A bit of age

[Trubador]

boy, oh boy,



My first wine, WE Selection Merlot, now aged about 4 months (2 months
in carboy and 2 months in bottle, first fermented in Dec. 2006).
I am drinking it now as I write this. It tastes sooooo much
better than it did last month and the month before. I am now a
true believer in the aging process. I only wish that I had added
the extra K-meta to it, but I didn't so I'll have to drink it over the
next few months before it totally oxidizes....(not a problem for a
first wine

)



It is a bit gassy, but I've followed George and others advice to shake
the bottle a bit, decant it, swirl it in the decanter every 15 minutes
or so for an hour and 95% of the CO2 is gone......I'm hooked!
I've got a Chardonnay/Semillon WE Selection series about 2 weeks into
it's bulk aging, I've just learned a bit about vacuum degassing in
combination with mix stir/fizz-X.....I'm very excited! The
Chardonnay should be outstanding! Plus I learned to add the extra
k-meta, so it will last as long as i want (within reason of course)



Just last week I placed my first order (of hopefully many) with
FineVineWines. A bunch of miscellaneous toys/bottles,etc...AND a
WE Selection Cabernet!



I've only visited this forum for about a month or so now, but it is a WEALTH of information and full of friendly people

Thanks so much to each of you that have given advice to me so far.



When I can, I hope that I can contribute some of my own advice and experiences to those that are looking.



Again, for those in doubt, age on the wine is a wonderul thing. I
can only imagine how good this wine would taste after an additional
year of aging. This one won't make it, but future wines most
definitely will, at least a few of them

- Jorma a.k.a. Trub

 

[Wade E]

I love when someone makes a batch and loves it. It makes this forum so enjoyable!

it wont be long now until you have a family of carboys bulk aging now!
Edited by: wade

 

[JWMINNESOTA]

Trub, you are contributing!

 

[masta]

Glad to hear you enjoying the first batch and as you progress and fine tune the process you will certainly enjoy the finished and aged wine more and more. Thanks for sharing your thoughts and the kind words for the Team! Edited by: masta

 

[chevyguy65]

Our first batch was a little scary for us too. We made a WE leibfraumilch and were a little disappointed with it at bottling time but at 2 months in the bottle its improved greatly!!! We can now see that more time in the bottle will only help it. We have a MM Lambrusco bulk aging about 3 weeks now we will wait til the end of July then probably bottle then.We thought about bottling 3 gallons and leaving the other 3 gallons in bulk for a few extra months to see how much of a diff it makes.
Good luck with future batches

 

[OilnH2O]

Way to go, Trube!


I made a newbie mistake of my first batch being a less expensive kit -- a WE Vintners Reserve Bourgeron Rouge -- on the theory that if I messed up it wasn't a huge investment. Well, first, as you note about the forum members here, it is hard to mess up if you just read and listen and as Smurfe says, 'follow the directions!'


That first batch is now close to 18 months old, and there are only a few bottles left -- and it's amazing how good it tastes and keeps getting better -- with AGE! I only wish I'd started with a higher-end kit, but I will say that the experience has given me a bench mark from which to measure the REALLY great tasting results from those higher end kits!


It just goes to show that every experience is a learning one.

 

[chevyguy65]

Insanity= doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results!!


All results ,good or bad, teach us something...