Reducing high acid grape wines

For those wishing to successfully reduce a lot of TA in high acid grape wines please read on:


Oct 2
This year I obtained some local Foch grapes. We had a great summer but unfortunately it rained 3 weeks in sept. In early October the grapes were picked as the rain wasn't letting up.

At home we sorted the grapes and threw out the large number of unripened ones. My readings were as follows: Brix 18, PH 3.2, TA 15 GL
Measured TA and PH with an inexpensive PH meter (calibrated religiously)

I decided NOT to reduce any acid with chemicals at this point for a few reasons:

~My PH reading is perfect for MLF.
~ I didn't fully trust my TA reading.
Instead I went ahead using Lalvin 71B yeast, some OPTI-RED and oak shavings and added sugar to 22 BRIX. Fermented 5 days on skins to 1.00 SG.


Oct 8-9
After pressing I took a sample, DE-carbonated it by heat and shaking...
TA is now down to 11 GL... Wine tastes as tart as lemon juice I feel like crying at this point.
After a day of settling and racking off gross lees Viniflora Oenos MLB was added.

NOV 6:
As MLF seems to be pretty much done I did another reading today
OMG the wine tastes great!.. no tartness, very smooth and the TA is down to 6.4 GL, PH 3.4

Plan to barrel age and cold stabilize over the next year.

Congrats. Your numbers are spot on

I'm hoping the same for my MN 1200 this year. Congrats on your success.

GreginND said:

I'm hoping the same for my MN 1200 this year. Congrats on your success.

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Thanks guys
How was your PH at the start Greg? Did you have to add calcium carbonate to bring the PH up before starting?

Hope you have success as well.

No. My TA was only 7.8. But the pH was 3.2. I used 71b and am doing mlf. I think it should turn out good. We'll see how it looks in a few weeks.

GreginND said:

No. My TA was only 7.8. But the pH was 3.2. I used 71b and am doing mlf. I think it should turn out good. We'll see how it looks in a few weeks.

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Nice.
This should turn out well!

I have 15 gallons of frontenac and it is high in acid. I added some calcium carbonate to bring it down a bit. I'm just learning about malolactic fermentation and it sounds like this would have helped smooth things out. However it might be too late in the process. Any suggestions?

weaverschmitz said:

I have 15 gallons of frontenac and it is high in acid. I added some calcium carbonate to bring it down a bit. I'm just learning about malolactic fermentation and it sounds like this would have helped smooth things out. However it might be too late in the process. Any suggestions?

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Can you give us more details? How far along is this batch? What are your PH, TA and how much ABV? Have you added sulfite at crush and/or after fermentation?

Adding Calcium Carbonate is not necessarily a mistake as your PH may have been too low anyways to get MLF started. Most strains of MLB wont work unless you get the PH up to 3.1 or 3.2
We got lucky as my PH was within range even though my TA was huge.

MLF was successfully carried out last year on a 2 month old wine with Bacchus MLB.

This cold snap we are now having in Wisconsin may be a good time to do some cold stabilizing of Frontenac and other high acid wines. I've got a couple carboys out in my garage right now. I'm not sure that it lowers the TA all that much, but it does eliminate the precipitate in the bottle problem.

I racked mine today, wines have been kept quite warm. Was very surprised to see that there were wine diamonds sticking against the glass everywhere even without cold stabilizing it yet.