Steve & Mike to market at 8:30. Bought 12 cases of the usual Muscat Alexandria from Mrs. Lapide. 42#, $42 each. Why 12 and not 10? One of the gents there gave us a taste of his old, gold Muscato he makes in whiskey barrels - ambient yeast, no racking, 5 years before drinking - and we thought we might make an experiment.
Back at the house by 10. Unloaded the grapes. Lori had prepped the focaccia and we popped grapes into the dimples. Jon arrived just as we were hustling the press and destemmer out of the cellar. We decided to also go with a sorting table this year. Doyle arrived a couple of cases into the process, and Mike's buddy Nick dropped in for a while in the middle. Mike picked up Pam and Carmelo right about then, and we were at full force. Lots of folks stopped on the street to chat, a few brought their kids in to taste a grape or look into the scary destemmer as it worked. One dad, born in Italy and raised in South America, looked longingly at the crushed grapes and yearned for grappa, grappa miel.
The grapes were a mixed bag - not as uniform as last year. Some boxes nearly perfect, but just as many with lots of bad fruit or raisins. So with the 12 cases we actually wound up with a slightly smaller yield than with last year's 10 cases. Lets say just above 65 liters.
And here's the experiment:
We took about 60 liters of mixed crushed grapes and less than perfect grapes and put them in a tank to ferment on the skins. For how long? We don't know. A few days? Until fully dry? We don't have any set expectations and it won't cost us anything but labor. My guess is that when we have any significant amount of free run going under the cap we'll drain that off and finish fermenting along side the original pressed juice.
Measurements?
The day was overcast and hovered around 70. The cellar was a few degrees warmer. The individual boxes and grapes tested all over the place, but the crushed juice was at 25 Brix, 3.77 PH. We did not sulfite during the crush this year (why? forgetfulness). We pitched standard Montrachet Red Star yeast at about 4 PM - mixed at our late lunch table (last year's wine, 2nd focaccia, cheese: could have added a roast animal. Next time.)
Clean-up was great. Everything hosed out at the street, boxes broken down and tied. Crushed grapes bagged. Destemmer moved to the back yard to await the red grapes, press to the cellar.
Doyle, Jon, Pam sorting grapes.
Mike at the press.
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