This Article Originally Appeared
When I set out to
make wine from cold climate hybrid grapes (specifically dry red
wine), common sense told me I should follow wine making practices
used for vinifera grapes. But after fermentation, stabilization and
aging had finished, I was left asking myself- where is the body?
Where is the backbone? Needless to say my first attempt at working
with hybrid grapes was good, though not great. But fear not dear
reader, after further research, experimentation and talking with
other winemakers about my less than stellar outcome, I was able to
drastically improve my wine. Read on to learn about
the methods I have
discovered for use in making wine with
hybrid grapes, to
improve the over all product and help the wine to make it to the
finish line.
1.
Saignée
is
the method of removing a portion of the juice from the fermenter in
an effort to concentrate the flavors. Saignée
literally
means “to bleed.” By bleeding-off 10-20% of the juice, you
increase the skin to juice ratio resulting in a wine that is more
rich in color and flavor. The
must can soak for a few hours prior to saignée
to allow the juice being removed to gain a little color. This juice
can then be
made
into a rosé
or added to a fruit wine being made at the same time. I use the juice
from my Léon
Millot must
for a blueberry wine I make to add a vinous character to the
resulting wine.
2. Pre-fermentation Maceration
Cold
soaking grapes is a practice many winemakers use to draw out more
color and supple tannins from the grape skins. This method is most
notably employed into Pinot Noir wine making, but if your hybrid
grape wine
has been short on color in the past, this is
a
way one
can try to gain
color intensity. To
perform a cold soak,
simply fill
with water and freeze
several one-gallon milk jugs in advance of crush. You will need at
least four jugs to get 20
gallons of
must to
a
temperature around
40-50F
(4-10C). This
temperature is low
enough to prevent spontaneous fermentation. Rotate
the jugs as needed to keep the must
cool. Cold soak can run for just a few hours up to several days. The
duration of the cold soak
is up for experimentation to discover
what exactly works for you. If you plan to to do Saignée
and
cold soak, I recommend removing the juice first to allow the
concentration effects to take place during the cold soak. Once
you are satisfied with the cold soaking period, simply remove the
plastic jugs, allow the wine to get up to ambient temperature and
proceed as usual. For
the full run down on cold soaking, check out my article
Cold Soaking Success in the Oct/Nov 2017 issue of WineMaker magazine.
3. High
Acidity
Growing
hybrid
grapes in
areas with shorter growing seasons, the fruit
may come into the winery with high acidity (or
if you are just growing Frontenac grapes in
a good year).
This
leaves
you questioning
what direction to take the wine. While a wine should never be pushed
to become something it does not want to be, there are ways to reign
in the acidity in an effort to make a dry red wine instead of having
to back-sweeten for balance.
-
Amelioration: Adding water to the must can be used to reduce the acidity or at least take the edge off of a high acid level. Although this may dilute the wine to some degree, it will help you achieve your goal of a dry red wine by reducing the acid to workable level.
-
Calcium Carbonate can be used to take the edge off of the acidity and can be used in conjunction with the other methods of acid reduction. For example, you may minimally ameliorate, put the wine through malolactic fermentation and then tweak the wine with calcium carbonate to dial in your desired acid level. It should not be used to reduce the acidity more than 0.2% as a salty taste may result. If more of an acid drop is desired, be sure to perform bench trials to dial in exactly how much is needed without altering the flavor of the wine.
-
Blending: If you want a more natural approach than the use of calcium carbonate, another option is blending. By using the Pearson’s Square or the wine calculator- Fermcalc (http://web2.airmail.net/sgross/fermcalc/) you can enter the acid levels of each wine and figure out how much blending wine is needed to reduce the acid to your desired level. You could do it the old fashioned way by blending and tasting, but by entering the high acid level of your wine and then adding the hypothetical acid level of the potential blending wine into the calculators mentioned above, it will give you an idea of what acid level the blending wine will need to be. Blending will come up again in this article, but as you can see it can be a powerful tool in creating a palatable wine from problematic hybrid grapes.
-
Malolactic Fermentation: Just about all red wines will go through malolactic fermentation. This process is the conversion of harsh tasting malic acid to a softer lactic acid and carbon dioxide that creates a rounder, fuller mouthfeel. Different strains of bacteria will produce various levels of Diacetyl, and depending on the style of wine being made, is a desirable attribute to the flavor profile. Malolactic fermentation is also carried out to avoid spontaneous malolactic fermentation activity later in the bottle, which would produce off-flavors and carbon dioxide, making for a fizzy wine. Not only will malolactic fermentation add complexity to the wine, it will also help to reduce the overall titratable acidity level, which is our main focus here. While it will not reduce the acid level from 1.7% to 0.7%, it certainly is helpful in acid reduction to some degree and will contribute to the stability of the wine overall. When working with high acid grapes, the pH may be on the low side (<3 .2="" span="">which will create challenges for malolactic fermentation to complete. To overcome these challenges, preemptive acid reduction (by one or more of the aforementioned methods above) should be performed to get the pH level to at least at 3.2 or greater- where most malolactic bacteria are comfortable working. Be sure to use a nutrient made for malolactic fermentation such as Opti-Malo and choose an appropriate malolactic bacteria culture for your particular juice chemistry, e.g. wine pH, alcohol level etc. Be sure to check pH after malolactic fermentation as not to allow the pH level to rise too high, which would affect the color, make the wine prone to oxidation and would require the use of more sulfites to be protected.
-
Yeast can be chosen as a function rather than a stylistic choice. For example, grapes with a high acid level can be fermented with Lalvin 71B yeast which reduces some of the malic acid content. This will help malolactic fermentation complete later on.
-
Back-Sweeten: Maybe the acidity is just too high or this is a stylistic decision, but you can make an excellent wine by balancing the acidity with a bit of sweetening. Be sure to stabilize the wine with potassium sorbate prior to sweetening in combination with a sulfite addition.
4.
Fermentation
Additives
Inactivated
yeast products such as Opti-Red, Nobless and Booster Rouge will
contribute to
mouthfeel, body and color
stability in red wine. I
would love to get into what each one does for your wine, but it is
beyond the scope of this article. I urge you to take the time and
research these additives
to see what they can do for your wine. I personally have found the
results of using these
products in my wine
nothing short of amazing. These additives can definitely
help you in your quest to
achieve a medium to full
bodied red wine from hybrid grapes.
5. Yeast
Nutrient and Yeast Hydration
No matter
what sort of wine you are making, one of the most important steps in
conducting a healthy fermentation is
the use of yeast nutrients. Nutrients will help
keep the yeast happy,
healthy and assist them in their survival toward the end of
fermentation when their environment becomes hostile to them.
Nutrients will also prevent the rotten egg odor of Hydrogen Sulfide,
which is the result of
yeast stress. A good
protocol
to follow when introducing
yeast to the must (rather
than just sprinkling it on top)
is to
hydrate the yeast according to the manufactures instructions in
combination with Go-Ferm Protect.
Go-Ferm Protect provides
yeast with the proper micro-nutrients to get them into optimal shape
for fermentation. It also makes these nutrients immediately
available to our cultured yeast, before native yeast and bacteria
present in the must can make use of it.
Once your yeast has been properly hydrated (typically 15 minutes) you
can make what is called a
yeast starter by adding
50mls of juice per yeast
packet used to the yeast
slurry and allow it to ferment for up to one
hour. This can be repeated
several times to build up
a large starter for introduction to the must. A
yeast starter has
a few benefits: it gets
the yeast’s feet running and ready to ferment, fermentation
will start sooner, it also
helps to acclimate the yeast starter
temperature to the must temperature. Temperature
acclimation
is very important as not to shock the yeast and
delay fermentation. The
temperature range of the
must and yeast starter should
be within 17F (-8C) of
each other.
Once
the yeast starter has been pitched into the must, a yeast nutrient
such as Fermaid or Super Ferment can be added at cap formation. But
before you add the whole recommended amount, a
great yeast nutrient
protocol is to add half of the manufacture’s recommended amount at
cap formation, and then at the
rest of the recommend
amount at2/3
sugar depletion-typically at a specific gravity of 1.060 (14.7 Brix).
This later nutrient addition is paramount to yeast survival toward
the end of fermentation.
6. Tannin Management
Tannin
is
likely the most important component missing from hybrid grapes.
Not
only is it the
back bone in red wine,
without
tannin, red wine lacks structure and the tactile sensation
you experience when you take a drink. Tannin acts
as an antioxidant and is
also
needed for color retention and stability
in red wine.
Please
read Know
How to Hold Em’, New Insights into Hybrid Tannin Retention 2015,
By:
Anna
Katherine Mansfield, Associate Professor of Enology, Department of
Food Science, CALS, Cornell University (link
at the end of this article).
In
her
paper you will
find
the
research
being done at the Cornell
Enology Extension
Lab
that
strongly suggests proteins in the grape solids of hybrid grapes are
binding tannin, preventing them from being extracted into the juice.
This could explain
the
reason for such low tannin levels in hybrid wines.
Since
the grape solids may
be responsible
for tannin binding, the timing
of
the addition becomes just as important as the amount added. After
separating
the grape solids from the juice by
pressing(depending on the grape I am working with) I will add 1-3x
the manufacture’s recommended amount of tannin.
I then barrel age or use oak cubes after malolactic fermentation.
Once I am satisfied with the amount of oak imparted
into the wine, I then perform bench trials (see
below) to
determine the amount of aging tannin (Tannin
Complex)
to add in
an effort to
tweak the final product, if
needed.
To
perform the bench trial, prepare
a 2.5% solution of Tannin Complex by mixing 2.5
g of Tannin Complex with 80 mL of deionized water in a 100 mL
graduated cylinder. Once combined bring the volume up to 100 mL.
Pipette
the
different
volumes
of
lab solution (see
below under
ml’s of
2.5%
lab solution)
into separate
375 mL wine bottles
(See
below for dosage under
ml’s of
2.5%
lab
solution)
and
then fill each
bottle with
wine, leaving one bottle without
the 2.5% solution as a control for comparative tasting. Affix a
stopper or airlock to each bottle and allow the bottles to settle for
24 hours before tasting. Taste each one and determine the amount that
fits your wine best. Once
you have decided on the amount of tannin needed, see the
corresponding tannin addition rates
below under Lbs/1000
gal.
Bench
trial recommendations (per 375 mL bottle)
Lbs/1000 gal ml’s of 2.5%
Lab Solution
0.2 0.45
0.4 0.75
0.8 1.50
1.3 2.25
1.7 3.00
2.5 4.50
(Dosage
rates Tannin Complex Bench Trial Sheet By:
Scott Laboratories)
This
bench trial helps you to figure out how much tannin complex to use
per 1000 gallons, so
we will need to scale this down to
determine
how much to add per gallon. Use
this equation to
determine how much Tannin Complex to add to your wine:
For
example, if
you decide you would like to add Tannin
Complex
at the rate of 1.3 lbs per 1000 gallons.
1. Convert pound to grams, in this case it is
1.3lbs = 589.67 grams.
2. Then determine how much per gallon-
589.67/1000= 0.58967 grams.
3. Now scale it up to your batch of wine –
0.58967x (x) gallons of wine.
Tannin complex can be added up to 6 weeks
before bottling to allow for integration. Another bench trial can be
performed to dial in the exact amount of tannin desired later in the
process.
See the bench trial sheet here:
http://www.scottlab.com/uploads/documents/downloads/232/Tannin%20Complex%206-16-10.pdf.
7. Blending
Why do we
blend? Winemakers will blend to maintain
consistency from year to year, or if they believe a better wine can
be made from combining different wines that compliment each other.
Other times wine makers will blend out of necessity to remedy an
issue or
account for some shortcomings a wine is
suffering from. Blending
can be used as
a tool to
increase
the color intensity,
body, structure, or to improve the complexity of the wine. Whatever
the reason, it is a great idea to familiarize yourself with the basic
concepts. Typically blending is done by combining
two or more wines that have finished fermentation and are essentially
finished wines. These
wines are then aged to allow the blend to fully integrate.
Another way to blend is by field
blending grapes.
Fortunately
for me, at the time of me writing this article, another contributor,
wrote an excellent
article on field blending, which is blending wines in the vineyard
rather than blending finished wines. Check
out Field Blending By Dominick Profaci in the Feb/Mar 2018 issue of
WineMaker Magazine.
A few final
words on blending. If you also work with vinifera grapes, blending
Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot or Syrah or
other vinifera grapes will
significantly improve wines
made from hybrid grapes.
Be sure to experiment and objectively
evaluate your blends. Invite friends and family over to help too.
8. pH
Different pH levels in your wine can affect it
in various ways, some positive and some negative. Needless to say it
is an important parameter to measure and action should be taken when
it does not fall in line. Knowing the pH is also important to
determine the amount of sulfite needed to ensure the wine is
protected. Another thing to consider is if your color is lacking
even after tannin additions and timely punch downs, a high pH level
may be the culprit, but if you are not measuring it, you will never
know. Try your best to maintain a pH of 3.4 to 3.7. However, if the
pH is not perfect but the wine tastes great, you do not need to
potentially throw the wine out of balance just to achieve the
recommended pH (although >4.0 pH should be addressed and a
reduction attempted to some degree). Taste before numbers. Just know
that if the pH is high it may not age as long (more than 5 years),
and more sulfite will be needed to protect the wine as it will be
prone to oxidation compared to if it was at a lower pH. For a full
run down on pH and what it means, check out pHiguring
Out pH by Daniel Pambianchi-
https://winemakermag.com/547-phiguring-out-ph
9. Oak Adjuncts and
Barrel Aging
You do not have to look far to find loads of
information on barrel aging wine. An in- depth look at all of the
benefits barrels provide is well beyond the scope of this article.
Suffice to say, oak adds complexity, color intensity, tannin and each
type of oak offers their own little nuances to the wine. The biggest
difference between barrels and adjuncts is-with barrels, you gain the
micro-oxygenation benefits, and the evaporation of water content
which concentrates the flavors. With all of the positive attributes a
barrel can provide, working a barrel into your process of red wine
production from hybrid grapes should be highly considered. However,
if you are not ready to step up to a barrel, there are several oak
adjuncts out there that impart a myriad of flavors into your wine,
vastly improving the overall product. Oak adjuncts such as Stavin Oak
Beans, Xoakers, or Winestix can be experimented with to determine the
best fit for your wine. When working with oak, whether it be with a
barrel or with adjuncts, be sure to taste often to make sure you do
not over do it, as a Chateau De Home Depot level of oak flavor
will result. The trick is to slightly over-oak and then remove the
wine from the barrel or adjunct. The oak flavor will dissipate over
time to an appropriate level. For more information on the influence
the different types of oak will have one your wine, check out the
Morewinemaking.com Oak Information Paper at
http://morewinemaking.com/public/pdf/oakinfopaper09.pdf.
10. Growing Practices
For those of you fortunate enough (or crazy
enough) to grow their own grapes, you have full control on how you
fruit will turn out. Some things to look out for to ensure your
juice chemistry will be in line are:
-
Do not over crop: Over-cropping will result in grapes with low sugar and high acid. This will no doubt create issues in the winery when you are trying to dial in your numbers for fermentation. The color will suffer too.
-
Canopy Management: If you are growing cool climate grapes, chances are you live in an area will a short(er) crowing season. This makes getting every bit of sunlight into the canopy one of the most important things you will do for your fruit. Be sure to leaf pull around the fruiting zone, leaving at least 15 leaves per cluster to ensure proper ripening. This allows sunlight and your fungicide sprays to penetrate into the fruiting area.
-
Develop a Spray Program: Keeping your fruit free of mold and preventing bugs from destroying the leaves is just as important as leaf pulling so photosynthesis can take place and ripen your crop. Check out the Midwest Fruit Pest Management Guide to assist you in making a plan for your home vineyard.
-
Harvest Timing: Be patient and harvest at the best possible time. Taste, test and taste again to determine the best time to harvest. Picking your grapes with the best possible chemistry reduces problems in the winery. There is nothing worse than harvesting your grapes with an unmanageable acidity level. No fun. Trust me.
I hope these these methods outlined above will
help to improve your wine. There are several other things we can do
to increase the quality of our wine such as fermentation temperature
management, sulfite management and proper aging, but we will save
that for another article. In the meantime feel free to research these
topics on your own. Becoming an avid reader will definitely improve
your skills therefore improving your wine. Cheers
For more information on the exciting world
of tannin binding and other issues facing hybrid grapes, I urge you
to check out these links below to gain a better understanding of
hybrid grape winemaking.
Know how to hold ‘em: New insights on
hybrid tannin retention By: Anna Katherine Mansfield
The Sticky Side of Tannin Management By: Tim
Patterson
https://www.winesandvines.com/columns/section/24/article/123720/The-Sticky-Side-of-Tannin-Management
A
Few
Truths About Phenolics By: Anna Katherine
Mansfield
A sidebar on white wine making
White wine, whether it is being made from
vinifera or hybrid grapes share similar wine making practices. In
this situation tannin and color extraction are not an issue as much
as protecting the delicate, nuanced flavors is. Maintaining cool
fermentation temperatures will retain all of these goodies we want in
the finished wine. Other things we can do to ensure a flavorful,
beautiful looking product are:
-
Use Bentonite to prevent protein hazes in the bottle. Even after using a pectinase and filtration, a haze can develop in the bottle from heat exposure followed by protein precipitation. Using Bentonite early in the process during fermentation will prevent this from occurring.
-
Pectinases like Lallzyme C Max allows for rapid clarification and settling of juice in just 4-6 hours. This enables you to rack off the gross lees and initiate fermentation faster than with your average pectic enzymes.
-
Fermentation additives can be used such as Opti-White and Booster Blanc to increase mouth feel, fruit character, body and maintain fruit character in the wine. Gum Arabic before bottling will also help to improve the body and mouth feel of the wine. All in one wine pup
-
Cold Stabilize the wine by keeping the wine down to around 28F (-2C) for 2 weeks to prevent tartrate crystals from forming in the bottle.
-
Filtration gives a wine a professional look. Although it is highly debated, you will be convinced once your wine comes out of the filter.
-
Work Quickly: Developing a process you are familiar with will help you perform operations such as crushing, pressing, racking and filtration quickly and efficiently. This will reduce the wine’s exposure to oxygen therefore help to retain the delicate aromas we are trying so hard to keep.
-
Sulfite Management: I encourage all winemakers to carefully monitor their sulfite levels. The best way to do that is by testing with the Aeration Oxidation kit from MoreWine! Or the Vinmetrica Sc-100 or Sc-300. By monitoring Sulfite levels, you know what you need to add to maintain a proper level to prevent oxidation. The purchase of a pH meter also allows you to dial in the exact sulfite level needed according to your pH level. For the whole run down on the relationship between sulfite and pH, Read Solving the Sulfite Puzle by Daniel Pambianchi- https://winemakermag.com/634-solving-the-sulfite-puzzle
-
Oxygen Management is a substantial factor in white winemaking success. With proper sulfite management, a well-planned method, and the use of inert gas, undesirable oxygen levels can be kept at bay. For the advanced user, a Dissolved Oxygen Meter from Vinmetrica can be used to keep your practices in check. Measuring dissolved oxygen before and after the various duties you perform such as racking, filtration or bottling can help you determine if your oxygen uptake levels are within a normal range. If oxygen levels are excessive, you can tighten up your practices to reduce oxygen uptake for the next time.
No comments:
Post a Comment