FREE grapes!

[BobF]

UPDATE: Ferment went perfectly. Hand pressed with a straining bag yesterday. I now have just short of 4G of wonderfully rich wine from my 5G of crushed mystery grapes. Aroma is intact! Color? VERY rich and dark! Body? Heavenly!
Tannins? Moderate ...
=================

Scored a bunch of free reds day before yesterday. Destemmed by hand and froze 135#, started 5g of crushed last eve - should yield 3g.

Not sure of the variety. SG = 1082, TA = .56, pH ~3.8. Added tartaric to .7 TA and pitched RC212. No added sugar, I'm going for a New World Red If it ferments dry, I should have ~12%. That's plenty.

I'll add some nutrient when the ferment gets going to make sure the 212 doesn't stress on me.

Very tasty and great aroma. Taste agreed with the acid measurement.

I'm not sure yet if this one will get backsweetened or not, but I'll be keeping the sulfites up on this one just in case ;-)

 

[countrygirl]

awesome bob! that's lots of hard work! keep us posted and some pics too!

 

[winemaker_3352]

Where did you get them from?

 

[Tom]

Any idea what kind of grapes?
I would not back sweeten depending on the grape

 

[Wade E]

I come out with more like 11% abv

 

[BobF]

i come out with more like 11% abv

1082 - 990 = 92. 92 / 7.36 = 12.5


I struggled for a long time to resolve the descrepency between PA readings on a hydro and Luc's alcohol/SG scale. Luc's scale predicts higher alcohol % than the hydor PA scale and agrees with my mouth-mounted alcohol sensors.

I finally realized that the hydro PA scale assumes ferment to 1.000. Luc's scale assumes ALL sugar is fermented.

In fact, the instructions/sample calc that came with my hydro includes a correction of 1.7% from 1.000 to .990.

 

[BobF]

Any idea what kind of grapes?
I would not back sweeten depending on the grape

I said I don't know the variety. Whether or not I backsweeten will depend on taste trials.

 

[BobF]

awesome bob! that's lots of hard work! keep us posted and some pics too!

Yep, an awesome deal! Sometimes you're in the right place at the right time

I spent roughly 12 hours total destemming, bagging, crushing ....

If this ends up happening every year, a destemmer/crusher and larger fermenters will be in order!!

 

[jet]

I said I don't know the variety.
...

Like Tom, I overlooked that part.

 

[Wade E]

I dont ever assume my wine will go down to .990 as its not very often. I always assume aroiund .998 as thats much more realistic.

 

[BobF]

I dont ever assume my wine will go down to .990 as its not very often. I always assume aroiund .998 as thats much more realistic.

Really? I've never had one not go completely dry.