Sour/contaminated wine

[jelvecchio]

I just started wine making a little over a month ago and had a lot of success with my first two batches. Afterwards I decided to make multiple batches at once. I sanitized everything with onestep but now ALL of the wines are sour, not just slightly bitter, but they taste as if they've been contaminated. Could there be any other reason this happened or did i just mess up somewhere along the line while sanitizing?

Thanks for the help.

 

[heatherd]

Onestep is a cleaner. You'll also want to use starsan or a similar product as a sanitizer.

That is strange. I have no clue what would cause the sour wine. I truly doubt that missing a sanitizer on a few batches would ruin them, because some people only use starsan occasionallly.

Maybe someone else has an idea. I know @Boatboy24 had some sour wines.....

 

[GreginND]

Tell us more. What kind of wine? What was your process? Did you keep it topped up? K-metabisulfite?

 

[montanaWineGuy]

My sanitizing process is a joke. Sometimes nothing, maybe a Camden tablet or two, or a just a vigorous shack with cold water. IMO, its something else, and your guess is far superior to any WAG of mine.

 

[jelvecchio]

There were a lot of different types of wine, all made with 100 % juice store bought with no preservatives. I had an apple cider, a concord grape juice and a white grape juice, a juice cocktail blend, and an orange/tangerine blend. All very different varieties with different yeasts.
My first batch I only used hot water for cleansing and it came out fine so I was fairly curious as to why all of these "wines" went bad.

As to my process, I don't yet have enough carboys or fermenters for each so I was fermenting in bottle for most of them, however some where in gallon carboys and still went sour. Some I used a mixture of sugar and honey, some only sugar, but that made no difference in the final product. I did not use K- metabisulfite.

As to keeping it topped up and using I'm not sure what that means. With sugar?

Also, the home brew community rocks! Thank you everyone.

 

[Wiz]

I spent several years making fruit wines and have found that they are all sour after fermentation. You must back sweeten at the proper time with at least some sugar for the wine to be drinkable. This is why I don't make fruit wines anymore as I like only dry wines. I do make a sweet mango wine every wine for my wife.

 

[montanaWineGuy]

As to keeping it topped up and using I'm not sure what that means. With sugar?

Minimal air gap between liquid and protective seal (airlock). To minimize exposure to potentially contaminating impurities in the air.

Just my opinion. Sounds like your process is all over the place. Maybe I'm just lucky, but I do the same thing (luckily the right thing, for me, for my area, etc.) from one batch to the next. If I was to do something different each and every time it would be hard to pin point what I might be doing wrong, to diagnose a end product problem.

 

[jelvecchio]

I spent several years making fruit wines and have found that they are all sour after fermentation. You must back sweeten at the proper time with at least some sugar for the wine to be drinkable.

Thank you. But This is less of a bitter kind of sour and more of a rancid, do not drink kind of sour.

 

[jelvecchio]

Just my opinion. Sounds like your process is all over the place.

Yes it is. Since I'm just starting out I am a bit all over the place. I was also I bit too excited about my first couple batches coming out right and just decided to try as much as I could.

As for topping it off, in keeping with the no set method motif, they were at varying levels.

I'll just mourn the loss of these pour almost wines and try to be more careful next time.

 

[Arne]

Do they smell bad? if not, maybe try sweetening them some. If that cures it, you have to stabalize before you sweeten the whole batch or it will most likely referment. Arne.

 

[GreginND]

My guess is that if you have not used sulfites and there was air space in your containers, they oxidized badly giving the rancid taste.

 

[pjd]

It sounds like a contamination of Brett. That will cause sour! Definitely a sanitation issue. I would dump them all and start cleaning.

 

[TemperanceOwl]

You said you only started your first wines a month ago and they turned out so well you did more… How long has it been since you started the recent bunch? Guys, if it's only been a couple of weeks, do you think it could have oxidized that fast? Maybe it hasn't even finished working yet.

 

[TemperanceOwl]

And what did you do? What kind of yeast did you use? Did you add any clarifiers once fermentation finished?

 

[jelvecchio]

Do they smell bad?

Yes they smell bad, and it is a strong smell.

My guess is that if you have not used sulfites and there was air space in your containers, they oxidized badly giving the rancid taste.

Okay, thank you. My metabisulfite came in today.

It sounds like a contamination of Brett. That will cause sour! Definitely a sanitation issue. I would dump them all and start cleaning.

Will do thank you very much.

And what did you do? What kind of yeast did you use? Did you add any clarifiers once fermentation finished?

I started this go round on 9/14. I used different yeasts from red star, pasture red, premier cuvee and cote des blanc. I did not use any clarifiers.

 

[GreginND]

So, these are only a week old? There is no way they are oxidized. They shouldn't even be done fermenting yet most likely. Are you sure you are not tasting and smelling the yeast? You wouldn't be able to tell much of anything about the wine after a week. See how it is after a few months.