Other Tosca Wine Buckets - Anyone tried these?

They come available in fall at our LHBS. There is a Gold medal series, and a regular. They are first run fresh juice buckets straight from California that come pre-inoculated. The Gold medal series comes with a varietal grape skin package.


Prices are $41-$60 and $80 for reds, and $40-$55 and $70 for whites.

http://www.brewersdirect.com/wine/tosca-juice/

The prices are hard to argue with, and it sounds like a good deal...there are winemakers here in the city who wait all year and pick up 15-20 of these all at once. I just don't know if they really like them, or they are just cheap (it is Winnipeg!)

Anyone tried these?

Where they any good ? I've orderd a cab and a merlot.

I see from your other posts you've made a few modifications. Hope you'll post the results. I'm not planning on adding a thing the first time.

Hey there Mark123,
I'm hoping they turn out well - let me know about the Cab, it was my second choice (I've already got a couple on the shelves, but no merlot)

As you can see from the other posts, we were originally going to do two the same and tweak only one. But plans change - I'm ok with that, as long as it tastes good in a couple of years!

the_rayway said:

Hey there Mark123,
I'm hoping they turn out well - let me know about the Cab, it was my second choice (I've already got a couple on the shelves, but no merlot)

As you can see from the other posts, we were originally going to do two the same and tweak only one. But plans change - I'm ok with that, as long as it tastes good in a couple of years!

Click to expand...

Two years ! I haven't even started yet and I'm thinking March or April.

Lol, I'm in no rush. I've got a couple hundred bottles on the racks now so I'm happy to wait It'll only get better, right?

How's the weather over in Portage? We had a beautiful blue sky over here today.

I'm having a bit of trouble with the buckets overflowing. Had quite mess to clean up this morning. Is this normal ? The ambient room temperature is about 21. Any suggestions as to what I can do ?

The problem is the buckets - they're too small for the amount of wine. I ended up racking (ok, pouring) mine into proper sized buckets with a couple of gallons head space.

Just pop the lid and your done. I knew that sounded a little too easy. The cab has settled down and I'll just stir the merlot a couple times a day. Next time I'll rack (pour) into a proper sized primary.

Lol, we had a few spills and over-flows. I don't know why they don't put a little more head space there!

I'm going to rack again this week, already have a lot of sediment in there. I can't wait to have another taste and see what it's like.

Started a couple of these buckets a little over a month ago. They sold me on the reds with the crushed grapes still in them and picked up a gold series Shiraz and Malbec. I added about 100 g of hungarian medium toasted oak to the buckets when I got them, they were not doing much in terms of activity. They were barely fermenting as they had gravities of ~1.08.

I left them in the buckets afterwards, more or less covered to prevent fruit fly entry. Racked the Shiraz over after 8 days it was still quite active, so I left the Malbec for another week on the crush and the oak.

I plan on leaving them another month in the carboy before stablizing with K meta and then adding a french oak spiral to each of them, probably bulk aging for about 6 months.

There was a fair amount of crushed skins at the bottom of the bucket, feel like I left over 2 liters at the bottom, looking forward to see what this turns into.

Nice! Keep us posted. There doesn't seem to be any other threads on this particular brand of bucket.

Mine had some big fruit fly issues - the whole house was full of them. Damn things came right through the screens on the windows!

I'll be racking some time this week, getting them off more of the gross lees and raisins (Amarone). Then I'm hoping to pop more oak in and leave them there stabilized for a couple months before I rack again. Still hoping for an oak barrel for Christmas

Just racked these out of the secondary and stabilized with 1/2 tsp K-meta and 10 g Ascorbic acid, heated and did the 1st round of degassing.

Tasted it, both the Malbec and Shiraz taste fine full of tannins and green but that is what is to be expected. The SG is down under 1 where it is expected at this point, the wine looks pretty good. My only worry is that I am well under the 23L now I am guessing I am around 21L due to the standard loss in the rackings and the big loss due to the crush and the oak at the bottom of the primary.

Guess I will have to top up with similar wines, I have some Malbec and Shiraz from other kits that I will add before adding the oak spiral and bulk aging for at least 4 months or until I need the carboy space.

I've racked these three times, so no more gross lees. I topped up with 'like' wines from some kits I had done previously. Now they're going into a bulk ageing stage until I can get my oak barrel.

The Merlot tastes really green, but the Malbec & Amarone are smoothing out already. I'm quite pleasantly surprised so far!

6 months in racked both the Malbec and Shiraz down to 19 L carboys taking a few bottles off, will let the carboys bulk age for another 3-6 months.

These seem to be fairly slow to come around, still very green in taste which I guess isn't surprising and since I am in no hurry to drink these won't be a problem. The grape crush really adds alot of tannins and richness/fullness at this point in. I will probably throw in a bit more oak as there is very little oak flavour to it.

Thanks for the update!

I'm still in bulk ageing as well. And I agree with you, these are VERY green. Also quite thin, which I found surprising, considering I even added an extra grape pack to the Merlot. And oak chips in primary.

I'm ordering some med toast French spirals, and they will go into the carboys soon. (oak barrel was a bust) Thinking about adding some extra tannins as well.

Someone mentioned elsewhere that the Chilean juice buckets really start coming into their own around 18 months. So I'm wearing my 'patience' hat with these, thinking it will be around the same.

Needed the carboys for another project so I bottled both the Cab and the Merlot. The Cab could be best described as watery and characterless. The Merlot was better but still very green. Glad these didn't cost much. I'll wait a few more months before pronouncing final judgement.


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I've got mine sitting on oak, and I've got some Tannin Riche Extra that I will likely pop in there for a finishing tannin.

Wishing that I'd done an MLF on them (as suggested by members here) - but at the time that I should have done it, I thought I was getting a barrel and didn't want to ruin it for kit wines. Next time I'll know better!

Will be tasting the Amarone soon. Currently it has a good liquorice nose, but all of them are lacking on body, even the Merlot which I added an extra grape pack to. I'm really hoping the cellaring tannins will assist with that.

I'm attempting to withhold judgement for another year, and am hoping to get some bottled soon-ish. I think my brother in law is getting antsy

Tried the Amarone last night with Dad (it was his pick). The oak is coming through strong, which has definitely helped with the complexity of the wine. It was still missing something though so we added a tiny pinch of Tannin Riche and...there it is! Suddenly it has so much more character, flavour, body and interest.

The Tannin Riche did everything for it!

Where did you find this Tannin Riche in Winnipeg?

Glad to hear it is turning out okay, I will probably bulk age fine at least another 4 months which will put it around the 11-12 month range, then bottle and hopefully it'll turn out.

I haven't been overly pleased with juice buckets compared to kits at this stage in my wine making

I hear you, I think they at the very least require far more of a grape pack during primary.

I had a friend pick up the Tannin Riche when they were in the US - ordered it online. $20 for one ounce, so quite pricy.