2020 Wines - Chapter 2 - Passion Fruit

This is potentially a beautiful wine, one which did not deserve my shabby record-keeping. I was more focused on the jaboticaba wine I had going at the same time, and now I can't find any of my notes. I know that I didn't use any secondary fruit, adjusted the pH up a bit with calcium carbonate, and fermented cool and slow. It looks great - it always starts the color of store-bought orange juice, then lightens up. Thankfully it didn't lose the aroma of passion fruit through the fermentation.

2020 Wines - Chapter 1 - Jaboticaba

I've been saving this fruit for years, literally; freezing every fruit that comes from the two trees. That may explain the short-term outcome. But I'm committed. And I'm committed to a second batch as well, which hopefully will come along more quickly than the first. It went like this:

• Thaw, then crush 3.8kg of fruit. TA 0.83%, pH 3.20, SG 1.030.
• Added 2.2l water, assuming 50% of the fruit volume will contribute to the final volume to just over 1g (some for topping).
• 3ml 10% KMS.
• 465g sugar to ~1.075.
• 1t pectic 
• 0.2g Lallzyme EX
• 1g each Opti Red and Booster Rouge.

No tannin additions. After 24 hours, another 155g sugar to 1.090. The pH was 3.05 and TA 0.97%. RC 212 and step feeding.

I pulled the seeds and skins after 72 hours to eliminate potential for any bitterness. This pic shows where we were mid-fermentation.

The problem is that even with KMS at crush and even before going dry, the wine took this brick color just a couple of days later.

We have about 4 bottles worth. We'll finish this out, but the color instability is a little disappointing. It doesn't taste or smell oxidized. Maybe that's just the color the fruit wants to give. Time will tell, but now it is time to start collecting a new batch of fruit.

Spring has Sprung, 2020 Version

Let's start with the yard. We had plenty of help with the mulch this year and it's all down by the first week of April, thanks to Hunter.

Epimediums

This little loader was not sufficient. Bucket was too small and it didn't easily clear the edge of the truck. We made it work but next year we'll use a real loader again. The grasses are mowed, pre-emergent down, beautyberries and other shrubs pruned. We're seeing 100% survival of the transplanted hellebores in the woodland area, and the epimediums are starting to poke through.

In the greenhouse, most plants look good. We have strawberry guava and grumichama fruit set. Pitomba is flowering as never before. We lost a calamondin, and a couple of the other citrus trees don't look great. The star apples have some marginal leaf necrosis, I wonder if they didn't like so much fertilizer. Hopefully we get them outside soon and they perk up. I took some fall cuttings of grapes, and some of them are pushing leaves.

Frontenac Gris

Speaking of grapes, we have the vineyard pruned. The Chardonel look like a complete loss. They didn't look great last fall but we got 3 gallons of wine from them. It may be the last Chardonel wine we make. My plan is to replace these with Frontenac Gris from cuttings. Aside from the Norton losses to crown gall, we're otherwise in good shape. Foch broke bud 4/9. We replaced some of the Norton with 10 Itasca vines. Itasca is described as having "aromas of pear, quince, violet, melon, minerals along with faint notes of honey." It broke bud already on 4/10. Another 10 Norton were replaced with La Crescent. This grape is used to make off-dry to sweeter wines and is known for "aromas are primarily apricot, peach and citrus." I'm linking the Stark Brothers page here because after the crown gall trouble on the vines from AA Vineyards, I found a new source. Our Frontenac, Vidal and Traminette look strong and I see bud swell on at least 9 Nortons. 

Itasca foreground, row 1; La Crescent row 2

Foch and Traminette

Jake and Taylor were in town for a few weeks after being sidelines due to the pandemic. Jake fished at every opportunity (thanks to Dave, Jane, Betsy, Jorgen, Tom, Jamie). 

Vineyard 2020 Budbreak Log

Foch 4/9
Itasca 4/10
Frontenac 4/12
Vidal 4/15
Traminette 4/12