Did I do MLF right??

[AbruzziRed]

I just did my Chromatography test and it did not come out as expected. I tested 5 reds two of which I inoculated with CH16 two days after pitching the yeast. And the other 3 did not get the ML culture.
I attached the pic of the test and it looks like all 5 wines are still strong in Malic Acid, Tartaric and some Lactic.
All the wines taste decent to me but I am not an expert yet like I am with beer. But there is not tart taste and all taste smooth but almost flat. What are your thoughts? Should I warm up the Italian juices and add more CH-16? Any other recommendations?

The first two are Italian juice pails Montepulciano and Sangiovese with premier rouge yeast, got temp to 88 day 2 and inoculated with CH-16 and medium French oak chips then held temp avg 77 through day 5 when I racked both to secondary. I held secondary temp at around 77 for month and half and did notice some gas bubbles in must. I did not add Kmeta when going to secondary. But I did add a medium oak stick.

The other 3 wines (Merlot, Pinot Noir and Zinfandel) are all Lodi juice pails with premier cuvée yeast and nutrient, fermented to roughly 1.00 for all 3 over 4 days at temps peaking at 88 for one day then down to 70-75 for the last 3 days.

 

[sour_grapes]

AFAIK, juice pails are often shipped with added sulfite. Can you check with the supplier to see if that was the case?

 

[AbruzziRed]

@sour_grapes yes both juices have sulfites from the supplier. I don’t have ability to measure SO2. Should I wait or try to restart MLF?

 

[user 36973]

At this point, your two options are to re-do MLF or to call it well enough. Note that it is possible that MLF won't be able to reduce the remaining malic (see below).

If you re-do the MLF, you are in good shape since you have not added sulfites yet. The risk is that you will leave your wine for another a month unprotected with sulfites while the bacteria do their job. This increases the risk of oxidation and spoilage. Completing MLF will lower the acidity further and potentially reduce the fruit aromas still present in the wine.

If you call it good enough, then you should immediately add sulfites to protect the wine from oxidation. This option will leave more acidity and fruit flavors, but less of a buttery mouthfeel to the wine. If the juice producer had added an acid blend containing malic, then it is likely the malic was synthetically produced which will contain equal amounts of L-malic and D-malic. MLB can only metabolize the naturally occurring L-malic molecular rotation and can't metabolize the other rotation direction of D-malic. This would explain the partial MLF result.

So, the decision comes down to the style of wine you are shooting for and the grapes/juice you are working with. From what you've mentioned above, you are satisfied with the current state of the wine. This suggests that you are better off calling MLF done and add your sulfites.

 

[montanarick]

not really sure why you want to proceed with MLF if your wines aren't tart to begin with. Maybe just give them a dose of lysozyme to kill the MLB and K-meta, age, bottle and enjoy