Steps in wine making

1. Clean and sanitize all equipment that will come in contact with the
grapes by using a cleansing sanitizing agent or a mixture of metabisulphite (anti- bacterial).

2. Because we crush larger amounts of grapes we are using a

crusher-destemmer combination rather than just a crusher as it is much easier than removing the grapes from the stems by hand and we do not want the bitterness in the wine.

3. The natural yeast is present with the grapes and will do the
fermentation on its own. I was told always use the natural method for making homemade wine, instead of adding sulphate and wine yeast, why spend the extra money when the grapes form their own yeast.

4. Cover with clean plastic but not too tight to allow the gases to
escape. The fermentation process is the yeast converting the natural sugars into alcohol which takes about 7-8 days. To provide the perfect environment for yeast cells to begin the fermentation of the juice (or must) the optimum temperature is 70-72 degrees, any warmer and

the homemade wine will ferment too rapidly resulting in a loss of aroma and poor flavor. Any cooler and the homemade wine will ferment too slowly or not at all as the yeast will remain dormant. During the fermentation process the skins and pulp will float to the top forming a cap. To maximize flavor and color extraction keeps the floating cap submerged by pushing it down once or twice daily during fermentation. This process is called punching down the cap. I normally do it early in the morning then at night.

5. The fun part where everyone gets involved pressing the grapes.
We take the run off from the barrel (this is the juice under the cap) and separate it into a few barrels. After that, is when we have to work by taking the grapes from the barrel and putting them in the press what we do differently than everyone else, as we press the grapes we put it through a strainer to make sure we do not have any pulp or seeds just the juice from the grapes in the barrel. Then we divide the pressed juice into the barrels this way it is evenly distributed among the run off.

6. Once all the grapes are pressed, we pump the juice into the glass
demijohn and stainless steel drums not filling all the way to the top I normally fill it to just a little less than 6 inches from the top to allow the foam to settle down then the next day I top it off about 3 inches from the top and add the air locks to the top of the demijohns I normally use vodka (most people use water but vodka does not evaporate) this creates a barrier from the environment to prevent airborne contaminates spoiling the wine but allows the gas to escape.

7. Normally we press the wine the first week of October after we fill

the demijohns I let it sit for a 7 -8 days then I start the racking process. The repeated racking is necessary to leave behind the sediment as the wine clears and also to give the wine a chance to rid itself of excess carbon dioxide from fermentation. I normally rack the wine every 2 months as each rack goes by you will see it clearing up more and more.

8. Around April or May (depending on outside temperatures) the sugar

and yeast are normally at the right levels (range for homemade wine is

0.990 to 1.120). Once we are at the right range it will be about 12- 13% alcohol this when I send it through a 6 page filtering machine. Filtering the wine will clear and avoid sediment in the bottom of the bottles (you might get a little sediment only because we do not use any chemicals) giving it a great finish.

9. Now we are ready for the bottling, once your wine is bottled let it sit in
the upright position for 3 days before laying it on its side this is so the cork makes a tight seal. Just try to keep your wine in a cool place till you are ready to drink it because there are no chemicals in this wine so leaving it in your garage or where it is warm the wine might turn on you and go bad. 10. Last but not least enjoy your wine and I hope this helped you.

DETERMINING ALCOHOL CONTENT

In order to obtain an accurate alcohol content one must use a hydrometer before fermentation and after fermentation. The hydrometer measures the density of the liquid by floating at a given level corresponding to the specific gravity of the fluid being measured. I take the first reading two days after we press the wine (people will tell me no but it works for me) and you should note the temperature (most hydrometers are calibrated to give correct readings at 59-60 degrees Fahrenheit. Higher temperatures thin the liquid slightly and result in lower readings than you'd get at the correct temperature). At which you take your reading at. The second reading should be taken after fermentation is complete, that is, before bottling. Here is the formula that I have been using plus I use a vino meter but I am getting older now and cant see the lines like I used to (LOL). Example readings: Start: initial specific gravity readingLast ( before you bottle the wine) Subtract

.095

1.090 0.995 ______ .095

Now times it by 131

This will be your alcohol count I hope this gives you a better understanding on when I tell you how much alcohol is in the wine.

131 ______ 12.445 %

Wine hydrometer reading

Month Racking day Temp. Spec. Gravity October November December January February March April May Perfect temps should be made at 60 F. Below 60 F subtract , 70 F add 1 Example: specific gravity is 1.100 (Temp 70F) Correction 1 Correction sp. Gr. Is 1.101

You know how to drink wine, but do you really know how to taste it?
Wine tasting is not the same as drinking it. To experience the true flavor of a wine requires that you slow down and pay attention to your senses of sight, smell, touch, as well as taste.

Remember - There are no right or wrong descriptions of how some wine

tastes or smells. Don't rush the tasting experience. Linger over the wine.

THE BASICS:
Start with a clear wine glass. The rim of the glass should bend inwards to help funnel aromas to the nose, and allow you to swirl without spilling.

HOLDING A WINE GLASS:

There are a right way and a wrong way to hold a wine glass, and it does make a difference. Never hold the glass by its bowl, only by its stem since the heat of your hand will quickly warm the liquid. If you are tasting several wines, begin with the lightest white wines first and progress to the heaviest red wines. This will help keep your taste buds more sensitive so you can better appreciate each wine in the series. A sip of water between wines can also help preserve your palate. Now pour a little wine into your glass about an inch or less is best.

SIGHT:
Look at the wine - in daylight if possible. The best way is to slightly tilt the wine in the glass and hold it up to the light or look at it against a white or pale background. What do you see? Is the wine clear or cloudy? The color will vary according to what type of wine you are tasting.

Red Wines:
Red wines vary greatly in color. A young red wine is typically a brightraspberry color. You will see hints of reddish-brown around the edges. An older red wine might be mahogany to brick-like in color. As red wine ages, the red wine tends to have a brick-like color. Some dessert wines and especially those that have been in oak barrels, tend to be golden.

White Wines:

White wines range from pale green to yellow to deep golden brown and become more golden as they age.

SWIRL:
While firmly holding the stem of the wine glass, gently swirl the ass in tiny circles on a flat surface for 10 to 20 seconds allowing oxygen to penetrate the wine. The purpose of swirling wine in a glass is to aerate the wine and release vapors, evaporating from the sides of the glass, for you to smell. As the wine coats the sides of the glass, it releases its bouquet. Observe the streaks of wine (legs) as they roll down the side of the glass. The legs can help you determine the body of the wine.

SMELL OR SNIFF:
Tip the glass up and stick your nose in it and inhale. Some tasters claim that you can get more aromas by holding your nose an inch or so above the glass after swirling. They think you catch more than you would if you put your nose all the way into the glass. Try both ways to see what works for you. Also, your nose tires very quickly. Even off-smells may not register after a number of sniffs. Did you know that 80% of our sense of taste is actually in our nose? The aromas can be quite different depending on how far into the glass your nose goes. What do you smell? There is no proper sniffing technique. Some wine connoisseurs prefer to sniff by quickly inhaling two or three times. Others prefer one deep sniff or smelling with one nostril at a time.

At the top of the glass, the smells are more floral and fruity; deeper in the glass, they are the richer. Try to detect the full range of scents from berry to floral to spicy to woody . . . and so on. Consider intensity and appeal.

SIP AND TASTE:

This is the final step and should be taken only after you've used your other senses. Then sip the wine, letting the wine spread across the tongue from front to back and side to side before swallowing. If you feel comfortable doing so, carefully slurp some air through puckered lips. This slurping of air (aerating) will help to release flavor and aromas. Assessing the wine by taste should confirm the conclusions drawn from the appearance assessment and the smell assessment.

A) B)

The tip of the tongue detects sweetness

The inner sides of the tongue detect sourness and/or acidity

C) D)

The outer sides of the tongue detect saltiness

At this point you can spit it either out (especially if you are tasting several wines) or simply drink it, but be sure to experience the aftertaste (the finish). Professional wine tasters will not swallow the wine, but immediately spit it out (you will see buckets for this purpose)

How to clean recycled wine bottles

bottles hope this helps you out.

I know this is the part everyone hates but it is part of the job to making wine. Here are the DOS and DONT in cleaning the

1. DO rinse the empty wine bottle with hot water as soon as possible
after its been emptied. You don't want any wine residue remaining in the bottle and drying on the inside surfaces. A good technique is to do a multiple rinse - fill the bottle about 1/3 fill, swish and shake vigorously, then drain. Repeat 3-4 times.

2. DON'T use dish soap to wash out you wine bottles. A soapy
residue can be difficult to completely rinse away from the interior and if residues remain it could ruin taste of the next wine in that bottle. If you really believe using a detergent is best, get a food-grade detergent.

3. DO store the bottle upside down after cleaning and rinsing, to let
any remaining water drain from the bottle.

4. DON'T try to recycle wine bottles that are particularly dirty or

contain a black mold or mildew spot on the inside. Look down the throat of the bottle in a well-lit room to see if there's any nasty stuff inside. If there is, it isn't worth it. Contribute that bottle to your recycling or trash service.

5. DO sanitize with Sodium Metabisulfite solution just before bottling. 6. DON'T recycle screw top bottles we cork the bottles, so avoid
recycling screw-top bottles if you can.

Cleaning the labels off the bottles

Last, what about old labels . . . I prefer to remove the old labels and re label the wine to reflect the new batch. Cause if I am giving the bottles of wine as gifts I want people to know its homemade wine. But note that old labels don't affect the wine inside, so removing them is more for aesthetic purposes. But again it depends on how you want the wine bottle to look. Here are some tips for label removal.

1. Soak the bottles overnight in water. I found it easier to use a cooler

(or 5 gallon buckets. You can fit more bottles in it. Which you can soak and de label multiple bottles. Fill the cooler with water to about the neck of the bottles and even put some water in the bottles themselves to weigh them down so most of the bottles stay submerged. 2. After soaking, scrap off the saturated label with a glass scrapper. Some labels (paper-based labels) will come off easy. Some may not.

3. Rinse the exterior of the bottle in hot water, scrubbing vigorously

with scouring pad to removing the glue residue.

4. For instances where you can get the label off but some glue residue
remains despite the hot water, a small amount of GOO-GONE (your local supermarket sells this) on clean rag can dissolve the glue residue. But keep the GOO-GONE on the bottle exterior only try not to get it on the inside of the bottle.

5. After the label and glue have been removed, rinse the bottle
completely and store upside down to dry.

6. If you get a bottle with an especially stubborn label and glue that
seems like cement, consider just discarding it.

WINE CONDITIONER
Making the perfect wine requires a combination of experience, skill, excellent grapes and the wine gods. Skill and experience are things we can acquire over time. But finding the perfect grapes is truly a difficult task. The most important thing is to open your mind to the creative process. Before you begin, spend time considering what you want each batch of wine to be and taste like most of us like the traditional wine styles, like oak or burgundy these are great but you might want to also enjoy some sort of crossbreed. Simply imagine what you want this wine to be and then we can create it. Among the most common flavor characteristics to consider is: alcohol, strength, acid, tannin, oak, fruit aromas, and flavors, body and sweetness. What follows are my suggestions for personalizing the flavor of your wine? Most of these methods are things we can do after the wine is done fermenting, but before you bottle it. I find it easier to decide what to do after the wine is about six months old. By that time, the wine has settled into something that resembles its finished flavor profile. With most of these adjustments, it is good to go slow, add a little, taste the wine, and then add more if you want. You can always add more flavor, but it is difficult to take flavor away if you have added too much. A great way of determining what you want to add to your wine is to compare your wine before additions to another wine that has the characteristic that you like. This should help you decide what you want to add to your wine.

THE SOLUTION:

If the wine is too dry when we are ready to bottle, we can add sweetness to the wine to bring it up to the level that you would like. For some of you I added a wine conditioner to the wine so it would be sweeter than a dryer which a lot of you liked better than the dryness. Basically what I did was add 2 ounces of sweetener per gallon some wanted more so I added 4 ounces to it. Its all about what you want the wine to taste like. Youre limited only by your imagination. Take a sip from the fermenter, and if you think adding a flavor will improve the wine, we will give it a try and have fun doing it. What I am basically doing here is trying to give everyone a chance to personalize the most they want out of their wine. Its all about you and I want everyone to be happy with what they have and if they want to be different then the next persons wine, its fine cause everyone taste buds are different. So lets take this to the next level and customize the wine to what you want.

REMEMBER. THIS IS YOUR WINE!

ADDING OAK CHIPS

The use of oak plays a significant role in wine making and can have a profound effect on the resulting wine, affecting the color, flavor, tannin profile and texture of the wine. Oak can come into contact with wine in the form of a barrel during the fermentation or aging periods. It can be introduced to the wine in the form of free-floating oak chips or as wood staves (or sticks) added to wine in a fermentation vessel like stainless steel or glass demi johns. Last year I tried something a little different by adding French oak chips to a 5-gallon demi john to see what kind of taste I would get from it and gave everyone a bottle to see how they liked it. The reason I went with the medium-toasted French oak chips was to give an aging effect to the wine that is very similar to that of a French oak barrel. So if you would like to have something different then the same type of wine every year we can custom your wine to have a different flavor, if you would like to mix and match this year that will be fine this way you can have two different types of wine. As we all know its all a learning experience every year, sometimes it comes to dry and sometimes it comes out sweet. But like wine we get better with age.

Differences between French & American oak

American oak:
Tends to be more intensely flavored than French oak with more sweet and vanilla overtones due to the American oak having two to four times as many lactones. Winemakers choose American oak typically for bold, powerful reds, base wines for "assemblage," or for warm climate Chardonnays. Besides being derived from different species, a major difference between American and French oak comes from the preparation of the wood. The tighter grain and less watertight nature of French oak oblige coopers to split the wood along the grain. The wood is then aged or "seasoned" for 24 to 36 months in the open air, in a so-called wood-yard. Even though American coopers may use a kiln-dry method to season the wood, almost all others will season American oak in exactly the same way as Open air seasoning has the advantage of leaching undesirable chemical components and bitter tannins, mellowing the oak in a manner, and those kiln-dry methods are incapable of replicating. Even though sun, rain, and wind may suffice in most cases to season oak, in dryer climates coopers - such as toneleria nacionalapply up to 80 inches of water a year to their wood stacks in order to facilitate the seasoning process.

French oak:
Must be split, only 20 to 25% of the tree can be utilized; American oak may be serrated, which makes it at least twice as economical. Its more pronounced oxidation and a quicker release of aromas help wines to lose their astringency and harshness faster; which makes this the wood of choice for shorter maturations - six to ten months. Because of American oaks modest tannin contribution, the perfect first fill is a wine with abundant tannins and good texture; it allows the fruit to interact harmoniously with the wood, which contributes a wide array of complex aromas and soft, yet very palatable tannins. French oak, on the other hand, generates silky and transparent tannins, which transmit a sensation of light sweetness combined with fruity flavors that persist in the mouth. Spices and toasted almond are noteworthy, combined with flavors of ripe red fruit in red wines, and notes of

peach, exotic fruits and floral aromas like jasmine and rose in whites, depending on the grape variety employed.

GLOSSARY OF WINE MAKING TERMS:

Air lock: A glass or plastic device designed to use water as an
insulator to protect the fermentation media from contamination and exposure to fresh air, while at the same time allowing carbon dioxide produced by the yeast to escape the vessel. Aroma: the natural fragrance of wine that originates from the fermented fruit upon which the wine is based. Brix: A measurement of the dissolved sucrose level in a wine. Carbon Dioxide: The colorless, odorless gas emitted by yeast during fermentation. Cap: The layer of grapes skins that are forced by rising carbon dioxide gas to the top of the fermentation vessel after crushing the grapes. Clarification: A wine making process involving the fining and filtration of wine to remove suspended solids and reduce sediment in the bottle. Crush: After harvest and prior to pressing, grapes are crushed or broken up so that the juice is released and allowed to macerate with the skins prior to and during fermentation. Dry: Wines with zero or very low levels of residual sugar. The opposite of sweet, except in sparkling wines, where dry means sweet. Fermentation: The conversion of sugars to alcohol by yeast. Filtration: the process of removing yeast cells and other microorganisms that could spoil the wine, as well as any remaining sediment that would keep it from being crystal clear, by pumping the wine through filtering pads. Finish: The final flavor, texture and impression that remains on the palate after a wine is swallowed. First pressing: The first press, after the free run off juice has been collected, that contains the clearest and cleanest juices that will come out of pressing. Free run juice: Juice obtained from grapes that have not been pressed. Hydrometer: Is an instrument used to measure the specific gravity

of liquids; that is the ratio of the density of the liquid to density of the water. Lees: Wine sediment that occurs during and after fermentation, and consists of dead yeast, grape seeds, and other solids. Wine is separated from the lees by racking. Maceration: the period of time grape juice spends in contact with the skins and seeds. Must: Unfermented grape juice, including seeds and stalks. Oaking: The process of immersing oak chips into wine to simulate having aged the wine an oak barrel. Oaking allows young wines to soften and absorb some of the woods flavors and tannins. Potassium Metabisulfite: Is used to sanitize wine making equipment and utensils. Primary Fermentation: The initial, main alcohol fermentation by yeast, it usually begins with the wild yeast on the grapes after you crush the grapes. Racking: the process of drawing wine off the sediment, such as lees, after fermentation and moving it into another vessel. Secondary Fermentation: This is in which the second phase of fermentation takes place. Sediment: The grainy, bitter-tasting deposit sometimes found in the bottles of older wines. Sediment is the natural separation of bitartrates, tannins, and color pigments that occurs as wine ages. Specific Gravity: A measure of density or mass of a solution, such as must or wine. Before fermentation, the density of the must or juice is high because sugar is dissolved in it. Making it thicker than plain water. As the sugar is converted by the yeast into alcohol and carbon dioxide, the density (specific gravity) drops. Tannin: tannic acid, essential for good aging qualities and balance, gives most wines their zest or bite. Tannins are found naturally in the stems, skins, and seeds of the grapes. Zymase: The name given to a group of enzymes which yeast use to transform sugar into alcohol.