There’s Too Much Tannin In My Homemade Wine!

Posted on October 1, 2020 by AIH

I have 3 five-gallon carboys of zinfandel with a low pH of 3.00, and what I identify as too much tannin. The wine has been “aging” for 18 mos. now and still unacceptable by my taste. Is it too late to doctor it to lower the tannin? It has been stored cool (I’m in N. California) and I can’t heat it. Too late for treating with egg whites or bentonite?

Name: Tony S.
State: CA
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Hello Tony,

I see your wine is still a beautiful, young color, even after 18 months. That is probably partially due to the fact that it has such a low pH. This can help to keep a color fresh looking as well as keep any potential spoilage in check. The bad part is as you have stated, it doesn’t taste good. That is the primary issue when you have to much tannin in any wine.

You said that you tested the pH of your wine and thought it was too low because of too much tannin being in the wine as opposed to the other typical reason, which is having too much tartaric acid in the wine. This could be easily verified by testing the wine with an acid test kit. This would tell you very precisely if there was too much tartaric acid in the wine or not.

If you do not want to do this you can go by taste and experience, but this can only tell you what direction to take in solving this problem, not necessarily how sever it is. If there is too much tannin in this wine you would expect it to taste bitter and dry-puckering. If it is a tartaric acid problem you would expect a tart and sharp flavor.

If you do have too much tannin in the wine, just as you implied, bringing the temperature up would most likely drop some of it out. I would not hesitate to use artificial means of heat on the wine to heat stabilize the wine. Bring the wine up to about 80°F. for about a 3 days. Because the wine’s pH is so low oxidation will not be an issue.

You can use something as simple as an electric blanket it to warm it up. We also have a heating belt that can warm five gallons by about 20°F. Just be sure to use a thermometer of some type to monitor just how hot the wine is getting.

Once the wine has reach 80°F. (this could take a day or two) treat is with bentonite and let the wine sit for the rest of the week.

If you are dealing with too much tannin in your wine, you will notice a remarkable change in the wine after doing this. You may want to test the pH again. If you do not notice any change, then I doubt you are dealing with a tannin problem and urge you to test the wine again with an acid testing kit. More than likely you will need to use acid reducing crystals on the wine.

Beyond this, if you do see improvement in the pH, it is possible to treat the wine a second time with bentonite, if you deem it necessary, but I would not heat it a second time. Once the pH rises above 3.2, you do need to be a little more cautions about oxidation. You will typically receive marginal improvement from a second treatment in such a potentially severe case.

Hope this information helps you out.

Best Wishes,
Ed Kraus
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Ed Kraus is a 3rd generation home brewer/winemaker and has been an owner of E. C. Kraus since 1999. He has been helping individuals make better wine and beer for over 25 years.

Why Your Homemade Wine Smells Like Acetone

Posted on September 29, 2020 by AIH

I have a 2017 Chamborcin that has a smell like acetone is their a way to remove this taste. Will oak aging help? If I let it oxygenate for several hours it is palatable. What can I do? I feel I have done every step correctly and my Vidal Blanc taste great a very light dry. Why does this wine smell like acetone?

Charlie C. — GA
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Hello Charlie,

When you say your wine smells like acetone, two things instantly come to mind:

It could be from fermenting the wine at too warm of a temperature. If a fermentation becomes too hot the yeast become stressed causing all types of funny chemical-like aromas. This is the reason we recommend that a wine fermentation never go over 75°F. and to take some sort of action to cool the fermentation if it does.

It could be that your wine is turning to vinegar. This typically happens when your wine has been contaminated with acetobacter (vinegar bacteria). The acetobacter could have come from anywhere. It could have been on the grapes, your equipment… If you’re making wine in a root cellar it could be floating around in the air and on the walls. The tell-tale sign of a vinegar fermentation going on in your wine is the smell of finger nail polish remover (ethyl acetate), which as a smell very similar to acetone.

Either situation is not a good one to be in, but it would be helpful to know the specific reason why your wine smells like acetone before moving forward:

If you noticed the acetone smell in your wine during the fermentation, then most likely it is from a hot fermentation. The odor will become noticeable along with all the other smells of a fermentation. Then as time goes on, and the wine is racked a couple of times, sulfited, etc. you will notice the chemical smell start to become less noticeable.

If you did not notice it during the fermentation, but noticed the acetone smell later on and getting worse with time, then it is most like that your wine has caught the vinegar bug. Even if you did smell it during the fermentation, but it has gotten worse since then, I would lean towards acetobacter as being the cause – the overriding factor is: it’s getting worse, not better.

What To Do Now

If you feel that that your wine smells like acetone because it was fermented too hot, then I would do nothing other than go through your normal winemaking procedures. The strategy is to hope that the smell is volatile enough to dissipate on its own accord. If it becomes time to bottle the wine and the aroma of acetone is still noticeable, about the only thing you can do is rack the wine in a splashing manner and then sulfite. The type of sulfite you use does not matter. It can be Campden tablets, potassium metabisulfite or sodium metabisulfite. Use the dosage that is recommend on the contain it came in. The splashing will encourage the acetone smell to dissipate. The sulfites will help to drive out the odor as well as any oxygen that may have saturated into the wine during the process. Excessive oxygen in the wine can lead to oxidation.

If it seems as though your wine smells like acetone because of acetobacter, then there is something you can do now to stop it from getting any worse: that is to sulfite the wine. Any of the sulfites mentioned above will easily destroy the vinegar bacteria that is growing in your wine and producing this odor. This will stop things from getting any worse, however it will not reverse the damage that has already been done. To rid the wine of the smell that is already there, you will have to do as recommended before. That is to splash the wine and treat with sulfites. Unfortunately, in many cases of acetobacter contamination, this is not enough and the wine is lost.

What To Do With Future Batches
There are things you can do to make sure your future batches of wine do not smell like acetone:

Keep the fermentation temperatures from rising too high: Do the best you can to keep your fermentation around 70° to 75°F. Fermentations create their own heat, so it might be advisable for you to get a liquid thermometer of some type to track the fermentation temperature.

Use sulfites at the appropriate times: The wine should be treated with sulfites 24 hours before the yeast is added, then again before aging, then once more before bottling.

Keep air exposure to a minimum: Not only does air promote oxidation, it also promotes of growth of an acetobacter. Getting a few cells of vinegar bacteria in your wine is not a problem. It’s when those few cells are given the opportunity to reproduce and grow into a full-blown colony. That’s’ when your wine can start to smell like acetone. This is what excess air exposure does.

Make sure your wine making equipment is sanitary: Just as keeping your wine sanitary with sulfite, it is important to sanitize all your wine making equipment. First make sure it is soapy clean, then sanitize it with a product such a Basic A Cleanser.

Make sure your wine making area is sanitary: If you are making wine in a basement or cellar, you may need to sanitize your entire wine making area. This can be done with spray bottle filled with a mixture of 1/4 cup of Clorox bleach to 1 gallon of water. Do not spray your equipment with this mixture, but rather counter-tops, exposed floor joists, etc.

Charlie, I hope this information helps you out. Having a wine smell like acetone is a good reason for concern. Hopefully, everything will work at fine and you will finish with a wine that will be well beyond your expectations.

Bulk Aging vs Bottling Aging Wine. Which Is Best?

Posted on September 27, 2020 by AIH

One of the long, ongoing discussions in the world of home wine making is, “should I be bulk aging or bottling aging my wines?” While bottle aging wine has its merits, there are some good reasons to consider bulk aging. Here’s some food for thought when considering bulk aging vs bottling aging your wine.

What Is Bulk Aging Wine?

Bulk aging refers to storing the wine in something similar to a glass water bottle. Home wine makers refer to them as carboys. It’s important to have a container with a neck of some sort so that the head-space, or air gap, can be mitigated as the bottle becomes full. Aging wine is a bucket-style fermenter is not recommended. The carboy is usually sealed airtight with either a rubber stopper or cork stopper while the wine is aging.

Many home wine makers elect bulk age over bottling aging their newly made wines for months or even longer before moving the wine into bottles. The reasoning behind this could be anything from, “that’s how the wineries do it” to “I was waiting to get more empty wine bottles.”

Why Do Professional Wineries Bulk Age Their Wines?

In reality, the commercial wineries bulk age, or maturate, in bulk because it is a safer and more controllable than aging in wine bottles. It’s safer because air, light and heat can all be kept in check more evenly – these are the elements that can come together to produce oxidation in a wine. It’s more controlled because the maturation process is slowed down when oxygen contact is reduced. Wine in bottles have more air contact per gallon then wine in bulk.

Why Slower Is Better

It’s common knowledge in the wine industry that slower aging produces a better tasting wine, one that is more in balance. Oxygen is what drives the rate of some maturation processes, but not all of these processes respond equally to oxygen. As a result, a wine can become out of balance, as some aging process outpace others when aged too fast.

In addition, some aging activities in a wine are triggered in sequence – sort of a domino effect. One cannot happen until the other one occurs. These falling dominoes are set off by the oxygen, but again, if too much oxygen is given, some of the maturation processes fall behind in the chain, again, putting the wine’s qualities out of whack.

For these reasons many wineries age in bulk before bottling. “How long?”, depends on the wine at hand and how the flavor and bouquet of the wine are developing. These elements are monitored to determine when it is time to bottle the wine. It could be weeks; it could be a year.

Bulk Aging Homemade Wines In Carboys

The home winemaker can use either glass or food-grade plastic carboys to do the aging. While you can use an actual cork stopper to seal up the carboy, I prefer using a rubber stopper. I also recommend using baling wire or similar to hold the stopper in place, otherwise changes in temperature or barometric pressure can cause the stopper to pop loose.

The wine should also be treated with a dose of potasssium metabisulfite before sealing it up to be aged. This is to eliminate any chance of spoilage and to help keep the wine’s color stable.

When bulk aging a wine in a carboy, be sure to monitor the flavor of the wine as time goes on, just don’t monitor it too much. About once ever 2 or 3 month you can take 1 or 2 ounces out to see how things are progressing. A wine thief will help you in this regard to get the wine from the carboys or any other glass jugs with a narrow neck.

After Bulk Aging The Wine

Once it’s time to bottle, you can bottle the wine directly from the carboys just like you normal would have without aging the wine.

Once the wine has been bottled there is a typical period of bottle shock that the wine will most likely experience. This is a temporary condition of the wine that results in a flat, lifeless character. Let the wine sit to condition for about a month and the wine should come back to its former self.

Whether or not you bulk age your wine in a carboy or individually in wine bottles, your wines will age none the less. So don’t feel that bulk aging vs bottle aging is a make-or-break decision. Just remember that air exposure to the wine is a premier factor.
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Ed Kraus is a 3rd generation home brewer/winemaker and has been an owner of E. C. Kraus since 1999. He has been helping individuals make better wine and beer for over 25 years.

Making A Basic Apple Cyser Recipe

Posted on September 24, 2020 by AIH

Which one of your wine making kits would I buy to make a basic Apple Cyser recipe? And a list of other ingredients needed. Thank you Janet

Name: Janet N.
State: CA
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Hello Janet,

Without a doubt you will want to get the “Your Fruit!” Wine Making Kit for making apple Cyser. This wine making kit has been designed for beginning winemakers that will be using their own fruit instead of a wine concentrate – in your case, the apple juice. It works great for making wines from strawberries, blackberries, cherries, peaches, watermelon… the list is endless. And yes, it will work great for making an apple Cyser recipe.

This starter wine making kit includes all the essential wine making ingredients you will need to make almost any fruit wine. The wine yeast, nutrients, sanitizers, etc. It also comes with two wine making books. One of them containing 100 wine making recipes; the other contains great insights to making homemade wine. A complete list of what’s in the wine making kit is on our website.

Coming up with an basic apple Cyser recipe is easy. Sense apple Cyser is basically an apple mead, essentially what you are doing is making an apple wine recipe, but instead of adding the sugar it will call for, you will be adding honey in its place. So basically, you can take any apple wine recipe and turn it into an apple Cyser recipe.

Because honey is not all sugar – it has some moisture or water in it – you will need to add more honey by weight than the wine recipe calls for in sugar – usually about 20% more. In the case of our apple wine recipe, you would want to take out the 5 pounds of sugar called for, and replace it with 6 pounds of honey. This is all that is needed to turn it into an apple Cyser recipe. Apple blossom spun honey would be idea but is usually cost prohibitive at 6 pounds. Barring this, clover or wild flower honey will work fine.

Apple Cyser Recipe
(Makes 5 Gallons)

5 gallons of apple juice
6 lbs. of honey
2 tbsp. Yeast Nutrient
1/2 tsp. Pectic Enzyme
2-1/2 tbsp. Acid Blend
1tsp. Tannin
1 Packet of Wine Yeast: EC-1118
10 Campden Tablets (5 prior to fermentation and 5 at bottling time)

You can follow the wine making directions on our website or the directions that come with the starter wine making kit.

And that’s how to make apple Cyser. Get the “Your Fruit!” Wine Making Kit; convert the apple recipe into a basic apple Cyser recipe and follow the wine making directions. Also realize that you will have some left over wine making ingredients for making future batches of wine. This could be use to make another apple Cyser recipe or some other fruit.

Best wishes, and happy wine making,
Ed Kraus
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Ed Kraus is a 3rd generation home brewer/winemaker and has been an owner of E. C. Kraus since 1999. He has been helping individuals make better wine and beer for over 25 years.

Restarting A Stuck Malolactic Fermentation

Posted on September 22, 2020 by AIH

I have a Chilean Pinot Noir from fresh juice. I have a stuck malolactic fermentation. I’ve added malolactic culture when I inoculated my wine… Yesterdays MLF test read 75, pH 3.4, Free SO2 18-28, but my acid was .90%, too High?. Temp is 73 degrees. I’ve added malolactic culture twice. Should I try lowering the acid? Can I add sulfite and move on? Suggestions ? Thanks in advance

Name: John F.
State: Mass.
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Hello John,

I am assuming that the yeast fermentation has completed and you have an SG in the neighborhood of .996 on your hydrometer.

Going through the numbers, the only thing that concerns me is the SO₂ (sulfite) level of the wine. I would rather see it at around 10 to 15 ppm. I’m not saying this is what’s causing the stuck malolactic fermentation, but it very well could be contributing to it. Some experimentation may need to be done with aeration to lower the SO₂. This could be as simple as racking the wine in a splashing manner. This alone could be all that is required for restarting your stuck malolactic fermentation.

Dropping some acid out may be helpful, as well, but I do not believe this is the root cause, either. At a total acidity of .90% you need to drop some acid for flavors sake, anyway, so go ahead and start this process to get it down to .80% for now. More readjusting may be needed after the MLF has completely run its course. Lowering the TA could also help with restarting a stuck malolactic fermentation.

The temperature and pH of the wine are fine. I would not be concerned with them at all.

Realize, that an MLF can take months in some cases to finish. It is a function of how much malic acid there is to ferment. Each situation is different. Your malic is currently at 75 ppm, but this does not reflect how much has already been converted into lactic. Is this number lowering over time. That’s what’s important.

If you have not tasted the wine, I would do so now to see if too much lactic acid is starting to form. This will be noted as a sour-tang. If it is too noticeable or forward, then I would add sulfites such as potassium metabisulfite to the wine to stop the MLF and move on. The rest of the excess acid can be reduced with neutralizers such as potassium bicarbonate.

If the wine does not have a forward sour-tang, then wait 3 weeks and take another malic reading. If it has dropped some, then you do not have a stuck malolactic fermentation. Just be patient. The wine will need to age anyway. What’s wrong with it aging while it’s doing its MLF?

As for the malolactic culture, I would not add any more. Too much, could set of an autolysis reaction that can add a bitter-nut to metallic flavor to the wine. This is something that is irreversible.

Restarting a stuck malolactic fermentation is something that very rarely needs to be done. It’s just that sometimes it can progress very slowly with time and patience being the only remedy. I you do have a stuck malolactic fermentation, just remember it is usually because of the environment the fermentation is in and not the lack of malolactic culture.

You can find more information on our website in the article: Malolactic Fermentation.

Happy Winemaking,
Ed Kraus
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Ed Kraus is a 3rd generation home brewer/winemaker and has been an owner of E. C. Kraus since 1999. He has been helping individuals make better wine and beer for over 25 years.

No-Bull Directions For Using One Step No Rinse Cleanser

Posted on September 20, 2020 by AIH

The directions on the container of One Step No Rinse Cleanser simply say to rinse your equipment with the solution. Is there a minimum amount of contact time one must allow for the solution to work prior to using the sanitized equipment? The results of an online search stated anywhere from 30 seconds to 2 minutes. I know the safe route would be to let it sit for at least 2 minutes, but I’d rather not stand there waiting if I don’t have to.

Name: Paul
State: Missouri
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Hello Paul,

The One Step No Rinse Cleanser is actually an oxygenating cleanser. This means that it uses a burst of oxygen from the solution to do the sanitizing. This high oxygen level actually destroys any unwanted microbes.

The great thing about any oxygenating cleanser is that it gives the biggest burst of oxygen while the solution is evaporating off the surface of what is being sanitized. In other words, the contact time with the solution is not what really matters. What matters is that the solution be allowed to evaporate without interruption after being taken out of the solution. The amount of time in the One Step solution is not critical. This is way the directions seem so vague.

The only situation when the length of time would matter is if you are treating a piece of equipment that has a lot of tight spots, or has a surface that is complex and not smooth. A couple examples of this would be a nylon brush or a straining screen. In both cases you would want to give “some” time for the solution to work its way in between and onto the surface of each nylon bristle or into the corner of each square of the screen. This could require a few seconds due to the surface tension of the solution.

The flip-side of this is when sanitizing a surface that is smooth, like glass, no time is required in the solution at all. Just dip or apply with a rag and allow to evaporate. Again, the evaporation from the surface is what’s key, not the time in the solution.

If you want to get the most out of the One Step No Rinse Cleanser you would allow your equipment to dry completely before using. However, I understand that following such directions would not be practical in a lot of situations, since it would make things way too time consuming. So as a matter of practicality, I would follow these directions: dip or or wipe with a rag the equipment with the solution of One Step No Rinse Cleanser, then allow to dry for 5 minutes.

One final not I’d like to make is that the One Step No Rinse Cleanser is not a soap or detergent in any way. It is not designed for or intended to release grime from your wine making equipment. This is something that needs to be done with a dish soap or similar, beforehand. The One Step No Rinse Cleanser is strictly for sanitizing your wine making equipment. It is designed to kill any molds, bacteria, etc.

What’s The Skins Got To Do With It?

Posted on September 17, 2020 by AIH

I hope you can answer my question about wine to press the grapes. Why is it important to ferment the must with the grape skins prior to pressing? Your article says that white wine grapes can be pressed right away, whereas, red wine grapes is fermented prior to pressing. Please explain because I want to lean how to make white wine later this year.

Thank you,
Gabriel
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Hello Gabriel,

This is a great question, and an area of wine making that causes some confusion for many beginning winemakers. When to press the grapes and when to have the grape pulp in the fermentation are fundamentals that need to be understood.

One thing that needs to be pointed out is that if you are making wine from concentrated juices or wine ingredient kits, the skins have nothing to do with your wine making at all. The juice producers have taken care of everything for you when it comes to handling the grape skin or pulp. So just relax.

If you take the darkest or reddest grapes you can find and run them through a grape crusher. Then press the grapes with a press. You will not have a red juice. What you will have is a pink or blush juice. If you ferment that juice you will have a pink or blush wine, not a red wine. There is nothing in the fermentation process that will make it turn more red than it was at pressing.

The color in a red wine comes from the grape skin not the juice. This is the reason that the skins are left in the must during the fermentation: so that the color can be extracted from the pulp into the juice. There are also body and aroma elements that are extracted as well making the wine more structured and complex.

With white wines it now starts to become clear why the grapes are pressed right away. Contact with the skin has very little value when making a white wine. You are no necessarily looking for color.

Some wineries do live the pulp and skins in with the juice for a very short period of time to add depth and structure to the wine, but it is usually a matter of hours not days. For example, this might be done with a Chardonnay or Sauvignon Blanc grape where significant body is expected.

I hope this answers your question sufficiently and gives you a better idea of when to press the grapes and when to leave the pulp in with the fermentation when making your wine.

Happy Wine Making,
Customer Service at E. C. Kraus
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Ed Kraus is a 3rd generation home brewer/winemaker and has been an owner of E. C. Kraus since 1999. He has been helping individuals make better wine and beer for over 25 years.

Having Fun Using Honey In Your Wine Making

Posted on September 15, 2020 by AIH

I want to start using honey instead of sugar in my wine making so I have a few questions: do i put the honey in the must to start with, or, to sweeten after the wine is done fermenting? Also one pound of sugar equals how much honey?

Tom – NC
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Hello Tom,

Using honey in wine making is something you can have a lot of fun with. One of the favorite wines I made was a Raspberry Honey Zinfandel. Nobody could keep their hands off of it, and it was soon gone.

There are different ways honey can be used in wine making. You can add it to the wine must, before fermentation, and have its sugars ferment into alcohol, or you can add the honey after the fermentation and have its sugars contribute to the sweetness of the wine.

Using Honey Instead Of Sugar Before The Fermentation

When you add honey before a fermentation, what will be left when the fermentation is complete is the herbal character of the honey. No sweetness will remain. For example, if the honey was spun off of wild flowers then a wild flower character will be added to the wine during the wine making process. If the honey was spun off of strawberry blossoms then you will have a note of herbal-strawberry character in the wine, and so forth.

What this means is you can alter any fruit wine making recipe you find by replacing some or all of the sugar called for with honey. Using honey in your wine making in this way will add a layer of depth to the wine’s over all character. You can compliment the wine’s character, such as adding raspberry-blossom honey to a raspberry wine recipe, or you can contrast the wine’s character, such as adding apple-blossom honey to a cherry wine recipe.

When using honey in wine making before the fermentation, you want to use it in-place-of or instead-of the sugar called for in the wine recipe you are using. As a general rule-of-thumb you can replace 1 pound of sugar with 1.2 to 1.3 pounds of honey. You can also use a wine hydrometer to determine how much honey to add. Keep adding the honey until you get to the appropriate reading on the wine hydrometer’s specific gravity scale – usually between 1.070 and 1.090.

Using Honey Instead Of Sugar After The Fermentation

If you add the honey at bottling time or anytime after the fermentation, you are contributing to the sweetness of the wine instead of the alcohol. The herbal characters of the honey are still being added but along with its sweetness. It is important to note that any time you add a sugar to a wine at bottling time – whether it be honey, cane sugar or grape concentrate – you must also add potassium sorbate (wine stabilizer) to eliminate any chance of re-fermentation later on in the wine bottle. The is in addition to the Campden tablets that we recommend at bottling time for any wine. Here’s more information on sweetening a wine with honey.

Should I Use Raw Or Pasteurized Honey?

I recommend using pasteurized, filtered honey – the kind you typically find on the grocery shelf. This type of honey has been cleared of wild microbes and various solids that you do not want in your wine. If you do plan on using raw honey in your wine recipe, you will need to heat it up to 170°F. for a full 30 minutes along with some water. During this time you will also want to skim off the top whatever rises.

More Information On Using Honey In Wine Making

You can find more information on our website in the article, Wine Making With Honey. It gives a basic run-down of how honey has been used in wine over the years along with some basic honey recipes.

Using honey instead of sugar in your wine making is a fun way to add more interest depth, not only to your wines, but your wine making. It’s one more way to be creative in the enjoyable and rewarding hobby.

Oak Wine Barrel Preparation And Maintenance For Longer Life!

Posted on September 13, 2020 by AIH

I have a Shiraz that I want to age in a an oak wine barrel. It will be a new barrel. Do I need to do something to prepare the new barrel? How about for each follow-up use of that same barrel? Is there some type of maintenance on the oak barrel that needs to be done? When will I know can no longer be used anymore? As always, thank you.
Rick

Name: Rick R.
State: Colorado
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Hello Rick,

Oak wine barrel preparation is very important. The last thing you want to do is get a new wine barrel and dump your wine directly into it. The barrel needs to be treated first. There will also be some maintenance that will need to be done between uses.

Oak Wine Barrel Preparation
The first thing you will want to do to prepare a new wine barrel for wine is to swell the wood. This is done by filling the barrel with water. As the wine barrel sits, the wood will swell, tightening all the joints. The barrel could actually leak for a day or two during this process, so be prepared for the potential of water leaking onto the floor. Also, be aware that you may have to add more water along the way as it soaks into the wood and possibly leaks out.

A secondary reason to soak the wine barrel with water is to remove the harshest of tannins. Some tannin is good for the wine. These tannins being removed are sort of over-the-top tannins in the oak wood that are too extreme in their effect on the wine to be of benefit.

Once you are done treating the oak wine barrel and its wood is saturated, there is a second part to oak wine barrel preparation. Now it’s time to sanitize it. To do this you will want to dump the tannic water out and refill the barrel with fresh water. To actually sanitize the wine barrel you will want to treat it with sodium metabisulfite and citric acid.

As for the dosage, you will want to use about 1/4 cup of sodium metabisulfite and 3 or 4 tablespoons of citric acid for every 10 gallons of the wine barrel’s volume. Dissolve the dosage in a gallon of water first. Then add to a half full barrel; agitate to mix everything well. Add the rest of the water and allow to sit for at least a few hours. Overnight or 24 hours would be much better. Dump the sanitizing water out of the barrel. And, that’s how you prepare a new oak wine barrel for wine.

Oak Wine Barrel Maintenance
After you are done aging the wine in the barrel, you will want to treat it with BarrolKleen as directed on its package. BarrolKleen is a blend of alkalies that will neutralize leftover acid deposits from the wine as well as help sanitize it.

As for storage between uses, you will want to keep a mixture of water / sodium metabisulfite / citric acid in the wine barrel as before when you were sanitizing. You will want to keep the oak wine barrel full this way until it is ready for its next use. Sodium metabisulfite will need to be replenished every six month, along with some topping-up water to make up for evaporation.

How Many Uses Can You Get From An Oak Wine Barrel?
In theory a wine barrel can be used for generations – as long as it will hold wine – but I believe your question was referring to its usefulness for actually aging a wine.

Most wineries will employ a wine barrel somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 uses. In a typical ongoing operation what this means is that every year the oldest 10% of the barrels are replaced. The winery then blend all the wine from all oak wine barrels before bottling. This is done to even the qualities of the wine across the entire season’s batch.

What this means for you as a home winemaker is that you can realistically get 10 or 15 uses from the wine barrel, but the effects of the barrel will take longer to come into fruition with each successive use. Your first batch may need to be in the barrel for only 3 weeks, while your 15 batch may need to be in the barrel for 3 years. But beyond this, the barrel should last you for decades in terms of just storage. And lets face it. Barrels are really a cool looking item to have sitting around!

So, there you have it. That’s all there is to oak wine barrel preparation and maintenance. These are fairly simple treatments. Follow these steps above an you’ll have a oak wine barrel that will last you a lifetime.

Campden Tablets: What They Can And Can’t Do.

Posted on September 10, 2020 by AIH

One of the most commonly used ingredients in home wine making are Campden tablets. You will find them in almost any of the wine making recipes you will use; talked about in almost any of the wine making books you will read; and called into action by just about any of the homemade wine instructions you will follow.

What Do Campden Tablets Do?
The original reason Campden tablets were used in wine making was to keep the wine from spoiling after it had been bottled. By adding these tablets at bottling time, you could virtually eliminate any chance of your wine falling victim to mold, bacteria and other foreign enemies.

Since their introduction into wine making, Campden tablets have also become routinely used for sterilizing the juice prior to fermentation. By adding Campden tablets a day before adding your wine yeast, you can start your fermentation with a clean slate, so to speak. All the unwanted micro organisms will be gone.

Some home winemakers also use Campden tablets with water to create a sanitizing solution. This solution will safely sanitize fermenters, air-lock, stirring spoons, hoses and all the other pieces of equipment that may come into contact with the wine must.

What Campden Tablets Don’t Do?
Many beginning winemakers believe that Campden tablets are a magic pill of sorts. One that can instantaneously stop a wine fermentation dead in its tracks. While it is true that Campden tablets can bring a fermentation to its knees for a period of time, it is also true that these fermentations will usually gather themselves back up and eventually overcome the effects of the tablets. The result is a continued fermentation – sometimes after the wine has been bottled.

Truth is, Campden tablets are not designed to stop a fermentation and never have been. Using them for that purpose can get you into all kinds of trouble. There is really no ingredient that can be safely used by itself to assuredly stop a fermentation.

What Are Campden Tablets?
Simply put, Campden tablets are metabisulfite. When you add a tablet to the wine you are adding sulfites to the wine. Most Campden tablets consist of potassium metabisulfite, but some are made with sodium metabisulfite.

How Are Campden Tablets Used?
Their use is fairly straight-forward. You add one tablet to each gallon of wine must 24 hour prior to adding the wine yeast – before the fermentation. Then you add one table per gallon just before bottling.

The Campden tablets must first be crushed and dissolved in a small amount of the wine or water. This mix is then stirred thoroughly into the rest of the batch.

You can use the Campden tablets to create a sanitizing solution by crushing up 4 tablets into a quart of water. This can be used as a sanitizing rinse, or you can pour it into a fermentation container and allow the fumes to sanitize the entire insides.

As An Alternative To The Campden Tablet…
You can use potassium metabisulfite or sodium metabisulfite in the form of a granulated powder. The advantages are: you don’t have to crush it up; and it is cheaper. The disadvantage is you have to measure out the dosage, which is 1/16 teaspoon per tablet.

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Ed Kraus is a 3rd generation home brewer/winemaker and has been an owner of E. C. Kraus since 1999. He has been helping individuals make better wine and beer for over 25 years.