windseafire
Junior
I like really dry wines so would like to ferment out as much sugar as possible. When I transfer from primary to secondary, do I have to add sorbate and k-meta or could I just let any residual fermentation continue?
Sorbate and k-meta in secondary?
- Thread starter windseafire
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windseafire
Junior
I should have added that this was in relation to a fine wine making kit that had undergone 10 days of extended maceration after it got to 1.010.
Ohio Bob
Senior Member
Certainly rack now and add the appropriate amount of Kmeta. Sorbate now is not required, and if you bulk age it for greater than 9 months, you may never need it, unless back sweetening later.
Kmeta does not kill yeast, might slow it down. Kmeta will kill bacteria, and help foster lees dropping out.
windseafire
Junior
Interesting, I didn't realize that the kmeta just stunned the yeast. Thanks for the Info!
Except in high concentrations, K-meta may have little to no effect upon commercial yeast, which is selected for K-meta tolerance. OTOH, wild yeast and other microorganisms will be killed and/or stunted.
I add K-meta at each racking (post-fermentation) and at bottling. K-meta is a preservative, antioxidant, and general purpose bug killer. IME, adding K-meta greatly improves the shelf life and longevity of your wine.
Adding on to Bob's note -- you only need sorbate if you are backsweetening your wine. If you're making a dry wine and it ferments out dry, sorbate is completely unnecessary. The only other time I'd use sorbate is if I have a stuck fermentation and can't get the wine to ferment dry -- in that case I'd add sorbate as insurance against having a few cases of mini-volcanoes.
