Hi guys,
Making my first wine from fresh grapes (grown in my back yard). They're Cabernet Franc or Cabernet Sauvignon (if I look on wikipedia, they look more like Sauvignon). I did an acid titration test and the TA was 1.1%, so I added calcium carbonate to drop it to 0.7%.
I destemmed, crushed and primary fermented the grape for 7 days at around 17 degrees Celsius, a bit low but the FG was 1.004. Unfortunately I made the mistake of stirring the cap the night before racking to the carboy and the head was not fully formed. Since i don't have a press I had to do things manually, and unfortunately I got quite a bit of pulp in the carboy. I also read online that you should add bentonite during fermentation so I added my finning agent (chitosan) in the carboy and stirred for a good 5 minutes. In hindsight, I don't think it was the most brilliant idea I ever had but what's done is done.
Here's the carboy after 3 days in the carboy (sorry the image was too large to include directly in the post):
http://imgur.com/soeit
My question, when I rack it off the sediment, is there any way for me to extract as much wine as possible while not sucking up too much.
In case some of you are wondering, it's a slight pink because of the Calcium Carbonate.
Thanks !!!
Making my first wine from fresh grapes (grown in my back yard). They're Cabernet Franc or Cabernet Sauvignon (if I look on wikipedia, they look more like Sauvignon). I did an acid titration test and the TA was 1.1%, so I added calcium carbonate to drop it to 0.7%.
I destemmed, crushed and primary fermented the grape for 7 days at around 17 degrees Celsius, a bit low but the FG was 1.004. Unfortunately I made the mistake of stirring the cap the night before racking to the carboy and the head was not fully formed. Since i don't have a press I had to do things manually, and unfortunately I got quite a bit of pulp in the carboy. I also read online that you should add bentonite during fermentation so I added my finning agent (chitosan) in the carboy and stirred for a good 5 minutes. In hindsight, I don't think it was the most brilliant idea I ever had but what's done is done.
Here's the carboy after 3 days in the carboy (sorry the image was too large to include directly in the post):
http://imgur.com/soeit
My question, when I rack it off the sediment, is there any way for me to extract as much wine as possible while not sucking up too much.
In case some of you are wondering, it's a slight pink because of the Calcium Carbonate.
Thanks !!!
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