What's going on in your winery today..

[waggoner]

Got a bit bored this afternoon,, so made a no1 wine with prune juice and red grape juice..

Then had a search about and made this up,,, 1 large tin of grapefruit pieces, 2 tins of mandarins (just out of date), 4 ripe kiwi fruits, 1 orange and the juice of 1 lemon and 1 litre of grape juice... the fruit was not going to be eaten so rather than throw it away,, fermented it instead!! Wait and see now how it turns out??

[billybuntus]

Got a bit bored this afternoon,, so made a no1 wine with prune juice and red grape juice..

Then had a search about and made this up,,, 1 large tin of grapefruit pieces, 2 tins of mandarins (just out of date), 4 ripe kiwi fruits, 1 orange and the juice of 1 lemon and 1 litre of grape juice... the fruit was not going to be eaten so rather than throw it away,, fermented it instead!! Wait and see now how it turns out??

Its the best way to learn suck it and see

[spritzer]

Well... I think I am going to see whats in the wine making cupboard now, and see what I come up with. I know there is a kit or 2 in there, and lots of juice....

There is plently of fruit in the freezer too.... so maybe some of that can be used....

Oh, the possiblities

[ukric]

The procurement of cheap Christmas puddings. Opted for 12 asda classic recipe ones, the only luxury ones i could find were £4.50 and £5

[lockwood1956]

12?


wow are you fermenting all of those, or opening a soup kitchen for down and outs and serving up christmas Fayre?

[NorthernWiner]

The cap is still coming up strong on the Petite Verdot. At this rate, will probably press Wednesday.

Well, it's now the following Monday, and I still haven't pressed yet. That's on the agenda for this afternoon. The cap has been bouncing back all week, so I figured I would let it go until the point where it began to look a little heavy. So... 17 days on the skins.

The alcohol on this wine is probably pushing 15%. It smells quite nice, but boy oh boy, the tannins jump right up and smack you in the mouth! Drinking a glass of this will require immediate teeth brushing afterward.

I am quickly starting to see why Petit Verdot is used primarily as a blending wine. A little will definitely go a long way.

[waggoner]

I picked up 4 tesco finest matured ones,, half price. £5 each,, 907 grams each,,so should be able to do 4 gallons, ok i guess!!

[ukric]

12?


wow are you fermenting all of those, or opening a soup kitchen for down and outs and serving up christmas Fayre?

I'm sure the down and outs will enjoy them fermented much more

I'm doing them all, they're the half size ones, so really, technically, I've only bought 6.

5 for a 5 gallon batch and 1 for a 1 gallon batch (for topping up)

[goldseal]

A water pipe burst in our garage, spraying a lot of my kit with water.

The main casualty was my WE Crushendo kit. The water penetrated the box, and dampened the oak sachets. They have been dried in the oven, but I'll have to get the kit going tomorrow asap, to save the oak.

[fatbloke]

Well, Clare is a "do stuff in advance if possible" person (she already got the cards, wrapping paper and a few gifts for next crimbo.....), so I'm waiting to see if I can get to the kitchen (currently the next batch of mince pies, sausage rolls and some other stuff being prep'd/cooked etc).

I'm hoping that I'll be able to fire up the mini-jet with some coarse pads in it, as my heather honey mead has dropped about as clear as it's going to now (2 part finings the other day). That should give me enough of an idea about whether it's worked or not i.e. removing the back sweetening haze.

That way, I'll know if I need to try the bentonite or not. It looks like the sediment that's dropped out is of a very fine type, not like a heavy yeast sediment - I managed to get that out before I back sweetened.

Plus, if the pads don't get too badly choked up, I'll run a couple of other batches through them to make sure that the worst of any sediment is out. Then I can start thinking about whether they'll need finer filtration or not to final polish.

Does seem a bit weird though, as the number 3 pads for the mini-jet, say that they filter to 0.5 micron and are listed as "sterile". Yet other devices state a smaller diameter is "sterile". I'm wondering how small the particles that are filtered out have to be before the filter can be referred to as "sterile".......... Not that I like to go too fine as I know that in some cases, too finer gauge filter can also remove flavour and colour particles.

Though I understand that a lot of the US wine makers routinely "sterile filter" their wines. I wonder why that might be and whether taste and/or aroma (possibly colour as well) are affected, as some might consider this "over processing"......

Hum???

regards

jtfb

[spritzer]

Today, I have made up a Solomon Grundy Chablis Blush, and Mondego Pinot Grigio kits...
I have never tried either of them, but like the sound of both of them, so thought I would give them a bash.

I am just waiting for some sugar syrup to cool a bit more, and that will be going into a pineapple number one....
When I first made pineapple number one, it wasn't really a drink that I liked too much.. ... I only made it for the sister/sisters in law.
But I have to say the last couple of batches have been lovely... its definately growing on me

I have some port to bottle...
But I have been wondering what kind of corks do you all use ?
Do you use the plastic topped ones ?
So that you can recork the bottle ?
Or do you use smaller bottles ?
I am not sure what to do

[Rich]

But I have been wondering what kind of corks do you all use ?
Do you use the plastic topped ones ?
So that you can recork the bottle ?
Or do you use smaller bottles ?
I am not sure what to do

I generally use a smaller bottle. 375ml for my ports, with normal corks in. Then put a vacuvin in it if there is any left, which isn't often!

[spritzer]

I generally use a smaller bottle. 375ml for my ports, with normal corks in. Then put a vacuvin in it if there is any left, which isn't often!

Aye....
I was thinking on using 375ml bottles...
Or maybe the small 250ml screw top wine bottles ...
Decisions, decisions

[NorthernWiner]

Does seem a bit weird though, as the number 3 pads for the mini-jet, say that they filter to 0.5 micron and are listed as "sterile". Yet other devices state a smaller diameter is "sterile". I'm wondering how small the particles that are filtered out have to be before the filter can be referred to as "sterile".......... Not that I like to go too fine as I know that in some cases, too finer gauge filter can also remove flavour and colour particles.

Though I understand that a lot of the US wine makers routinely "sterile filter" their wines. I wonder why that might be and whether taste and/or aroma (possibly colour as well) are affected, as some might consider this "over processing"......

John,
To truly sterile filter wine, you need a 0.45 micron membrane filter. If you have a vacuum setup, there are cartridges available to filter to this level (though it's a very slooooow process). Anything larger than 0.45µ will allow some types of bacteria to pass through.

Any filter arrangement that uses DE pads is incapable of sterile filtering, including the Buon Vino Mini & Super Jet models. These are called "nominal" filters. Under the best conditions they will remove up to 99.9% of particulate, but are not considered sterile.

As for your last question, commercial wineries (US, European, Australian) routinely sterile filter any wine containing residual sugar and/or malic acid to prevent refermentation in the bottle. Most of us home winemakers use potassium sorbate and high levels of SO2 to accomplish the same thing.

Sterile filtering may remove some color & flavor constituents, but I would argue that any bits the filter catches are bits that would eventually settle out at some point anyway. Filters won't remove particles at the molecular level, which is where most color/flavor lies.

[ms67]

squeezing in some brewing activities over the season
bottling:

• 2 gallons of Blueberry & Cranberry
• 1 gallon of Orange & Elderflower
• 1/2 gallon of Elderflower
• 1 gallon of Green Tea & Ginger

started 3 gallons of Tanglefoot