Grape Futures (11)

We are nearing the end of this little grape odyssey which has spanned spring and summer and gone from budburst to veraison to harvest.

The fruit has been picked and is ready for processing.

Whole bunch and stem

I don't fancy bitter tannins from the stalks so I will destem the grapes.

Destemmed fruit before crushing

Once destemmed they can be crushed to free the juice which will start to flow out.

Crushed grapes

If I wanted to make white wine from white grapes I would cold soak pulp, juice and skins overnight and then press them to get clear juice, which would then be fermented. Alternatively one could press straight away and ferment the juice after leaving it to settle overnight at cool temperatures.

As I want red I am leaving everything together until the end of alcoholic fermentation which may take several days.

Since I have only a small volume of juice and do not want to let it spoil I will forgo the opportunity to wait for the ambient yeasts to start the fermentation. There is always a risk that undesirable yeasts may set to work resulting in unpleasant flavours or spoilage. They are often not able to survive in more than 5% alcohol so are therefore unable to produce wine. In other words the precious juice could well be turned into vinegar -not what we want- unless sufficient numbers of the desirable sort of yeast are present.

So I am inoculating the must with a starter culture consisting of a small amount of juice into which some dried yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) has been added. Left to itself for an hour or two the yeast will become active and start feeding on the sugars in the juice, which it will transform into alcohol, giving off carbon dioxide in the process. Hence the characteristic bubbles which signal the fermentation process.

Crushed grapes fermenting

This starter is then added to the main volume of juice and left to ferment.

We shall see how it evolves. It might turn out to be drinkable !