WineXpert Vintners Reserve Liebraumilch

[Crawlspacevintner]

I'm brand new to wine making and this message board. I am a couple days into my primary fermentation. It looks like things are going great.

Just writing to see if any one has specific advice on this kit that might deviate from the instructions or common wine making techniques. (when to rack, how much degassing, when and how much of the f pack to use, aging, etc...)

Hope this batch goes well and can't wait to get it to the bottle and have some.

 

[cpfan]

Hope this batch goes well and can't wait to get it to the bottle and have some.

Best suggestion that I can give you...Patience, patience, Procrastination, and Patience. The wine really will be better if you give it some extra time. Extra time in the carboy will help it to clear and mature. Waiting patiently once it is bottled will also lead to a nicer wine.

Steve

 

[Dugger]

I think that since this is your first kit, you should follow the directions as closely as you can. This way you should have no problems and will know how it it is meant to be; on future kits you can do some tweaking if you wish. Having said that, once the wine is stabilized and degassed you can wait longer as cpfan has suggested.

 

[robie]

Good advice above. Welcome to the forum.

 

[Bailey]

I've made this kit 2 or 3 times. As a matter of fact, it was my first batch - about 20 batches ago.

Each one turned out very well.

As a beginner - follow the directions to a T. Once you get the basics down you can start tweaking things.

Give this plenty of time to clear on its own.... the longer the better. As hard as I know that is for a beginner.


Good luck!

 

[Runningwolf]

Great advice from everyone above. I have also made a few of these and I think they are awesome.

 

[Flem]

Welcome to the forum and good luck with your first kit.

 

[Crawlspacevintner]

Thanks for the advice everyone. I think it's tough being new to this. I'm not so worried about being patient and waiting for it to clear and age enough but more worried that I'm going to invest all this time into something that is bad.

Tell me if I'm wrong, but it seems like the degassing/carboy aging is the biggest debate with these kits. I do not have a drill mixer so I was just planning on letting sit with an airlock a little longer suggested. If this is not done right will I get carbonation in the wine? If a sparkling liebraumilch is what I get. I can live with that.

I am on day three of the primary fermentation now and I gave it a little stir. I still have my bucket just covered with a dish towel. I would put the lid and the airlock on but the black washer type piece fell into the must when I was putting my air lock in. I can't find it on the bottom and dont think I should be diggin around in there. Hopefully i can rack it soon.

I will keep everyone posted on how it's going. And I'm sure I will have more questions along the way. I'm already looking into what I want to make next. Might already be time to invest in another carboy.

 

[cpfan]

Tell me if I'm wrong, but it seems like the degassing/carboy aging is the biggest debate with these kits. I do not have a drill mixer so I was just planning on letting sit with an airlock a little longer suggested. If this is not done right will I get carbonation in the wine? If a sparkling liebraumilch is what I get. I can live with that.

IMO, the wine will NOT degas on it's own. I personally do not think that the drill mixer is the most effective degassing tool. I think that a side-to-side motion with the large stirring spoon is more effective than the round-and-round motion with the spoon or the drill. Admittedly, I use both. The drill to mix additives, and the back-and-forth motion to degas.

Steve

 

[robie]

Like cpfan said, it just will not degas on its own. You can take our word for it or find out the hard way.

If you bottle it with CO2 still in the wine, each bottle will have to be individually decanted for several hours before drinking. I know this because my first kit has CO2 in the bottle.

There is a difference between a sparkling wine and a wine that simply has not been degassed. The sparking wine usually has a lot more CO2 in it. A non-degassed wine has just enough to make it taste bitter and unpleasant on the tongue. All just my opinion, though, but many will agree.

Trust us, degas it!!! You can always let it bulk age for two years or so. After all that time, you will still have a non-degassed wine.

 

[Runningwolf]

Before my vacuum pump I used the drill mix and spoon both. Actually I still use both sometimes to get rid of a substantial amount of gas if I have it before using the vacuum pump. As Steve said, I also like to use the side to side motion.

 

[robie]

Six months or so ago I read in Wine maker's Magazine where Tim V. put a sanitized carboy brush down inside a carboy of Chardonnay. It was amazing to me how that brush caused the CO2 to nucleate (if that's the right word) and very quickly cause the CO2 to release.

I had had times where even my vacuum pump wouldn't get out all the CO2. I would stopped the pump, stirred the heck out of the wine with a drill/stirrer, then vacuum again with better results.

I have even shaken the carboy back and forth while degassing with the pump and got a quick new spurt of additional CO2 coming out.

Wish I had a way to stir the wine while vacuum degassing.

A good temperature of about 74 or 75F really helps, but sometimes that CO2 just doesn't want to budge. I might just try the carboy brush method next time.

 

[Crawlspacevintner]

Thank you for the info everyone. My thought on that were purely off on post I read somewhere on here where someone said they were making the Liebfraumilch and they over degassed it and it stayed cloudy. I will trust all of you over the one other post I read.

What do large wineries do about degassing? I have taken a few winery tours and I don't remember them every explaining this part. (I might not have heard them) Is this specific to wine kits?

 

[cpfan]

What do large wineries do about degassing? I have taken a few winery tours and I don't remember them every explaining this part. (I might not have heard them) Is this specific to wine kits?

It's not specific to wine kits. It may be specific to home winemakers but I don't think so.

Commercial wineries use large tanks and barrels. A larger surface allows more outgassing than we experience in a carboy (especially a topped-up carboy).

Steve

 

[Crawlspacevintner]

I racked to my carboy last night after 7 days in the primary. I was down to sg of 1.000. I checked it at day 5 and it was at sg1.02. I didn't rack too late did I?

It took forever to rack it though. i could only get a slow flow out of my racking hose. Took over 20 minutes. Is this normal?

Getting more excited by the day. This is tremendously broad, but what should I make next?

 

[Bailey]

Sounds like you're doing fine. Racking early can oxygenate the wine some which will help finish the fermentation. But - active fermentation in the carboy can bubble up through the air lock. Watch for that - towel under or around the carboy? or the carboy in the sink until it slow down... otherwise don't worry about it.


For the next batch - save the slurry (leftover gunk after racking = a lot of active yeasties) and try Skeeter Pee. It's an easy one, cheap, and quick drinker while the Lieb. ages. Also - the slurry can be refrigerated for a short time, frozen for a longer time, and then used to start a new batch. With kits though, always use the yeast supplied since it's selected for that particular variety.

Good luck!

 

[Flem]

Everything will be fine. Not sure why it took so long to rack. Could be the size of the tubing or racking cane or auto siphon. Did you have the primary bucket high enough above the receiving carboy? Good luck!!

 

[Crawlspacevintner]

Baily thanks for the info. There a fair amount of head space in the carboy right now and I dont expect it to have a problem making a mess, but you would probably know more than me. On that note I will probably go put a towel down.

As far as skeeter pee goes, I'm kind of kicking myself I didnt do something with the slurry. I read some posts and it sound fun. I honestly didn't really know what the slurry was though. It seemed like all i had left over was bentonite. Does it look like mud? next time around i think I'll try that.

 

[robie]

On that note I will probably go put a towel down.

I set my carboy in a small, round plastic tube that is only slightly larger in diameter than the carboy. It can sure save a mess, if you get an overflow or when racking.

 

[Crawlspacevintner]

The time is here to actually do something to my wine. Today was day 10 of secondary fermentation. I had readings of .990 yesterday and today. With the amount of days that have passed and the repeat sg readings it looks like I'm ready for the next step. I have honestly read through the directions 3-4 times and am unsure what to do. I would like to go by the instructions to a T but have read a lot on here that things should be changed. Here are my questions:

Add kmeta and sorbate before or after drill degassing?

If planning on bulk aging over a month, add F pack right away or later?

add fining and clearing stuff before or after f pack?

add fining and clearing stuff before or after bulk aging?

I know what all needs to be done, just not sure on the timing of it all.