Thawing sulphited must

[theTheme]

I was preparing a pear wine must last week and after I had sulphited and chaptalized, I had to leave town before I could start the ferment. So, I put it in the freezer to return to it when my schedule calmed down.

My question: Does the freezing and thawing force out the sulphites from the Campden tablet? Should I add more? I don't have a sulphite test kit.

 

[Julie]

If you chaptalized it then fermentation has started? If so you would not be adding any more sulphites. I would be more worried about the yeast.

 

[Wade E]

Since you sulfited it and then froze your must should be ready to add yeast as soon as its thawed unless you added more sulfites then recommended. I myself like to also use ascorbic acid with very delicate musts like pear and apple as they can change color very easily due to even small amounts of oxidation like waiting for it to thaw out and reach its desired temp for adding yeast.

 

[Julie]

Wade, he said he chaptalized the must, then yeast would have already been added, since chaptalize means step feeding sugar to a fermenting must, correct?

 

[Wade E]

To my knowledge you are correct Jules. Maybe there is another use for this term but Im pretty he just used the wrong term here.

 

[theTheme]

Fermentation has not been started, thus the last part of the first sentence "I had to leave town before I could start the ferment."

Chaptilization is the adding of sugar before the ferment:

Chaptalization is the process of adding sugar to unfermented grape must in order to increase the alcohol content after fermentation. The technique is named after its developer, the French chemist Jean-Antoine-Claude Chaptal. This process is not intended to make the wine sweeter, but rather to provide more sugar for the yeast to ferment into alcohol.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaptalization

Since you sulfited it and then froze your must should be ready to add yeast as soon as its thawed unless you added more sulfites then recommended. I myself like to also use ascorbic acid with very delicate musts like pear and apple as they can change color very easily due to even small amounts of oxidation like waiting for it to thaw out and reach its desired temp for adding yeast.

No more than recommended, one tablet per gallon. It's a good point on the oxidation, I could speed the thaw by putting it next to the radiator. Would the faster rate of thaw negatively affect the must in some other way though?

 

[Turock]

We make alot of pear. And in our experience, the slight browning of the fruit does not impact the color of the wine. While it's thawing, get the pectic enzyme on it too. On pear, you can double the amount of pectic enzyme so the fruit breaks down a little better. A better approach is to use a better pectinase such as Lallzyme C-Max because it works better on viscous musts such as pear.

Are you going to bentonite the primary? I recommend it on pear, or else it can be a tough wine to clear---the extra pectic enzyme also helps with this to some degree. If you use bentonite, add it on the 3rd day of the ferment--any sooner and it will deactivate the pectic enzyme.

 

[SmokeyMcBong]

I could speed the thaw by putting it next to the radiator. Would the faster rate of thaw negatively affect the must in some other way though?

Speaking strictly from a food safety stand point this is not a good idea. Some of your must will be thawed and warm for quite some time before the entire block of ice has melted. The fact that you added campden before freezing probably changes everything but, as I said, this is from a food safety stand point.

 

[theTheme]

Are you going to bentonite the primary? I recommend it on pear, or else it can be a tough wine to clear---the extra pectic enzyme also helps with this to some degree. If you use bentonite, add it on the 3rd day of the ferment--any sooner and it will deactivate the pectic enzyme.

I hadn't planned on it, but I have been wanting to try this and see if I could clear in secondary sooner. What do you think of fermenting dry in primary, then bentonite and rack?

Speaking strictly from a food safety stand point this is not a good idea. Some of your must will be thawed and warm for quite some time before the entire block of ice has melted. The fact that you added campden before freezing probably changes everything but, as I said, this is from a food safety stand point.

Good point. I think I'll take the possibility of browning over the risk of having to throw the whole thing out.

 

[Turock]

Yes, you can bentonite the secondary. However, it's always best for the wine to be warmer to do this and is why you always see the advice to do this in the summertime.

Your best bet is to do it in the primary. It's a lot less hassle than in the secondary and you'll see the wine beginning to clear in the secondary even after a couple days! We use alot of bentonite because we make many fruit wines with no water addition so our musts are always very dense. It clears wines beautifully, and you also get the additional effect of heat stabilizing the wine so that you have no or less precipitates in the bottles when they're chilled. Be aware that when you go to transfer to the secondary, your wine will be very milky--just ignore it--this is how it's supposed to look after bentonite dosing.

Before we used bentonite in the primary, our chief hobby was trying to clear wines in the secondary. I hate fooling around with stubborn wines in the secondary.

I would let the must come to temp on its own. Stir it around every day to help it thaw. And when you're ready to start the ferment, be sure there are no fruit pieces with mold on them because sometimes this will happen. Just disgard them.

 

[Wade E]

Thats interesting the Theme! Winexpert, the wine kit manufacturer mis-uses that term then. In their Port kits they call chaptilizing the act of adding sugar to the wine after fermentation has been going for awhile. They have you do this mainly because the kit is really pushing the yeasts abv tolerance to its extreme and if you added all the sugar upfront it would put the yeast into sugar shock. See, you learn something new every day still.

 

[sour_grapes]

C'mon, a perfectly reasonable interpretation is that people refer to Chaptalization as the process of adding sugar to increase ABV, regardless of when you do it. It is the concept, not the recipe.