corkscrew

"The Corkscrew, a useful key to unlock the storehouse of wit, the treasury of laughter, the front door of fellowship, and the gate of pleasant folly". (Author unknown)

Racking to Barrels & Aging

Racking. Pressing the grapes after fermentation produces liquid (wine) and a variety of solids (dead yeast cells, or tiny bits and pieces of grape skins, or grape tissue). This solid material can add "off" flavors, so it is important to separate the wine from the solids as quickly as possible. The solids are referred to as "Lees". The solid due to their weight naturally will fall to the bottom on
the storage containers. There are some materials that can be added to the wine to force the particles of solids to cling together. If you've attended any Winery tours, you may have heard tour guides refer to Egg Whites being added in the past.
Racking essentially is drawing the wine off the top of the solids and moving it to another storage container. Commercial winery's use stainless steel tanks and use filters to separate our the solids. Homewinemakers typically use glass carboys to temporarily store the wine. By using Glass you can see the solids sitting on the bottom of the glass container. The wine can be moved by placing a clear plastic tube in the wine, and creating a suction to draw the fluid to a separate container. I usually use a gravity feed system. A electric pump can be used, but this (to me) seems to bring in too much Oxygen.

Typically I'll rack the Wine two or three times over a six week period. After six weeks, the majority of the solids have been removed, and it's time to move the wine to a long term storage vessel. This can be a stainless steel tank, an old Beer Keg, Glass Carboys, or Oak Barrels. Carboy's come in a variety of sizes, as small as a couple of gallons up to about 7 gallons. I have Oak barrels that have a 15 gallon, 30 gallon, and 60 gallon capacity. There are larger sizes as well, but those are strictly for commercial use.

Oak barrels are very expensive. A French Oak 60 gallon barrel can cost as much as $800 per barrel. I'll do a separate post of barrels as that is a whole topic in itself. The positive side, is that Wine barrels will continue to impart Oak flavor for about 5 years, however the amount of Oak influence declines over time. A brand new barrel, will add Oak characteristics quickly, which means wine needs to be moved to a nuetral barrel sometime before the wine is bottled. A nuetral barrel is an Oak Barrel that no longer imparts Oak flavor, so this is a barrel typically older than 5 years old.

So, when Racking is done, I move the clear wine to the Oak barrels for aging. I will store the wine in Oak for a minimum of one year, and as long as 18 months. The decision on how long to leave the wine in Oak is tied to the age of the barrel, and just sampling the wine over a number of months to see how it is changing in flavor and character. Since I use some nuetral Barrels for aging, I have to add some new Oaks chips, or "berries" to the barrel to ensure Oak flavor is added to the wine.

Oaks barrels, chips, or berries are toasted under a flame. This adds a sweet caramel hint of flavor. Coopers (experts that make Wine Barrels), toast the barrels in various degrees. It depends upon the barrel manfacturer, but typically you can get a light toast, a medium toast or a heavy toast. More on this later.

Since the barrels are wood, they are prone to evaporation, so I have to add the equivalent of a bottle of wine a month to the barrel, during the aging process. This wine comes from leftover wine I have placed in carboys during the aging process.
As an example, if I harvest 500 lbs of grapes I will get close to 38 - 40 gallons of wine. I will move 30 gallons to Oak, and put the remainder into a 5 gallons carboy, and individual Gallon jugs. All with airtight caps. I will take one of the gallon jugs and fill 4 - 5 individual wine bottles and cork them. As the Wine Barrels lose wine to evaporation, I will "top off" the barrels once a month with one of these wine bottles. When I run out of bottled wine, I break down another gallon jug.

That's enough for now. More later.

Court? A Convervative Decision!!!!

What do the Wingnuts have to say about this one?

The answer? They won't say Dick.

High school exit exam reinstated
SAN FRANCISCO - The California Supreme Court on Wednesday reinstated the state exit exam as a graduation requirement, but it was unclear whether the decision means 47,000 high school seniors who failed the test won’t graduate this year.

Emerging Wingnut Election Platform

"We suck, but they (the Dem's) suck more". As in:

"We're butchering the management of the Iraq War, but the Dem's are wimps, and the voters know we're always happy to Bomb somebody".

"We're corrupt and on the take from Lobbyists, but you know some Dem's are being caught with their hands in the Cookie Jar too, so it just comes with the territory".

"We've been caught lying to the American public on repeated occasions, but the lies are only about unimportant things, and we wouldn't lie about anything REALLY important, besides Slick Willie lied about a BJ!!!!!?"

"We really Support our Troops more than the Dem's because we never miss an opportuntity to tell America so, at every photo/camera/media opportunity. The Dem's don't like our Troops because they want to pull out of Iraq."

"We know what America really wants better than the Dem's. We know you want low taxes, God, No Gay marriage, the Freedom to carry a Bazooka on the gun rack of your pick em up truck, and good cheap goods at Walmart. The Dem's? They just want to Tax you, Teach Gay is OK in the schools, and celebrate the 4th of July by Burning the American Flag! "

Cleanliness & Blending

I can't emphasize enough the need to keep the wine making equipment and general area "clean as a whistle". Once a wine batch starts to go, there is no way to save it. I have learned the hard way, and basically poured at least 100 gallons of wine into the ground over the years.

Chemistry is crucial. I have posted a number of times about additives to keep the PH and Acid in balance, plus you have to add SO2 at regular intervals to prevent any chance of bacteria getting involved.

Blending. An Art for sure. A few years back after fermentation, extended maceration, pressing, racking, etc, I had about 75 gallons of Zinfandel to put into Oak. I had a brand new American Oak 30 gallon barrel, a 3 year old 30 gallon French Oak barrel, and a 4 year old 15 gallon French Oak barrel. I filled each barrel with wine from the same batch, same vineyard, same harvest day, same yeast used. 18 months later I was ready to bottle. I barrel tasted wine from each barrel and each tasted totally different. Each had significant characteristics, and each had holes or incomplete aspects. So, I invited friends over and I pulled out about a 20 ounce sample out of each barrel, labeled them, and then we each started blending them in various percentages. We took copious notes. This was an amazing learning experience. Adding even 5% of one wine to another cause a profound change in flavor, and complexity. We decided on a blend to optimize the flavor and this produced an exceptional wine, while wine from each individual barrel was ordinary at best.

6 months ago, my neighbor who I make wine with, had two 30 gallon barrels of wine he wanted to pour out. One was 30 gallons of Primitivo, and the other was 30 gallons of Zinfandel. I did some blending experiments. I had some Petite Sirah, that was dense dark, and very fruity. In doing just a few blending experiments I came across a blend of 45% Primitivo, 45% Zinfandel, and 10% Petite Sirah, that produced an amazing wine. We bottled every thing up, and this blend is always the first one friends ask for.

Sacrifice

Sacrifice - Forefeiture of something highly valued for the sake of one thought to have a greater value or claim.

Bonehead - A stupid person, a dunce.

These recent Tax Cuts are bonehead. Our Prez is the only Prez in the history of this Nation to repeatedly cut taxes during times of War. If we are truly fighting Terrorism, then as a Nation we have to make sacrifices for this.

So the Rich get Richer, and we are Taxing our Armed Forces with their lives. We are taxing our Children, Grand Children, and Great Grand Children with Debts we cannot pay.

We have had many great, and intelligent leaders in this Country. Is our Prez trying to tell us he is smarter than every War Prez before him? The truth is this Nation has been sold out for a Pot of Gold. Where is the OUTRAGE?

Fermentation to Pressing

"Forsake not an old friend, for the new is not comparable unto him. A new friend is as new wine: when it is old thou shalt drink it with pleasure."

Oxygen is wine's number one enemy. Fermentation produces CO2 as a byproduct, the veil of CO2 over the fermenting wine acts as a barrier and protects the young wine from the exposure to Oxygen. Some CO2 actually dissolves into the wine during the fermentation process. Wine will continue to release CO2 after fermentation is complete. It is important that the grapes/fermented wine combo be pressed before the CO2 is fully dissapated, such that the exposure to Oxygen is minimized.

There are a couple of ways to detect this. Primarily you can check the specific gravity of the wine on a daily basis, measuring the drop in sugar level. A complimentary step is to watch the floating cap of grape skins on the wine. It is kept floating by the CO2 being released. The first hint that the cap is starting to settle, is the best time to press the grapes.

My neighbor and I purchased a grape press manufactured in San Francisco about 80 years ago. It still works fine, and obviously it was built to last.

A typical manually operated grape press has a three legged, chair type base with a curved lip on all sides, except for one opening to allow wine to come out. Up the middle of the chair basic come a heavy, steel, threaded pole, extending up 30 - 36" from the seat base. A round wooden slatted cage (in two semi circle halves) is placed upright on the inside edge of the chair lip. The wooden slats extend vertically. This unit is assembled, a 5 gallon bucket placed at the mouth of the base to capture wine.

The fermented wine and grape skins are then scooped our of their fermenation vessels, and essentially poured into the opening of the wooden cage. The free run wine escapes between the gaps in the slats and runs into the 5 gallon bucket. The gap between each slat is no more than 3/8". Wine/grape skins continue to be added until the wooden cage is filled to the top. Think of a giant Life Saver candy, but in this case made of wood, heavy oak, that has been cut in half. This is want goes on top of the grape skins, inside the slats, surrounding the steel threaded pole. The oak is probably 2 - 3" thick. A heavy ratchet unit is then threaded on top of steel pole and screwed down until in contact with the heavy wooden Life Savor. Basically at this point a pipe is inserted into the ratchet, and you crank the ratchet back and forth pressing downward, pushing the wine throw the wooden slats.

Initially this is easy work, but it becomes very difficult work. 500lbs of grapes will end up producing close to 40 gallons of wine, including sediment, which might be 2 - 3 gallons worth. This sediment is largely the expired yeast cells.

When you are done pressing, what is left is a very dense, round, flattened mass of grape skins, and grade seeds. If done properly this cake is practically bone dry or close to it.

All of the pressed wine is transferred to an airtight glass, steel, or food grape plastic vessel. The the wine is allowed to settle. At this point the PH, is tested again. PH never drops during fermentation. Some of the acid are converted during the process so you may lose acidity. Testing is required to make sure the acidity has not gone above PH 3.5, and if it has, then Tartaric Acid has to be added to lower the PH down to 3.5 or less. Another by product of fermentation is the production of Malic Acid. Malic Acid naturally breaks down in wine over time, but you can accelerate this conversion by adding a malolactic bacteria culture that feeds only on Malic Acid. Malic Acid is unstable, and you do not want to bottle this until the Malic acid has been fully converted. The Malolactic culture will do this conversion in a few weeks, instead of waiting 6 - 9 months to have it done naturally.

Over the next few weeks, loose solids will settle to the bottom of the storage vessels. These are called "Lees". Every week or so, you have to pump off the clear wine off of the Lees. This is called Racking. This is important because the Lees can impact off odors, and flavors to the wine. Racking typically is completed over a couple of weeks and the wine is ready to be placed in an Oak Barrel for aging.

Harvest to Fermentation

Da Sleepmeister has 140 vines as I have previously mentioned. 60 Cabernet Sauvignon, 50 Zinfandel, 30 Petite Sirah, and 10 Petite Verdot. All Red Grapes, and yes, I only make Red Wine. I also buy grapes from a couple of different growers. This past year, I purchases some Barbera, and Syrah grapes from Rock Wall Vineyards. Excellent quality, and these wines are just HUGE.

FYI. Mature Vines each produce a half a gallon of wine at least. So, in an average year, I will get 70 gallons of wine from vineyard. The rule of thumb is that you will get about 4.5 bottles per gallon, after some loss due to evaporation, barrel tastings, etc. The barrels are oak, so yes they do evaporate water throught the wood, but this only adds to the depth of flavor.

Harvest. I like to harvest grapes when the Brix is 26+ and the PH level is close to 3.5. Starting around September 1, I test each of my rows for sugar content and acid levels once a week.

I have harvested as early as the second week of September, and as late as the third week of October. It all depends on the weather and the relative vigor of the vines.
Obviously a hot summer will cause the vines to ripen sooner. Another factor is that the damn vines grown like weeds. If left unattended the vines will just grow too many leaves, and will send off many secondary shoots. The problem is the plant devotes too much energy for leave growth, and this extends the growing season. I try to limit each grow shoot to 16 - 18 leaves. I have to constantly pinch off secondary shoots, and pinch the end of the primary shoot to limit the growth.

The first clue the grape vines provide to you that they are starting to ripen is when veraison (?spelling) starts. This is when the grape color starts to change from green to red. The rule of thumb is that 6 weeks after this starts, the grapes will be ready to harvest. As well during this time, I selectively pull off leaves that cover portions of the grape clusters such that you get even sun exposure to the whole clusters which aids in even ripening. Also at this time I have to apply Bird Netting to the vines. Robins, Blue Birds, Swallows, Finches, etc, all love ripe grapes, and if unattended they would strip a ripening vineyard in a week. I lost my first harvest this way. Still they end up getting about 5% of the crop anyway as they peck through the netting. I also lost probably 400 lbs of grapes to racoons three years ago.

When we harvest, we invite friends and family over, and we get started early in the morning when it is still relatively cool, say 7AM. Everyone gets a row, pruning shears, and a 15 gallon plastic tub to drop the cut grapes in. We use different color coded plastic tubs to ensure we don't mix the varietals.

After all the grapes are harvested, we load them into the back of my pick em up truck, and drive to my next door neighbors house, where the grape processing equipment is stored. We weigh each plastic tub, and record the yield grape varietal, by grape varietal. Next, we group the color coded tubs together, and dump the grapes into an italian made crusher/destemmer. Basically this machine pulls the individual grapes from the stems and also removes the leaves. The partially crushed grapes and released "free run" juice flow into another plastic tub. Then we take this and dump it into a 50 gallon "food grade" plastic white container. When all the grapes are processed we have multiple separate varietals in their own fermentation container. I then test the PH and sugar content of each. I have an electronic PH meter, where I place an electrode in the juice, and it tells me the PH. I test the sugar level, by getting about 5 ounces of free run juice, and pouring it into a tall narrow cylinder. I then drop an hydrometer into the juice. The hydrometer (from your high school chemistry) measures the specific gravity of the juice and tells me the sugar level, and what the expected alcohol level will be after fermentation.

After this, I may adjust the acid level a tad by adding granulated Tartaric Acid (naturally occuring in grapes), to ensure the PH is 3.5 or lower. Next I add some
sulphur dioxide to kill any bacteria, or any wild yeast. This is maybe a teaspoon of this stuff. You mix is all together, then cover the containers for 24 hours. 24 hours later, I add carefully selected wine yeasts. There are hundreds of em. Since I harvest at Brix 26+, I have to ensure I select a yeast that can handle an alcohol level of 14% plus. Plus the yeasts I select bring out a strong berry/fruity aroma.

If I chose to ferment outdoors, the fermentation would finish in less than a week. I choose to ferment in a basement where it is cooler, and slows the fermentation. This allows the fermentation to take about 3 weeks. This is also known as extended maceration. A slower fermentation helps build a solid tannin structure for aging potential, and also helps bring out a deeper red color.

A natural by product of fermentation is CO2 and heat. An active fermentation can make the juice look like it is boiling. It doesn't get that hot, but the temperature can get above 95 degrees, which in my mind is too hot, and can give the wine a "cooked" flavor. You can control the temperature, by fermenting in a cool place, and also punching down the cap. The cap is loose grape skins. Since CO2 is released during fermentation, this gas pushes the grape skins to the surface of the wine. This creates an insulating barrier, and prevents the heat from escaping so this raises the temperature of the fermenting wine. So I take a gold old "clean" garden hoe, and push the cap down into the liquid, releasing heat, and CO2. Plus pushing down the cap, helps increase the grape skin to juice contact helps extract color.

Next I'll move on to more testing, and pressing the grapes, but that is another post.

Growing update, and Harvesting

All of the rain this year, has ensured that the water table is high in the ground, and combined with a week of hot temperatures, the vines are showing explosive growth.

Too much so. The vines are pushing out growth shoots all over the place. I spent at least 3 hours this weekend pulling suckers, or unwanted growth shoots.

Professional growers typically try to harvest all their grapes from a given vineyard in the same day. A couple of few tests are used in conjunction to determine when to harvest the grapes.

First is taking a sampling of individual grapes from various spots in the vineyard and just tasting them. It is up the individual doing the tasting to decide what they are looking for in terms of flavor. Next is picking say a dozen individual grapes from random spots in the vineyard, then squeezing the juice into a container, mixing up the juice, then testing it for sugar level (Brix), and the acidity of the juice. It is very important that there is an important balance between the sugar level, and the acidity. Typically when the sugar level in the grape is low, the acid level is high. As the grape ripens and the grapes add more sugar the acidity begins to drop.

This balance can change rapidly. At some point as well, a grape vine will stop directing energy to the grape cluster, and in essence shut off the nutrient supply. The stem connecting the cluster to the vine will turn brown, and at this point the valve is turned off.

Water is nuetral between acidity and akalinity. PH is how acid/akalinity levels are measured. Water is a PH of 7.0, and this is considered nuetral. Acidity is important in wine making, because it contributes to crispness of flavor, it helps solidify the structure of the wine, and the right level of acidity prevents bacteria growth. Grape growers monitor the acid level of the grapes and look for a PH in the range of 3.3 - 3.5 when trying to decide when to harvest.

Acid levels are tested using a series of chemicals in certain proportions to measure the Acidity. Much in the same way Swimming Pool water is tested for PH levels.

Every grape varietal ripens a bti differently. Some ripen early in the season, and others require much more sunlight or degree days.

Sugar. In order to provide a minimum structure/stability to a wine, it needs about 12% alcohol. A Brix (sugar) level of about 22 - 23 will produce 12+% alcohol.
Brix/sugar levels can be tested with a refractometer. It's a small handheld tool.
Basically you take a drop of fresh juice squeezed from a grape, onto a glass prism. A plastic flap then covers the drop of juice. You then look an eyepiece and examine the sunlight that flows through the grape juice covering your prism. The unit has a small scale that shows how the Brix level of the juice based upon how if filters the light. It is a relatively simple exercise.

The dilemna is that every vineyard ripens inconsistently. Grape clusters at the end of a row of grapes will ripen more quickly than clusters in the middle of a row. Even all the clusters on a single vine will ripen at different rates. As such a professional grape grower, when the choosing a time to harvest, will have some combination of perfectly ripe grapes, overripe grapes, and underripe grapes. They pick a time to harvest and then they clear the whole field. This is typically done very early in the morning. Once any fruit is harvested, a natural by product is to produce more sugar. Buying green banana's as an example then a few days later, they are sweeter and softer. Plus heat accelerates this sugar conversion, so the grapes are harvested when it's cool ideally.

I don't harvest all at once. I only harvest what is ripe. The last few years I have harvested by vineyard in thirds. I have learned which area of my vineyard ripens first, then I harvest just that area. Maybe a week later another portion of my vineyard is ready, and I harvest that next. Lastly, it still may be a few days later, or another week or two, then I'll harvest my last section of my vineyard.

This means I have to ferment each batch at different times, and believe it or not, each batch of grapes will produce it's own unique flavor and characteristics.

More to follow on this.

Harvest Year 2006

2005, was an incredible year. Just about perfect growing conditions. Professional Winemakers have referred to this past harvest as maybe the best in the last 35 years in California.

2006 is likely to be bad for Valley growers due to all the rain. Foothill growers should be ok due to adequate drainage.

January, February, March. I added some amendments to the soil (lime - calcium carbonate) as my soil is too acidic, and I also added a low nitrogen fertilizer to help the vines through the winter and it also helps stimulate root growth. I use IRONTITE, which also has a small percentage of compound that helps with fruit set on the vine.

April. Pruning. I have a stack of cuttings that is probably 4 ft x 4 ft x 4 ft.
I have taken some pruning clinics. The vines don't always comply, so you have to train them to grow the way you want them to grow. Ideally you want one to two growth buds on your cordon spread 4 to 5 inches apart. The fewer number of buds means reduced crop size and limits the growth. I try to have no more than 16 - 18 growth shoots per plant tops. That means you could have 16 - 18 clusters per plant, but that places too much of a strain on the vine, so you are supposed to thin your crop (drop crop), so maybe you get 10 or so clusters.

I spray the cuts with a low soap solution, to help prevent disease or bacteria from invading the cut, and weakening the vine.

May. The buds have opened and the early flower clusters are forming. The vines always produce far more buds that I want, and they produce them in spots you don't want, so you have to remove them. Believe it or not, I walk through the vineyard every day for a month, pinching off grow shoots that are unwanted. This takes 4 - 5 hours a week.

June/July/August/September/October. More later.

Inspired by others

After surfing the blogosphere, I've decided to post about something near and dear to my heart. I'll try to run through the lifecycle of winemaking, and give you a first hand view of the experience

I am a home vintner. I am a farmer, and I am a winemaker. These are my among my primary hobbies. A creative outlet so to speak. In a given year, I devote hundreds upon hundreds of hours tending the vines, pruning, pinching, training, fertilizing, dropping crop (thinning), cutting off wings (reducing the size of clusters).

I have 140 or so grapevines planted on a half acre of hillside land, southwestern facing, in the Sierra Foothills. The elevation here is about 2000 ft. All the vines are trellised. All the rows have been hand dug by myself, or my sons. It has taken the better part of 10 years to complete this work. The soil is a combination of rock, clay, with a little topsoil mixed in. Digging out the rows raises more questions than answers about the origins of the soil that you uncover shovel by shovel. Occasionally I come across ash levels, they provide evidence of past flash fires that roared through this land. I will find pockets of beautiful soil, and I wonder where that came from.

I do my best to amend the soil to ensure there are proper nutrients for the vines. Yet I have learned that grape vines need to struggle. In essence they are like weeds, as they will just about grow anywhere, however you need to keep them alive without coddling them too much. The more they struggle (within limits), the more likely they can produce special flavors.

Healthy robust, heavy bearning vines, produce ordinary wine. Vines that produce grapes grudgingly, produce someting very special.

Morality & Liberty

"The Hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who remain nuetral in times of great moral conflict". (Dante, I believe)

“We have, in fact, two kinds of morality side by side; one which we preach but do not practice, and another which we practice but seldom preach.”
(Bertrand Russell)

“Morality is contraband in war.” (Mahatma Gandhi)

“Morality is the best of all devices for leading mankind by the nose”
(Friedrich Nietzsche)

"It is easy to perform a good action, but not easy to acquire a settled habit of performing such actions" (Aristotle)

"I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations" (James Madison)

"Liberty has never come from government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of government. The history of liberty is a history of resistance. The history of liberty is a history of limitations of government power, not the increase of it" (Woodrow Wilson)

The true danger is when liberty is nibbled away, for expedience, and by parts. -- (Edmund Burke)

"Force, violence, pressure or compulsion with a view to conformity, are both uncivilized and undemocratic". (Gandhi)

"The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion". (Edmund Burke)