worst catawba wine ever

[RevA]

Hi,

After a long hot dry summer and not enough rain I had horrible catawba harvest, just enough grapes to make 2 gal wine. Grapes were not the best, but made a go of it anyway, three months later I did the first testing after 3 racking. I had to scrub my tongue! All I taste is the foxy taste thats usually very light (ferment on the grapes for literally a few days to get a light rosé) was overpowering. The wine is bulk aging in the hope that it will improvr, but I think this will become my first wine vinegar. Anyone know of something that might save the wine?

 

[Julie]

when you say foxy, what does that taste like? did you check ph & acid?

 

[RevA]

when you say foxy, what does that taste like? did you check ph & acid?

Ph was 3.5 didn't do a TA test. The taste is kinda like wet fur and tree bark mixed, usually the foxy taste is just a little musky (which I like), but wet fur isn't something I want in my wine...

 

[Julie]

try adding some tannins to it, let it set a couple of weeks and then take a taste.

 

[RevA]

Thanks julie, will give that a go!

 

[Julie]

I had a muscadine that had a strong musty taste to it, this is what I did and it worked, turned out to be a pretty good wine.

 

[Larryh86GT]

What color is your Catawba?. I have 5 gallons of Walker's Catawba Grape juice in primary right now and it is an interesting color of reddish mud. Walker's considers this to be a grape for making a white wine but I don't believe is going to be very white.

 

[RevA]

It started a nice red and its a very nice pink now. It is white only if directly pressed, otherwise it is anything from a delicate pink blush to a bright pink

 

[FTC Wines]

I had both Cataba &Merlot planted in my small vineyard in the Ga Mts, 1650' Elevation. We got very small production, but the two blended together were awesome. 3.5 yrs later still enjoying the blend. Only 10 bottles left! Never had Cataba by itself. Roy

 

[Larryh86GT]

My Catawba looks more brown than red. This may have been the bottom of the barrel when they were filling the 5 gallon pails. But it smells good and the fermentation is going well.