Recent content by tjmeyer

If you're in the Southern CA region, I'm happy to allow winemakers to harvest their own grapes in our vineyards. We have the following available self-harvest this year: Zinfandel, Malbec, Sangiovese, and Chenin Blanc. Price TBD. meyerwine.com

Welcome to WMT! 1. Yes! I absolutely add potassium metabisulfite to freshly crushed must. This doesn't mean it needs to be done, necessarily. As a business, I can't risk 55g+ (barrel fermenter size) of product to a particularly aggressive yeast strain that happens to be around that year--yes...

Sounds like a low SO2 wine, nothing wrong with that! If you're not finishing a bottle before it starts to go, consider smaller bottles. I regularly bottle in 350mL bottles for wines I don't trust to stand up to much more than a light breeze lol

Perhaps this is where that gin-like quality is coming from. It's not unpleasant and adds a complexity I didn't expect.

Couldn't help myself 😂 so I pulled a wine thief worth out to taste it. It has already darkened, but still very bright red. Currently it is high tannin, low acid, high alcohol, and sweet (sweet in a dry way, fermentation is totally complete). It has notes of sweet currant, something flowery...

Oh my, what a question! I have tried many timings and they've all worked, but I must say that our recent WMT community ferment was probably the healthiest, fastest yeast take over after pitching I've ever seen. We did the standard stuff mentioned here with a few variations like adding must juice...

True! But there are lots of kinds of sour. I was referring to the tell-tale acetic acid bitter/sour that doesn't really age out like strong malic or tartaric acids do. 👊 Clarified on the data post, thx!

Data 04/11/2024 First racking complete! I would normally do this a little sooner, but the vineyard and planting season honestly forced this little fun side project completely out of my mind until last night. (sorry!) Setup I'm using 2x 14 gallon SS Brewtech conical buckets. They are not a true...

warmer than i thought! nvm lol

You're middle/slightly cold for most grapes if I know SLC weather at all. That late of a harvest is worrying, your growing season for that species might be too narrow. I'd be interested to see how some of the cooler varieties do there as an experiment. Try some Riesling! I'd love hear how it...

Really? I thought most Malbec in central/northern CA were already leafed out! Our vineyards are all selected for exactly that kind of climate. An old wise man once told me that Italian grapes will grow anywhere Creosote will grow. So far that's been quite true! I think Malbec is supposedly...

After about 2" of snow and upper 20s F last night, buds look ok! Still green, soft, and leafing. My apple trees weren't so lucky, buds on those are looking withered

Yes, sorry. I find US-specific measurements a little weird and never use them, personally. It's snowing now! Very odd start to a Southern CA April....

Just got this forecast for today/tonight ... Pretty worried about this and right after bud break.

great catch! These typically (not sure if always) have a good amount of methanol (CH3OH), a big no no to consume.