'Natural' wines

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I tried natural fermentation last January... A year and almost 5 months later I just took all my Syrah and emptied the bottles back into a carboy! The fricken bottles will not stop fizzing! Ya... Ran it thru the all-in -one long ago.... I now took a chance and added some Pottasium Sorbate to see if I can calm it down.... Never done it since..... Never do it again.


Sam
 
I tried natural fermentation last January... A year and almost 5 months later I just took all my Syrah and emptied the bottles back into a carboy! The fricken bottles will not stop fizzing! Ya... Ran it thru the all-in -one long ago.... I now took a chance and added some Pottasium Sorbate to see if I can calm it down.... Never done it since..... Never do it again.


Sam

You might have to try sterile filtering if you have the ability. I would be tempted to put it into a carboy, put it in the freezer at say 28 degrees for a few weeks. Then sterile filter and then apply sulfites and sorbate. It might not be a sure shot, but with something that old it is definitely not something you want to pitch.
 
I tried natural fermentation last January... A year and almost 5 months later I just took all my Syrah and emptied the bottles back into a carboy! The fricken bottles will not stop fizzing! Ya... Ran it thru the all-in -one long ago.... I now took a chance and added some Pottasium Sorbate to see if I can calm it down.... Never done it since..... Never do it again.


Sam


Oh man!!!!!


Sent from my iPhone using Wine Making
 
I tried natural fermentation last January... A year and almost 5 months later I just took all my Syrah and emptied the bottles back into a carboy! The fricken bottles will not stop fizzing! Ya... Ran it thru the all-in -one long ago.... I now took a chance and added some Pottasium Sorbate to see if I can calm it down.... Never done it since..... Never do it again.


Sam


I won't do it again either but I am glad I don't think I have to throw it out!!!! I am much happier and comfortable with the way I am doing it now.


Sent from my iPhone using Wine Making
 
We used to ride horses but now we have cars and jets. Does that make horses wrong or just a less effective mode of transportation? We used to drive cars without seat belts and most of us made most of our trips safely. So does that mean we should drive without seat belts?

Silly questions and answers to illustrate a point. Wine was made for thousands of years without any enological intervention. The Romans discovered sulfur as a preservative. The French discovered barrels as a storage vessel......and on and on to modern winemaking with all the science and techniques we have at our disposal.

I get the appeal some have with "natural" wines. They think it is somehow better or more pure. But, in my opinion, that is junk logic. Yeast produces SO2 naturally during fermentation. adding a bit more just preserves the intended wine. If they want to make true natural wines then there should be no stainless tanks, glass bottles or modern closures. I want to see wines stored in lambskin at the Fred Meyer. Using isolated yeasts is not using "unnatural" yeasts as using the term "natural yeast" for unknown wild yeast implies. The commercially available isolated yeasts are naturally occurring wild yeast that have been separated from other strains and give the winemaker choices in style and purity to help control the final artistic product he/she is trying to create.

I could care less if someone wants to make lottery wine. Best of luck to you. I want to use all of the modern tools available to me to consistently ensure that my investment in grapes, equipment and time yields a wine I am proud to share with my friends and customers. I will wear my seat belt.

I am now stepping down from my soapbox and going to add so2 to some barrels.
 
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Calamity Cellars - I agree with you that labelling some winemaking techniques/practices as 'unnatural' is a problem.. in reality I don't think you can draw a clear division between natural and man-made, because all wine is the product of the interrelation of natural & cultural processes.

For what it's worth, I think the issue a lot of people have with the idea of so-called 'natural' wines is that they see it as unscientific or irrational. Again, all I can do is refer to my own experience which is that I have met and interviewed a number of professional winemakers who hold high-level scientific qualifications (in oenology, chemistry, molecular biology etc), who make excellent wines that are highly regarded critically, and who consciously strive to reduce their inputs into the wine because they feel that the wine is better and more interesting as a result.

There may be a little bit more risk involved but I wouldn't say that their approach is reckless or a crap-shoot, and it is definitely not unscientific, because it requires sterling standards of hygiene and a thorough understanding of what is going on at a chemical level at every stage of the process.

It's just a different orientation to the same problem, which is that of how to make good wine. If you see the manipulation of wine by the addition of acid, tannins, or whatever as something to be avoided where possible (rather than an integral, standard part of the winemaking processes) then you're more likely to focus on getting the grapes as good as possible to begin with.
 
It sounds like a great and interesting approach if you can control as much of the process as possible. For the home wine maker a more pragmatic process is probably best!
 
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