screwed up this year

[scottdaman]

Just wanted to, give some info, I have been making small quantities of grape wine for 20 years. This year I only had about 4 gallons of must. I put some potassium metabisulfite in the must, just like every year to kill the natural yeast,and let sit for a day. But being lazy and not measuring I put too much sulfite in. It would not start cooking , waited another day. And still nothing. Just out of curiosity, rather than throwing it away, I put a few tablespoons of baking soda in the must. And sure enough in 6 hours it started cooking. Lucked out, next year I won't be so lazy.

 

[JohnT]

OK, so the baking soda is an alkali (base) the reacted with the acid in your must to produce gas and most likely some form of salt. You should have splash racked the must instead.

All is not lost though. I would advise that you test you acid and adjust the PH accordingly. If your acid level is too low, you open the door to all sorts of nasty results including oxidation.

 

[scottdaman]

thanks for the advice, most years I dont worry about PH and it comes out good. But youre right, this year I will