH meter read 3.74 when I first put it in the new solution. Maybe the meter drifted by that much since the last time I used it, but maybe the pH of these two “pH 4” buffers differed by 0.26. I was out of the old solution, so I couldn’t check this. The new solution is fresher, so it’s possible that the old one drifted over time, but I’ve got my doubts about the new one. Live and learn. The next time I buy buffer solution, and that’s going to be pretty soon, I’ll try to find out when it was made and how much detail is in the temperature table.

Update 5/13/2012 – Hanna buffers are my favorite

I’ve been calibrating my pH meter for five years now, and I’ve bought various brands of buffer solution. I keep going back to Hanna. I’m not a chemist, but the detailed temperature corrections and the small drift give me a sense that theirs is a cut above. They’re readily available at good prices too, so for whatever it’s worth this is what I buy.

Apple Wine Recipe

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I got my start in winemaking by fermenting apple juice. I bought 1-gallon glass jugs, filled with juice, for less than homebrew shops were selling them empty. This got me a collection of small secondary fermenters and some nice dry white wine. I still make apple wine, almost every year, from my own apple trees and store bought juice. The apple juice will be low in acid and fermentable sugar, so I’ll have to add both. I’m using honey as my sugar source this year, but ordinary table sugar works too.

Apples on a kitchen scale reading just over 4 lb and Trader Joe's Gravenstein apple juice. The main ingredients of my apple wine.

Ingredients

4 lb 1.5 oz Liberty & Akane apples
1 Gallon Trader Joe’s Graventein Apple Juice
0.5 tsp tanninTannin is optional, but no more than 0.25 tsp/gallon
honey to SG 1.090
acid to 6-7 g/L in the finished wine
sulfite to 50 ppm (equivalent to 1 campden tablet)
1 tsp pectic enzyme
Premier Cuvee yeast from starter

Procedure

Since the Gravenstein juice is pasteurized, there’s no threat from microorganisms. So I’ll chop & juice the apples and add all the sulfite to this juice, where it’s needed most. I’ll add the pectic enzyme to the Gravenstein juice, combine them, and measure the SG, pH, & TA. I’ll raise the SG to 1.090 by adding honey.

Juice from 4 lb of apples fills a plastic measuring cup to the 4-cup line.

Here’s where the juicer that I used making my Produce Department Chablis came in handy. It made short work of the 4 lb of apples I threw at it. It does clog often, but it’s so much better than the other methods I’ve tried (sugar extraction, blender, mill & press without an actual mill or press, chop & toss in the fermenter).

Measure sugar & acid and add the honey

The apples yielded 1 quart (just under 1 liter) of juice. Adding it to the one gallon of Trader Joes juice gave me 1.25 gallons. This combined juice had an SG of 1.050, a pH of 3.52, and a TA of 5.5 g/L. Added a cup of this juice to the 2 cups of starter (Niagra juice with Premier Cuvee yeast that I used to start the Merlot and Chardonnay).

Honey, with 18% water, has an SG of 1.417. Converting my 1.25 gallons to metric measures, I have 4.7312L of 1.050 must. Adding 0.5785L honey will yield 5.31L of SG 1.090 must. I’ll round and call it 0.6L honey.

I’ll wait to add the acid

My 4.7L of juice had 5.5 g/L of titratable acidity, or about 26 grams of acid in total. Adding 0.6L of honey brought the total volume to 5.3L. A typical white wine must would have about 8 g/L, so my 5.3L ought to have about 42 grams of acid. Assuming no contribution from the honey, I would need to add about 16 grams of acid to reach my goal. I think I’ll wait for it to ferment out, take another reading and adjust the acid then. Acidity often drops during fermentation, and I’ll aim for 6-7 g/L, as tartaric, in the finished wine.

Other apple wine recipes

Growing your own apples gives you more control (you pick the varietal, decide when to harvest, and so on). Here’s an apple wine recipe using 100% home grown apples!

On the other hand, making wine from store-bought juice is quicker and easier. Much quicker and easier. So if you’re just starting out or you just want great apple wine with less work and cleanup, try my apple wine recipe from store-bought juice.

Just Do It

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I’ve got a freezer full of rhubarb, tomatoes, and grapes. They, and the apples in my refrigerator, are all destined to become wine. What’s the holdup? Chemicals. I need more sodium hydroxide (NaOH) to do acid titration and buffer solution to calibrate my pH meter. If I’d ordered them online, they’d have arrived by now and I’d be in business. Instead I decided I needed them fast, so I’d just pop down to the local homebrew shop and pick them up. I don’t know why I keep putting it off. Who wouldn’t jump at the chance to sit in even more traffic or squeeze into a crowded parking lot? I could order them today, of course, but then I’d have to wait for them to be delivered …