Poppyseed Cellars

We were unsure of when we last sulphited, so we decided to go with +35 ppm. We will have it tested after we rack the 2013.

• 60 gallon barrel: +35 ppm = 138 ml of 10% SO2 soln

Tasting notes: Nice nose. I got of lot of cherry. Still has was we call a “young” taste. Feels like it has not yet “turned the corner”. Good tannins.

We also tasted the ’12 LH Syrah. In the past they have seemed more different. This time they seemed more similar, in that they both need more time in barrel. We were wondering if we are getting enough oak, since out barrels are more used than they were for the 2011.

Vinquiry sulphite test:  2013-12-02-006:

• 60 gallon barrel:
  • 30 ppm: no need to add more

Topped and sulphited the following wines:

• 2012 MV Syrah: +20 ppm sulphite
• 2012 MV Late harvest syrah, both barrels: +20 ppm sulphite
• 2012 MV Fortified syrah: +15 ppm
• 2011 MV Syrah: +20 ppm sulphite
• 2011 MV Zinfandel: +20 ppm sulphite

After bottling the ’11 syrah, we checked the ’12’s. We sulphited and topped them off.

• 2012 Syrah: Added +10 ppm SO2
• 2012 LH Syrah: Added +10 ppm SO2, both barrels.
  

• Topped
• sulphited +10 ppm

Had the sulphites checked 2013-04-26-011:

• 48 ppm: Just let it be. Higher than I expected.

Topped off all wines!

And tasted, with spitting. Very enjoyable morning!

Erwin and I tasted through the wines today.

’12 MV Syrah:

• Nose was good
• Tasted fine; didn’t take notes
• Sulphited 25 ppm:
  • 60 gallon barrel: 100 mL of 10% kmeta solution

• Topped it off

Erwin and I racked the ’12 MV Syrah. This is the first racking post MLF.

I was a little worried from a slightly off nose that we had noticed. But the racking went fine; it smelled and tasted great. We did not taste along side another wine though.

We started out with a 60 gallon barrel plus a 5 gallon carboy. When we finished, we had the 60 gallon barrel, and slightly over a case of bottles for topping, for a total of about 63 gallons. We only lost two in the racking process.

• Added 25 ppm sulphites:
  • 60 gallon barrel: 100 mL 10% solution
  • 3 gallons of bottles: 5 mL 10% solution

Tasted and topped everything…

2011 zin: both barrels good. Still slight difference, 15 gallon better, richer, but don’t know why.

2011 Syrah: very night; deep dark fruit; light tannins; great color

2012 Syrah: still something funky; I don’t think just a young wine, but maybe; cu did not help

2012 LH Syrah: definitely off nose; cu helped; need to rack, and see if cu still needed

2012 port: very nice; alc a bit harsh; needs a lot more time

I am trying out using Google Sheet as my calculator. I would like to keep a record of the calcs made for each wine. Here is one I am doing after the fact for the 2012 MV Syrah.

First add since ferment and MLF finished.

50 ppm addition to all containers.

• 60 gallon barrel: 200 mL 10% SO2 solution
• 5 gallon carboy: 16 mL 10% SO2 solution

Here is the Vinquiry report: 2013-01-14-003

Comments below:

• Alcohol: 15.33 %V/V by NIR
  • Wow! How did it get this high?
  • Sugars after 4 day cold soak were at 25.9 brix. We predicted 25.9 * .57 = 14.8% alc.
  • We actually added 3 gallons of water to try and bring down the sugars.
  • (75 gallons wine @ 25.9 brix) + (3 gallons H2O at 0 brix) = 78 gallons @ 24.9 brix
  • With a conversion of .57, that should have been 14.2 % Alc.
  • We actually got 15.33/24.9 = This is a very high conversion rate of .62, which seems impossible.
  • I don’t understand what happened.
• pH: 3.90 by Autotitrator
  • This is much higher than we would like, but it keeps happening. Maybe we can talk to Chris about this. I think it is too much potassium uptake in the vines.
• Titratable Acidity: 0.605 g/100mL by Autotitrator   (6.05 g/L)
  • This is perfect.
• Free SO2: 3 mg/L by Segmented Flow  (3 ppm)
  • No problem here; need to add 50 ppm SO2.
• Total SO2: 3 mg/L by Segmented Flow (3 ppm)
  • No problem here.
• Volatile Acidity: 0.054 g/100mL by Segmented Flow (540 mg/L)
  • The threshold for detection is 700 mg/L, so were are close but OK.
• Glucose + Fructose: 85 mg/100mL by Enzymatic (.085%)
  • Dry is defined as <0.1 % so we are good.
• Malic Acid: 9 mg/100mL by Enzymatic (90 ppm)
  • Vinquiry defines <300 finished, so we are good.

Paul, Erwin and I went out to taste everything in barrels. Based on some tastings over Christmas with the family, I am worried we are over oaking the 2011’s.

• 2011 Zinfandel: Started with a side by side tasting of the zin barrels:
  • 15 gallon barrel: Clean clear fruit. Light tannins.
  • 60 gallon barrel: Similar to the 15, but something else also. I wondered if it was brett, or maybe the beginnings of two much oak. We had lots of discussions, but could not positively ID the extras in the 60 gallon barrel. Decided a good future plan is to leave the 15 gallon barrel alone until summer. Transfer 30 gallons of the 60 gallon barrel to an older 30 gallon barrel, and bottle the other 30 gallons.
• 2011 Syrah: Generally happy with this one. Tannins much lighter than the 2010. Aromatics very nice; clearly syrah.
• 2012 Syrah: Something funky going on. Nose was off putting. Cu didn’t seem to help it. Hopefully just stuff from the MLF. Plan is to sulphite (if MLF done), let it sit for a month, and rack.
• 2012 Late Harvest Syrah: Much better nose than the earlier 2012 syrah. Not sure why. But still not clean. Same plan as for the early syrah.
• 2012 Syrah Port: Coming along nicely. Need to get the numbers to see what we have.

We started at 7Am and racked the wine off of the fine lees and Cu precipitate.

The nose was totally cleaned up; taste is still a little harsh, but it should smooth out over the next few months.

We topped and tasted the rest of the wines. The port has become much better in just a few weeks. The ’11 syrah ’11 zin were really good. I thought I might have tasted a little oak. I will taste again in a few weeks, and see if that is indeed the case. If so, we may need to find some neutral oak.

The day we bottled the ’10 syrah, Erwin and I ran a test on how much to copper the ’12 syrah.

We tried 0, 0.5, 1.0, and 1.5 ppm. From 0 to 0.5 was incredibly obvious. 0.5 to 1.0 was also pretty noticeable. From 1.0 to 1.5 was more difficult, but we decided that there was still a little H2S in the 1.0, so the decision is to go with 1.5 ppm.

Here are the adds:

• 61 gallon reCoop barrel: 136.3 mL  
• 7 gallon carboy: 15.6 mL
• 0.75 gallon jug: 2.2 mL
• 0.75 gllon jug: 2.2 mL

Total is about 69 gallons, or 154 mL of 1% Cu solution.

The 1% bottles from BevPeople are 4 oz, plus 1 oz from an older bottle. This is 147 mL, so not quite enough.

Erwin picked up a couple of Cu bottles, and went out Sunday morning and made the adds with a lot of stirring. The nose was already better.

We will rack in a week, Saturday or Sunday.

We also measured the sugar, and it seems stuck at 0.4%. If it doesn’t move, we are not going to try and finish it. We will clear the wine, and use potassium sorbate if necessary. Once we rack off the copper, we will inoculate for MLF, and put the 100W light bulb underneath again. That will push it up to 70F. Maybe the ferment will get going. One other item to consider is to try and start it again with a good restarting yeast. I may look around see how much work it would be.

Checked with Clinitest…somewhere between 0.5% and 0.6%. Bubbling slowly. Also stirred the wine.

Clinitest measures 0.6%.

I had Vinquiry test it…here are the results.

Glucose + Fructose = 477 mg/100 ml. This is about 0.5%, close to the Clinitest measurement.

Still bubbling, but slowly. What a pain in the ass!

Stopped in Sunday PM with Erwin. Sugars in the barrel at 0.0, so we are getting closer. Must temp was 68F, which is better. I put another blanket uon the barrel, totally enclosing the lamp underneath. I want to warm it up a little more.

I stopped by this morning. The barrel airlock was still going, a little slower than 1/second.

• Barrel: ~0.5 brix
• Glass: -2.0 brix.

The barrel has a way to go. I put a light under it and a blanket over it to move it along a little faster.

So we went out to rack the ’12 syrah off its gross lees.

We do have an H2S problem on the wine in the barrel. Now to figure out what to do. The ferment is almost complete. Should we copper first, or do MLF first?

Here is our painful history:

I stopped by to check on the  2012 syrah ferment.

• Free run (barrel): 1 brix; nose good; taste starting to get better. The bitter elements are gone. Can feel some tannins, but not too much.  Hopefully they stick around.
• Press run (tub): -1 brix; smell in tub not so good; maybe some h2s. Took a sample to glass, and the smell blew off, and seemed fine. Definitely more tannins in the press run.

Spoke with Erwin: current plan is to rack at least the press run on Wednesday morning when I get back from my trip.

We did a lot today. Started around 7AM, finished up at 12:0PM. Lomg day.

• Measured some of the ferments. From <1 to <3 in the various tubs.
• Emptied the new 2 year old barrel, rinsed it carefully, and  moved it to the cellar to let it drain.
• Racked the 2011 syrah from our 1 year old ReCoop barrel to a 2 year old barrel:
  •  The nose was fantastic. Some chocolate and cherries.
  • The mouth feel was a little light. We could use a little more structure, some tannins. Hopefully more time in the barrel will help.
  • We had extra wine since we were going from a ReCoop to a non ReCoop. We needed up with almost 2 cases of bottles which we will use to top.
  • We added 20 ppm sulphites.
• We cleaned and rinsed the 1 year old ReCoop that held the 2011 syrah, and set it up to take the 2012.
• We started by racking the press run into the barrel, but the pump clogged quickly. Still too much activity in the press run keeping the sediment in the juice. We cleaned and unclogged the pump (took 1/2 hour).
• We carefully racked the free run tubs into the barrel. We poured some of the wine that we didn’t rack back into the press run tub.
• Then we racked some of the press run from demijohn into barrel, and stopped a couple of inches from the top.
• Finally we poured the rest of the press run from the demijohn  and the press run from the 30 gallon tub into a single 20 gallon tub. We will let this continue to ferment until it settles, and then rack it.
• Put an airlock on the barrel; it started bubbling right away.
• Covered the press run tub with its lid and a blanket.
• Cleaned and sanitized everything!

We decided to press off sweet at around 5 brix. Trying to keep the tannins down a little, and we had a long cold soak.

We drained off the free run from the valve, and put it into the 20 and 30 gallon white tubs, straining out the seeds. Worked really well. Then pressed the rest in 2 press runs. We probably have 80 gallons of free run, and about 20 of press run.

We have:

• 5 20 gallon tubs, 3/4 full, of free run = 75 gallons
•  1 30 gallon tub, 1/2 full, of press run = 15 gallons
• 1 14 gallon demijon, 2/3 full of press run = 10 gallons

Because of the heat (predicted into the 80’s) we transferred all of the containers to the cellar to wait 2 days until Friday morning when we will rack off of gross lees to barrel.

Thursday’s activities:

• Clean bin with valve (Esteban did it before we got there)
• Test out valve for delestage
• Place second macro bin next to first, upside down.
• Place 4×4’s on upside down macro bin.
• Place valve bin on 4×4’s, with valve draining into right side up macro bin.
• Decided not to do any tartaric acid addition at this time. Last years TA went way up during ferment. Not sure why.
• Moved must to valve bin.
• Added water : 3 gallons to get to 14.3% alcohol, down from 14.9%.
• Mix yeast rehydration solutions:
  • Start with 2925 mL water at 110 F (had a hell of a time getting water to 110.)
  • Add 146 g GoFerm and mix.
  • Let temp drop to 104 F.
  • Add 117 g yeast. (whole 4 ox packet)
  • Mix, and let sit 15-30 minutes.
  • Mix over 5 minutes with equal amount of must.
  • Keep repeating previous step until yeast within 10F of must.
  • Add slurry to valve bin and mixed.
• Clean macro bin and replace.
• Clean up.
• Setup ladder for punch down.
• Show Esteban punch down log, tools, thermometer.

I took a sample in to Vinquiry for a core juice panel. Here are the results: 2012-10-09-006

• Sugars: 25.9 brix; this will end up around 14.8% alcohol at a .57 conversion rate. This is a high alc wine. We have to consider watering down. To get down to 14% would require about 5 gallons water.
• pH: 3.71: This is high. Much higher than my measurements of juice sample, ~3.4. I need to remeasure. It probably is due to potassium coming out in the cold soak.
• TA: 5.36 g/L: We would like to be at 6 g/L. We might have to add some tartaric.
• Total YANC: 190 mg/L (ppm): This is considered a medium YANC level.
• Malic acid: 3.25 g/L: This seems high. When converted to lactic acid during MLF, it will drop the TA by 1/3 of this value, I think.

So we have decided several things:

• We will use GoFerm for yeast rehydration.
• We will use full dose of FermaidK nutrients.

Questions to answer:

• Do we add water to bring down the sugars (and alcohol)?
• Do we add acid to bring up the TA?
• What yeast do we use?

Just for kicks, here is a core juice panel comparison for 2010,2011,2012:

Started up our fermenting log.

Added estimated dates for planning. Will replace with actual events as we go. Must be in barrel by 21st, as I am out of town for three days starting on the 21st!

We picked and crushed today!

We started at 7AM in the morning. Esteban had already cleaned the macro-bins, and was there when I arrived. Erwin showed up a few minutes later.

We prepared for the first hour. Here is a summary:

• Sanitized everything with StarSan.
• One macro-bin in winery to receive crushed fruit.
• Two 2×6 boards across macro-bin on which to place the crusher.
• Crusher sat on boards, with stem disposal into food tub next to macro-bin.
• Tarps on floor to keep it somewhat clean.
• Second macro-bin in back of Erwins truck to take to grapes.
• 4 totes and clippers for the pickers…Esteban, Erwin, Afsi, and Niels

We picked the Block 7 470 syrah first. We picked the outer 4 rows, filling the bin to about 3/4 full. The clusters were gorgeous, with almost no raisins. There was some what I think is wasp damage…hollowed out grapes, with just the skins left. Maybe it was birds.

Nice soft skins; lot’s of flavor. It went really fast as the clusters were big. It was amazing how much fruit had been previously dropped.

We then picked the Block 3 Alban syrah. End rows had some raisins, and we were careful to sort before putting into totes. We filled the bin so that it was mounding up maybe a foot. That should be about 1200 pounds.

Here are some stats post crush:

• 14 inch in-depth of must in bin. This calculates out to 117 gallons must, or 1197 lbs must (grapes), assuming 10.2 lbs/gallon for the must. That was what it was last year.
• We sulphited to 50 ppm;  384 mL 10% sulfite solution addition.
• We added dry ice pellets to must to cool it off and protect the must from O2.
• Must temp = 58 F…pretty warm.
• We put 6 gallon jugs of frozen water. Probably not going to help to much, but maybe a little.

Here are some photos from the crush:

block seven 470 clone

• 28 by hydrometer
• 26 by refractometer

Alban block 3 (did it twice as I was surprised by the numbers)

• 26 by hydrometer

Checked the samples again in the evening.
Alban: 22.5 brick; pH 3.13
470: 25.8 brick; pH 3.31

Plan on checking again in the morning.

Sampled the grapes this morning around 7AM (green results).

Resampled next morning, letting juice soak up. New results in blue.

• Syrah, Albam, Block 3:
  • Sugars: 22.0, 22.0
  • pH: 3.27, 3.45
• Syrah, 470, Block 7:
  • Sugars: 21.5, 21.4
  • pH: 3.10, 3.26