2018 Grape Season Underway

Just reserved 8 lugs of Pinotage from South Africa via Gino Pintos in South Jersey. Grapes are due in the last week of March. Still deciding what to due from Chile in April. Maybe another carmenere, I just opened last weekend a bottle of 2 year old carmenere that never went through MLF and it is turning into a very good wine. Several months ago it still tasted young but now the upfront fruit and sharpness has developed nicely.

Good luck everyone with your 2018 grapes and wines.

 

I decided to do buckets (mostly)
Chilean Juice Chardonnay
Chilean Juice Vigioner w/ some syrah grapes to make a blush from the mother in law
Chilean Juice Carmenere with some syrah grapes.

I am hoping the Carmenere works out ok.

 

Your gonna need to grab that crusher at some point soon. Don’t think I’m getting any earlier S. African so can’t do it on pickup day.
But if mine I’d want it before crush in case you would be doing any maintenance. I haven’t touched it. Crusher is currently at our shop in NE Philly. Between Northeast and south Philly, bucks county and jersey I’m all over the damn place so meeting up somewhere is always a possibility too.

 

I'm very flexible schedule-wise. I'll touch base with you next week and see what friday brings. Can't thank you enough.

 

Sounds good. Just to be talking about grape selection/pickup/orders is amazing. Spring is sneaking up on me and I’m nowhere close to being ready!
Need to rack and bottle last years Chilean-and then transport 25gals and the rest of my entire setup across state lines!
Thinking about going back to my ‘steady eddy ‘ RC-212 this spring. Rc212 gets a bad rap being needy/h2s prone, but I never had an issue and use to pitch religiously. I would also like to experiment with diff Malo but won’t. VP-41 I’ve used 4x now. All successful and all co-inoculated after fermentation kicked off. Gotta start thinking about all this stuff man. Gotta order up some freshies and check inventory.

 

Ouch on the moving part, but it will be worth the effort. I'll be sticking with RC-212 with reds this year as well. I tried 3 different Malo's the last two years VP-41 was the best.

You got a lot going on this spring, good luck with getting freshies.

 

Actually “moving” in and all the wine stuff will be like a break for me. Been renovating the place myself on nights and weekends. While demoing the laundry area I found more things I didn’t like so I ripped out EVERYTHING. Even the floor and walls. And a laundry room has essentially EVERY DAMN MECHANICAL KNOWN TO MAN NEEDED. And already butting heads with the township since they seem clueless.
I want to get a barrel for this batch but I’m only making 6 gal this spring. So I think one of those 20L Vadai barrels is in order. I’ll cut my teeth into the barrel world with a little guy before buying a larger one.

 

Good luck with all that. Bought the place I live in now in 2000, three story row, was going to be some minor renovations to make it livable, ended up gutting to the rafters and common walls. Took a year to renovate and replace everything, I did about 50% of the work while working a full time job. Glad I did it once, never want to do it again. Going downtown for permits was the worst.

I'm still vacillating on a barrel, but I think the 20l is a good way to start

 

Stil debating on how much grapes to buy. Being 18 lb lugs it turns out to be $2.00/lb. I'm definately doing a Malbec and Camenere juice with at least one lug of grapes from Chili. I'm thinking of doing a Pinotage but have been advised to try one first which I haven't done yet. I'm trying to aviod 2 trips to Harford so I'm waiting to get a confirmation of the delivery dates to decide.

 

I'm going to look for some Sangiovese and I'm debating on what else to try. Seems I may need a small crusher

 

I have a 6.6 gallon think it's nice size for doing a bucket and couple of lugs. The next one I'm trying to get is an 8 gallon but everyone is out of them. I have 10 gallons of Norton dying to get oaked plus this fall I plan on doing 10 gallon batches. I have a Zin in the barrel that's just about done. If the 8's don't come available soon I'll just put a portion of the Norton in it.

 

I forgot the SA lugs were 20lbs and the Chilean 18lbs, I need to call back and double my order tomorrow. If you don't want to take a risk with the pinotage my SA cab sauv from last spring is very good already but then again cab sauv grapes will be available from Chile as well.

 

Usually the confirmation dates come after the "last day to order" date, unfortunately. For that reason I went with a lug of Merlot grapes to go with a Cab Sauv bucket, since the Cab Sauv grapes historically come a week or so later. But it is a guessing game at best. Safest bet is to order all grapes, but the cost in the Spring makes it hard to justify it when they are more reasonably priced in the Fall.

But then again, if you have unlimited funds available to you, why not spread out the fermenting season a bit.

 

I think I'm going to come back sangiovese grapes this fall, they were my first all grape batch 3 years ago unfortunately I liked it so much none survived past 1.5 years.. I did do a few sangio juice buckets this past fall. Always a good choice.

 

spring grapes can be limited. Even though they grow Sangiovese notnsure it’s sold to us. I did see Sangio juice buckets tho. I just did a big Sangio batch for the 1st time in sept. Much lighter than I realized. I would have used more cab and merlot in hindsight. IMO I would get grapes Chile or S. Africa are known for. And save Sangio for fall.
Why get a ‘small’ crusher? You are the guy who was into bitcoin early correct? Go big and Get yourself a brand new motorized crusher/destemmer!

Juice bucket with its own lug or 2 (or 3 or 4) is a great way to save a few bucks. Last May I made both. Difference was not drastic but you can definitely tell which is the all-grape.
I know I want 1 smaller 5-6.5 gal barrel and another 13 gal to pair with my demis. And then In a couple yrs I’ll make all that useless and get a VC 150L-200L tank and 30gal barrel!

 

It's mostly a space issue. I'm a northern virginia townhome with a growing family so my wine making space is tightening up

 

Have you called them? In speaking with Kevin last fall, I think he said they used to order extra grapes but no longer do that. Said they still order extra buckets though.

 

Have or can you notice a difference in the product from a juice bucket vs one from a bucket of crushed grapes? I've read in some places that the juice buckets could have less of a body

 

You'll pay more, but you'll have a much better wine from grapes than you would from just juice.

 

I agree with Jim, you'll have a better wine with the grapes added to the bucket or just grapes. Adds some more tannins from the skin contact and color, in my opinion. Not sure how they extract the juice for the buckets, but I think I remember someone (@ibglowin?) posting that they extract the juice using steam? I could have been dreaming, much like I have for most of my life.