Wine day

Red Wine Racking Day.

Say that three times fast.

Today we racked all of our country red wines.  They are clear and for the most part, nearing time to bottle, and so it was a good time to sample them.

I racked elderberry batch #3 (3 gal) off of the oak.  This batch was made with straight tartaric acid and had some tartaric crystals.  It begs the question of whether I should cold stabilize this wine.  Probably not.  I doubt it will be chilled much below the temp of the basement this winter.  Color great, nice body, fruity, not too tannic.  Not sure if there is enough oak yet.  May benefit from more oak or finishing tannins.  However, in the words of a former professor, when in doubt, "Don't just do something, stand there."

Elderberry batch #4 (3 gal) came off of the oak as well.  Just a tiny bit of tartaric crystals in this wine, less than batch #3, because this one was made with acid blend.  I can't tell that it is any sharper than batch #3.

The second run elderberry, an elderberry rose (3 gal) may be the best of the elderberry wines.  Very fruity, low tannins.  This one has a couple of bananas for body which are supposed to be undetectable flavor-wise.  I'm not so sure.  But it is not there in a bad way; there is a complexity to this wine that the straight elderberry wines don't have.

Pomegranate/Cranberry (1 gal) is very good.  This wine, I discovered after investigating further, also has elderberry juice in the base.  I likely will bottle this one as-is.

Blackberry (1 gal) is fruity, a little citrusy, sharp, and probably excessively tannic.  This one is not ready for the bottle.  It clearly needs backsweetening, and may need the egg white treatment if it doesn't settle down in the next several months.

In greenhouse, the Carambola 'Kari' (starfruit) is just clinging to life.  I'm not sure what happened.  Very sad.  As you can tell from the background of the blog, it is one of my favorite trees.  This tree has produced dozens and dozens of tasty starfruit.  I have 4 1 gallon bags of fruit frozen, waiting for the next open 3 gallon carboy.  If I lose this tree it will take years before its replacement can produce the same amount of fruit.

Kari in happier times