Hello:
I’m getting ready to bottle my wine and noticed that it has a bubbly taste. Like champagne. Is this because I need to degas it? Or is there something else going on?
Ken
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Hello Ken,
It is very possible that you are correct in your assumption. The wine may simply need to be degassed. But you should also verify with a gravity hydrometer that the wine has actually completed its fermentation. It is possible that the bubbles you are experiencing are from a slight, but still active, fermentation.
When first learning how to make your own wine you want to get into the habit of double-checking that the fermentation has actually completed with a gravity hydrometer. Sometimes fermentation’s will stop before they are done.
If you do not know how to use a gravity hydrometer to check your wine, the article, Getting To Know Your Hydrometer, listed on our website, will give you an over view of the gravity hydrometer and its use.
If you have already determined that a slight fermentation is not the cause of your bubbly wine, then more than likely it is left-over, remnant CO2 gas from the fermentation. Putting the wine through a degassing process will be your answer.
There are a lot of ways to go about degassing a wine. You can siphon the wine back and forth between a couple of glass jugs in a splashing manner. Or, you can dump the wine back and forth between a couple of plastic fermenters. But both these methods introduce a lot of air into the wine. This is something you don’t want to do at this stage. It will promote the oxidation of your wine.
A safer way to go about it is to use a degassing paddle. A degassing paddle will agitate the wine without splashing it. This dramatically reduces the effects of oxidation. It attaches to a power drill, just like a drill bit, so it takes very little effort to use. The paddle blades also fold up so that they will fit into the small opening of a wine carboy.
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.
We bottled a kit of cabernet sauvignon on the 1st of Nov. When I opened a bottle this weekend it had a lot of bubbles and tasted green. Will it get better with age in the bottle or do I need to pour it back into a bucket and degas it some more?
Dede, it sounds like fermentation is occurring in the bottle. I would take a look at the following article for more information.
Bubbles In My Wine
http://www.eckraus.com/blog/bubbles-we-dont-need-no-stinking-bubbles
The article you recommended gives suggestions on how to prevent fermentation from starting back after bottling. But what do I do after I’ve already bottled? Do I need to pour it all back into a bucket and add the items in the article?
Dede, if you did not stabilize the wine from re-fermentation and added sugar at bottling time, you do run the risk of the wine fermenting in the bottles. If this does occur you could have corks popping out or worse the bottles could explode. Your two options are to store the wine in refrigerator temperatures that will be too cold for the residual yeast to ferment or to put it back in bulk and let the sugar ferment out, treat it and re-bottle the wine.