2016 Chardonnay, day 44, racked

Different levels of clarity.

Jon, Jim and Ron came over to help rack.  We went from 21 gallons to 20.  The first three carboys were all very much alike, but the fourth had much looser lees, clouded when we brought it over to the workbench, and you can see from the photo that the new cb that it went into is much less clear than its fellows.

Taste: still grapey, very tart, but very good for only a month and a half into the process.  Am hoping that some of the acid falls out over the winter, as it has with prior years' wines.  Did not measure.

About 16 ppm free SO2 - will measure again in a few days.  We were pretty good about not agitating the wine much during racking.  Will have to make a decision about whether to leave it alone or not.

Looking back at racking histories

Year	Date pressed	Days in primary	Days to next racking	Days to next racking	Days to next racking
2016	10/1/2016	8
2015	9/19/2015	7	11	64
2014	10/5/2014	6	7	75	115
2013	9/22/2013	6	8	56
2012	9/29/2012	7	8	82	78

Holy mackerel.  

Turns out that I've had a language shift that's created a racking shift.  2012 through 2015 when we took the must out of the primary and into carboys it was active enough so that we left air-gaps and a couple days later, as things calmed, we topped them off.  In those years, 7 to 11 days after topping off, we racked the wine and I called that racking it off its gross lees.

2016, with a different varietal, when we went from primary to carboys we topped immediately, and I also dumped the bottom couple inches of must calling them (in my mind) the gross lees.  Whatever!  But it means that if we rack this weekend we'll be at 40 days where we'd previously been at a max of 11.  I'm fine with it - things are looking beautiful.

2016 Chardonnay, day 42: moreso

07:00

Same vessel as in the last post, 17 days later.  Transparent now, still.  Not completely clear but ready to rack this weekend.  The larger carboys are all in similar states.

The 2015 wine we did not rack in November, but waited until Dec. 12.  2014 we waited until Jan. 3.  2013, Dec. 1.  2012, Jan. 5 but we did not start winemaking that year until Oct. 13.  Going to have to make a chart of all this.  Maybe we'll convince ourselves to wait a couple more weeks?