Mixed grapes and kit, MLF underway (oops?)

[tdah1986]

Hi all

Just after a bit of advice on the above. The situation is that this year I let my young vines grow a few (only around 2kg or so) of grapes – I then:

- Sterilised with a bit of a campden tablet
- Topped up with grape juice concentrate from a wine kit
- Added pectolase, then yeast, nutrient and bentonite
- Fermentation completed in 6 days. 12% ABV and pH of 3.4

I’ve racked it into a demijohn and then whacked in some bacterial culture to undertake MLF – v. slow bubbles have reappeared so I assume this is doing its thing.

Anyway I was having a peruse on the interweb the other day, and saw that you shouldn’t undertake MLF with kit wines, as the bacteria can react with the potassium sorbate in the stabiliser and turn your wine into a full blown geranium .

Lovely as geraniums are, I’m thinking that I should put the stabiliser aside – in fact I was simply planning on adding a campden tablet to each bottle at the bottling stage anyway, which I thought would do the same thing as stabiliser, and avoid this flower business.

Have I made a terminal mistake, or do you the campden strategy will work? Or is sorbate-based stabiliser crucial when using kits?

Thanks all, Tom

 

[salcoco]

no sorbate but it is also a problem with the kit wine. Normally it is balanced to insure new wine makers will have good product without problems and MLF is not recommended. You may end up with a flabby wine. the geranium issue is regardless if wine is from grapes, juice or fruit. sorbate and MLF bacteria do not mix.