strain lees

[sjo]

Does anyone try to strain or filter lees? I am talking at the first racking, a few of my batches have ended up with quite a batch of lees. That is a lot of potential wine to dump. What do you do with the stuff?
Scott

 

[Tom]

When racking you leave it (lees) behind. Then down the drain. What are you using to rack?

 

[Midwest Vintner]

. That is a lot of potential wine to dump. What do you do with the stuff?
Scott

i just did this about a week ago. used a tight metal strainer. got about 3~4 gallons out of it atleast. it was a ~25 gallon start.

 

[mmadmikes1]

At first Rack I put remains in tall bottle. It hold about 2 gallons. let it sit for day and rack it off but without any lees in it at al(CLEAN)l. I use that for topping off batch throw out rest

 

[Tom]

You may be racking to early as well.
What wine is fermenting? If fruit yes you will have alot to drop.

 

[sjo]

Tom, it is a plum wine, I started with 7 gallons. It has was down to .992 for 3 weeks. Thers was a 6 inch layer in the bottom of the carboy. I used an auto siphon to get the wine off. It just seems there is a lot of wine left in there. I did put it into bottles and put in the fridge to see if it will settle off.
Scott

 

[St Allie]

Pulp fermented?

Many here put the pulp into a leg of pantyhose so the bulk of the pulp can be removed easily.

I don't usually bother with the pantyhose, and first racking from primary to secondary is strained with a large kitchen colander lined with muslin or chux cloth into a bucket and then transferred from there to the secondary. It saves lots of racking later...

Allie

 

[sjo]

Allie, I did put the plums in a nylon mesh bag and removed that when I switched to secondary fermentation.
Scott

 

[St Allie]

Scott,

I have tried using the pantyhose.. never saw the difference with fruit such as .. apples/plums/peaches.. so just flagged it and stuck the fruit in the primary.

Suggest you try the colander/lined with muslin method.. it's more effective.

just my opinion.

Allie

 

[Wade E]

I dont strain the lees but I do rack many times and leave whats a mess in a smaller vessel to use for topping off the next time and generally dont waste any wine.

 

[Luc]

You may be racking to early as well.
What wine is fermenting? If fruit yes you will have alot to drop.

Agreed.

I make loads of plum wines (120 liter this year again, about 32 gallon) divided over several 30 liter carboys and never have that much lees.

Luc