Bread And Wine
March 28th, 2009 | 
Author: I grew up in a tradition that some may know or understand, where on the 1st day of the week, bread and wine had much significance. I find it interesting that some that grew up in similar traditions used grape juice instead of wine and have such an intolerance toward anything with alcohol. Some years ago, I even heard a preacher rail against alcoholic beverages, claiming that “alcohol” was the excrement of yeast. Funny – he didn’t seem to mind eating bread with his grape juice on Sunday mornings – bread that had been risen with the use of yeast. And of course, one wonders how the disciples and apostles back in the day were able to preserve grape juice and keep it from turning into wine in the first place.
But that’s a matter for another blog of a different topic. Maybe I’ll start one day on Theology. This evening, I baked bread, racked wine and took specific gravity readings. It was time to add the sulphite and sorbate to the Old Vines Zinfandel that I racked back on March 6 from the primary. As I expected, there was no change in the specific gravity of this wine: 0.996.
I really like the Mexican 6 US gallon carboys. They are stouter than the other carboys I have, and seem to take about a half cup or so less in quantity so there is rarely a need to ever top up after racking from the other type of carboy. Such was the case this evening.
The Zinfandel does contain a lot of Carbon Dioxide. Part of the routine of stirring in the sorbate and sulfite includes lots of vigorous stirring. I cannot completely fill the Mexican carboy when I do this – I need to remove a good cup of wine in order to have lots of space for the inevitable foaming. I will add the fining agents that the kit came with, but not until I’ve done lots of degassing and promote the release of the CO2.
While all this was going on, I was baking the No Knead Bread. The kitchen is filled with the wonderful smells of bread baking! Perhaps tomorrow I will break bread and drink some wine. I’d have a slice tonight, but the loaf is still crackling as it cools.
Prior to all of this, the “wee man” and I recorded some specific gravity readings on a piece of paper, which I then promptly re-recorded in my log book. It will be nice to save the “wee man’s” printing and numbers though and I’ve kept copies inside my log book.
But for anyone interested in following along:
Cru Select Old Vines Grenache:
March 23/09 – Starting SG: 1.106
March 26/09: 1.054
March 27/09: 1.031
California Connoisseur Liebfraumilch:
March 25/09 – Starting SG: 1.080
March 26/09: 1.072
March 27/09: 1.060
(Ahh.. this one is screwed up because of the stuck fermentation which I unstuck),
March 11/09 – Starting SG: 1.104
March 13/09: 1.092
March 19/09: 1.054
March 20/09: 1.046
March 21/09: 1.042
March 23/09: 1.030
March 25/09: 1.028
March 26: 1.021
March 27/09: 1.019
One of these days, I’ll start plotting these values. Might be interesting to see this graphed out.
So how was your home winemaking day?
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Posted in Wine Making | 
Tags: home winemaking, libfraumilch, no knead bread, potassium sorbate, racking, specific gravity, sulfite, zinfandel