Archive for the ‘Other Musings’ Category

Home winemakers have a love of tasting and enjoying their wines as well as sharing them with friends. Often, clubs will meet where wine tastings of different home made wines will occur. In most instances, home winemakers drink “responsibly” and are very careful about how much alcohol they consume before driving.

There is the old “rule of thumb” that it is safe to drink one standard alcoholic drink an hour and a person will be “safe” as far as driving is concerned. In this case, a “standard” drink of wine is about 4 oz. with an alcohol content of about 12%.

However, this rule of thumb is simply not an accurate way to know whether one is below the legal limit of 0.08% blood alcohol concentration. There are many factors that contribute to how fast alcohol is metabolized in the body. Even varying rates of body fat percentage can have an effect on alcohol metabolization. Alcohol can be diluted by water, but not by fat and therefore those who have a higher body fat percent will have a higher BAC than a person who has less fat and more muscle. Muscle contains more water.

In Canada, some Provinces like British Columbia and Nova Scotia have instituted lower BAC limits for driving on their respective Provincial roads. This means that many of us will have a much more difficult time in knowing if we are legally “safe” to drive. The new Provincial regulations can be draconian in the sense that you are immediately assumed guilty of an offense if a Police Officer demands a breath sample and you blow over the new lower limits.

Your driver’s license can be suspended immediately for 7 days, your vehicle can be impounded, and its up to you to pay for all the costs involved even though you haven’t actually been found guilty by a court and have had a fair trial.

This is a home winemaking blog and it’s not about politics, or inherent rights, or whether or not it is constitutional for individuals to be punished by the State before they have had the opportunity to a fair and impartial trial with the ability to mount a vigorous defense and question the evidence.

However, this is an issue that those of us who enjoy making wine and enjoy a glass of it with friends should be aware of. The new regulations are not likely to change anytime soon, and we must be more aware of how alcohol is metabolized in our bodies and what it could take to put us over the new lower provincial legal limits.

It should be noted that these Provincial regulations are not “Criminal.” The Canadian Criminal Code still provides for a legal limit of 0.08 mg alcohol per 100 ml blood. So if you are stopped and penalized for between 0.05 and 0.08 mg, they won’t mean you have a Criminal Record.

American readers will probably know that each State in the US has their own DUI laws and penalties (although the legal limit of 0.08 is standard as a BAC limit). You can get information on American State By State DUI Penalties.

Funny story in The Derrick News Herald:

“Authorities in central Pennsylvania who were called to investigate a suspicious odor at an abandoned house thought they had found a meth lab.

It turned out to be an old winemaking operation.

Police in North Cornwall Township searched the home’s basement and discovered fivegallon pails and hundreds of glass beakers, jars and other containers filled with unknown liquids on Saturday.

Police say the items are consistent with equipment used in the manufacture of methamphetamine. But further tests and research led police to conclude the home’s former tenant, who died about five years ago, had been making wine in the basement.

Police re-secured the residence, which is owned by a man who police believe lives in nearby Lancaster.”

Might not have been so funny if there were real live people in the house, just making wine for Christmas though.

I’ve been away on a little vacation with my awesome almost 7 year old son. We flew out to Edmonton, Alberta and enjoyed most of the time – spent in Whitecourt and a couple of trips, one through Fort Assiniboine and then one to Jasper. Not wine making country – but I do enjoy Alberta very much. When I was 17, I “ran away” from home and got a job on a ranch near Trochu. I loved the long summer days – and they are even longer at this time of the year the further north you go.

Needless to say, my own wine making activities have been nil for about two weeks. I did enjoy some wine while away though. But I also drank some beer too. What is it about beer that makes me so tired sometimes, I wonder? I could have a glass of wine in the afternoon and feel fine, but often when I drink one single beer, I feel very tired and drowsy. Anyone else find this?

I know of a few fly anglers that also make their own wine. Jack Keller is one, and so is Ernie Kalwa, the Captain of the Fly Fishing team (The Osprey’s) that I used to be a member of. Not sure which one of us ties the better flies, but I know it’s not me! Although I do enjoy doing that. Today and yesterday, I had two good days to combine my two hobbies. And one advantage a home winemaker has if they’ve brought a fish back to eat for dinner is that wine selection is not difficult. Whatever is there! For me, the bottle of Liebfraumilch was a good pairing with the baked trout and rice I made. And on top of that, the fly that I caught the trout on yesterday was made with hair from my Maltese dog named Rudy. You can read about the afternoon fly fishing here.

Winemaking activities included racking and degassing. The maple wine I started on May 5 is expelling lots of co2 gas still, even though the fermentation is complete. The specific gravity was at 0.996 yesterday when I racked it – it’s cleared nicely on it’s own since the last racking on May 28th. It has a very interesting taste – I just had very teeny sip of it, and could taste maple candy – but without the sweetness. I’m looking forward to seeing how this will age a few more months.

I started three wine kits two weeks ago – a Chamblaise and two Vieux De Roi. All are four week kits – I generally use 8 week kits for red wines but I wanted some Vieux De Roi and it was only available at the time in the more economical priced version. I noted that these two kits in the instructions called for 14 days in the primary fermenter. Anyhow, these three kit wines were racked and degassing is on going in all of them before I add the fining agents.

Then there is that potato wine! I’ve had a few interesting questions and comments about that. Like, “what does it taste like?” Yesterday, I racked and checked the specific gravity which was 1.002. It does taste a bit sweet – I’ll have to check my records on that one, but otherwise it is pleasant. I am reluctant to describe its taste just yet as it was only a very small amount and not quite what I expected or can really identify. The demerara sugar certainly has left it’s mark though.

The other day, I was snooping around some “stuff” I had and discovered two more wine kits I had forgotten about! They were purchased about September of 2007, just before I headed off to Grande Prairie, Alberta for the Canadian Fly Fishing Championships. I guess I had meant to start them upon my return, but totally forgot I had them. Both are Cru Select RQ’s: a Montepulciano Cab Merlot, the other Unoaked Chardonnay. I’m hoping and believing the juice will be fine but I will use fresh yeast when I start them, probably in about two weeks from now.

So there’s another connection between fly fishing and winemaking. One can get in the way of the other at times! Actually, it wasn’t the fly fishing that distracted me from these two kits back in 2007…

Have you ever looked at your airlocks popping up and down as carbon dioxide gas is being released and wondered just how much co2 you might be responsible for generating? There was an interesting discussion started by a user “Dhorton” at the WineMakingTalk forum who was wondering if there was any concern in regard to co2 amounts in their apartment as a result of making wine at home.

Apparently, since Dhorton began making wine, their smoke/carbon monoxide detector was activated a few times. I imagine the detector detects carbon monoxide specifically, and there could be a number of reasons for false alarms including humidity, dust and even bugs getting into the unit. But to a new winemaker, I can understand the concern seeing all these carbon dioxide bubbles coming up and wondering if the quantity is enough to affect the air inside.

An engineer, “Kiljoy” who admits to having too much time on his hands responded to the forum thread and figured that one gallon of wine with a specific gravity of 1.09 would release about .07433 lbs. of carbon dioxide per day over a 14 day fermentation period. The calculations then went on to show that this was a negligible amount, even in a small apartment.

Later in the thread, a link to a blog post that discussed carbon dioxide emissions by breweries was posted. In that post, Pablo concludes:

“Maybe this doesn’t sound like much, but let me put it in perspective: in 2004, Americans drank 23.974 billion liters of beer, resulting in 1,491,182 mT of CO2 emissions. Global beer consumption in 2004 was 150.392 billion liters, resulting in 9,354,382 mT of CO2 emissions. For a little something more to think about, the US emitted a total of 1,446,777,000 mT of CO2 in 1996. Now, keep in mind that this is based on an assumption of a brix value of 12. The average beer may be a bit weaker than that. Feel free to plug in your own assumptions to see what you get. Either way, the CO2 emissions from brewing are not negligible.”

Well, it seems to me that Pablo’s logic might be a bit off if he is suggesting that the brewing industry alone is responsible for this. Bare in mind that we are talking about emissions from the fermentation of organic material that contains sugars. I could be wrong, but I think that there would still be quite a bit of CO2 even if it wasn’t used in the brewing or winemaking industry – as the stuff rots it would likely release plenty of CO2. Humans release CO2 in their farts after eating organic plant material so either way – fermented or digested, or left to rot, CO2 will likely be produced. I’m just not sure if it would be in the same quantities – does simply rotting matter convert sugars to CO2? What I’m saying is that this plant material would release CO2 in time, whether it’s fermented or not.

In my opinion, trying to put some blame or pin global warming causes to include brewing or fermenting is a bit much. I don’t think home winemakers have anything to worry about, even if they do put great stock in theories about CO2 emissions and global warming.

About a year ago, I had a friend who “makes” wine at a local store (in other words, my friend pitches the yeast and then helps with the bottling – all the work is done by the store) give me a bottle of a Gewurtztraminer that he had “made.” The bottle was 375 ml in size. I know some folk who will bottle some of their wine in these small size bottles, and I do the same at times. However, a comment on Jack Keller’s blog got me to thinking a bit more about when and why I choose 375 ml over 750 ml, and when I might even select magnum size bottles.

Jack’s comment:

“A preface. I do not put all of my mead in 375 mL bottles, even though I know many do. I only fill two 375 mL bottles with each mead, and these are for tasting to see if the mead has aged enough to drink. I enter full, 750 mL bottles in competition unless 375 mL bottles are actually required, which they rarely are. You do as you desire.”
~ Jack Keller (Scroll down to the May 22nd, 2009 entry)

Personally, I’d never give anything less than a 750 ml bottle of wine as a gift if I’ve made wine from a kit that makes 23 litres of wine. It just seems “chintzy” to me. However, there are times when I do consider a 375 ml bottle for both gift purposes and my own use. I have my own arbitrary thoughts about it and as Jack says, “You do as you desire.”

First, I seldom bottle into 375 ml or magnum size bottles. Most of my wines and meads go into 750 ml. But then, most of my wines are 23 litre (5 Imperial gallons). I like the standard 750 size, and corking them is easy. Corking the 375 ml bottles with my Portuguese floor corker is a bit awkward – I need to put a block of wood over the bottle stand in order to give them enough height to be corked. And that means I also need to hold them steady. As well, obviously there are more bottles to be filled when using 375 ml.

When I do bottle into 375 ml size bottles, it’s when I’ve made 3 or less gallons of a particular wine or mead, or when I’ve made something exceptional and I’d like to be able to give away as many as possible to friends and clients while still keeping a good amount for myself. For example, a few years ago I made a 5 gallon batch of blackcurrant wine that turned out to be like heaven. That went into 350 ml bottles – and many were given away. The recent Kiwi Melomel that I made was 3 gallons, and it too turned out exceptional, so I have all of it in the smaller size bottles.

As far as magnum size bottles, the only time I can think of that I’d consider bottling into those would be if I was making wine for some special event where there was a corkage fee for bringing my own wine instead of purchasing the wine provided by the venue. If I were trying to save costs, then reducing the number of bottles that needed to be opened might be a time I’d think of magnums.

But then, that’s just another advantage of home winemaking. You can choose whatever size of bottles you’d like to use for whatever your purposes or reasons are. One caution though: smaller quantities might be more susceptible to temperature changes when aging your wine. Just as wine in a 5 gallon carboy won’t be as susceptible to temperature variations while aging as much as wine in a 750 ml bottle will be, wines in 375 ml bottles will be more susceptible than that in 750 ml bottles.

Anyone else noticing an increase in articles and websites that infer they can teach you how to make wine quickly?

Folks, settle down here! While it is true that you can pitch some yeast into fruit juice which might have some added sugar and in seven days end up with something that contains alcohol, it’s not going to be very drinkable – unless you’re desperate. Wine takes time. Yes, home winemaking can be fun, it can save money, and you can create wines that you won’t find in many wine stores – but the process to make decent wine requires the same thing the world over: time.

Recently, I came across someone trying to sell a manual and a packet of yeast who was claiming he could teach you to make wine in four days. I hope no one purchased that. A packet of yeast costs about a dollar, and no manual will ever teach you to make wine you’ll be pleased with in four days. It’s impossible. The very bare minimum you’ll need is a month – and you’d be best off to head over to your local winemaking supply shop and pick up an economical winemaking kit that provides instructions, grape juice concentrate and the necessary ingredients to stabilize and clarify the wine in 28 days. Even then, the wine will benefit from at least a month’s worth of aging in the bottle.

I did watch once a video about how some prisoners made wine in jail. Even they agreed it took at least seven days to end up with some plonk that had alcohol in it. But it wasn’t exactly very appetizing. It had something to do with smuggling sugar from the jail cafeteria, a plastic trash bag, fruit juice … a dirty sock, and some mouldy bread. I guess Lalvin EC-1118 yeast is hard to come by behind bars. I can only guess what use the dirty sock had.

If you want to learn how to make wine, be sure to take your time – or rather, let time do the work.

When making wine at home, the usual expression that is used to describe this is “home winemaking.” When making beer, folks will often refer to “home brewing.” In actual fact, “brewing” technically speaking refers to steeping something with heat. Think of “brewing a cup of tea.” Recently, I’ve seen some websites refer to making wine as “wine brewing.”

When folks make beer at home using a simple beer kit containing malt extract and yeast, and no heating is required, it’s not really a “home brew.” The brewing has already been done and all the home beer maker needs to do is add water to the malt extract. When a home beer maker purchases all the necessary ingredients, whether it is a kit form or not, and is required to heat any of the ingredients like the hops and barley, then technically that person is “brewing” beer.

Winemaking is often referred to as “vinting.” Therefore, a home winemaker is a home vintner.

Not that I’m fussy about technical labels, but it does seem weird to me to see making wine referred to as “wine brewing.”

We didn’t see fireworks, but we got a lot of “home winemaking” accomplished, the “wee man” and I. Here in Canada, it is the “May 2-4″ long weekend where the Monday before or on the 24th of May is a holiday to celebrate the Queen’s birthday. It’s not really Queen Elizabeth II’s birthday, but rather Queen Victoria’s day of birth. Traditionally, the holiday is celebrated with fireworks in the evening, and in the past, the Town has had a fireworks display about ten minute drive. Tonight, we drove up there but there was nothing. Many were confused about this year’s May 2-4 long weekend because it came so early. Some were thinking that it was next week that the holiday weekend landed on.

Perhaps the Town was confused too. Or maybe the recession cut into celebrating Her Majesty’s birthday this year. Regardless, the “wee man” David and I did not see fireworks this evening.

When I first learned how to make wine, the wee man wasn’t around. But ever since he could walk, he’s been trying to help me. If you check out this post over here, you’ll see photos of him, taken almost 4 years ago. He and I had a little “adventure” together, driving down from Orangeville to Beamsville, Ontario, when I picked up some Baco Noir must from a vineyard. Back then, he called grapes, “wine juice berries.” He was cute and a great little fellow back then. Today, he’s still cute and a great little fellow.

I decided to get the Dry Mead I had started in 2006 bottled today. That meant cleaning and sanitizing bottles, of course. I think David might grow up to be a home winemaking expert – he sure seems to enjoy sharing in all the tasks that need to be done. “Can I help make wine, Dad?” He doesn’t call me “Daddy” anymore. It’s “Dad.” He’s grown up, don’t you know!

I had about 30 bottles soaking to get old labels off, and then I sanitize and clean them using the water pressure thingamajigger that screws onto a faucet. And I have my sulphatizer beside it on the counter. The bottle tree is a few steps away, so David and I have a little routine. I clean and sanitize the bottles, hand two to David, and he puts them on the tree so they will drain and dry.

When the bottles are (mostly) dry, he helps bring them out to the kitchen where we line them up on the floor. While this, and the bottle sanitizing is going on, David is singing about “teamwork.”

It’s his job to count the bottles to make sure we have enough. As I fill the bottles, he colours the labels that get printed off. When the bottles are filled, he washes his hands and inserts the cork into the floor corker – always a step ahead of me – and I cork the bottles. We get things done in no time! Then it’s time to glue on the labels, and we’ve got a “teamwork” routine for that too.

Personally, I find the home winemaking task of cleaning bottles to be the least enjoyable part – but when I’ve got a helpful wee man helping me out, it does become a lot of fun!

Naturally, at 6 1/2 years old, there are other things he’d like to do including kicking soccer balls and learning how to dribble basketballs. So, we did take a little break and spent some time in the sunshine doing that together. And then he left me to my own devices to bottle the Kiwi Melomel that I started January 2, 2006. I had made three gallons and decided to bottle them into 375 ml bottles. It’s delightful! Although I think next time, I might add a bit more acid blend to it.

The only short size corks I had on hand were some synthetic corks distributed by Vineco. I don’t like them. I had three of them bend on me when trying to cork bottles, a few went far to deep into the bottle just because they slide that way, and well.. I don’t like them. But it’s what I had this evening. Ah well!

I have some work to do tomorrow, carrying cartons of mead to the basement. I know David will want to help with that too! I bet in about 20 years, I’ll be getting a phone call, “Dad! Come try this Kiwi Melomel I’ve been aging for three years!”

A couple of years ago, I checked out “Twitter” but didn’t see much use for it. I couldn’t figure it out either. So almost as fast as I registered my account, I removed it. But I see that Jack Keller is now twittering and maybe he’ll twitter about his home winemaking activities so I thought I’d try the tweet and twit thing again.

So far, I’m following about 6 other winemakers. If you’re on Twitter and would like to follow along yourself, my username there is ‘ianhughscott’. I’ll probably reciprocate if you decide to follow. At the same time, I’m not sure how much time I’ll spend “twittering” about whatever I’m doing at any given time.

If I do spend some time, I’ll probably tweet or twit or twattle (whatever the lingo is) about other activities including fly fishing, camping, outings with my awesome 6 1/2 year old son who recently lost both of his baby front teeth and trips to Alberta. Hopefully you won’t find it boring if you decide to follow along.

As soon as I’ve posted this, perhaps I’ll tweetle about cleaning bottles – I’m thinking today will be a good day to bottle up some mead. And happy tweeting, twittering, and tattling to you too!