2017 - Crush

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Published: Saturday, 04 November 2017 10:49

Written by David DeCiero

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This year, I was faced with what could be termed a good problem.  I had too much wine.  After putting away the 225 bottles form last year, I had about 600 bottles in the cellar.  Knowing that this was way to many, I had to cut back on the amount of wine I made this year.  So, instead of doing my normal 500 pounds of wine, I did 250 lbs.  This was a lot easier for a couple reasons.  First, I could fit it all in my car.  Second, the processing time was going to be greatly reduced.  Of course, cleanup would still be the same, but running the crusher destemmer would be much shorter.  

The weather this year wasn't great, as it wasn't that warm and it was a bit cloudy through the fall.  Luckily, the weather stayed pretty warm, so we were able to do a pretty late harvest.  The Brix for the Merlot was at 19.2 and the Cabernet Franc was 20.  I always chaptalize these grapes and boost the Brix by 1 during fermentation.  The crush went extremely well, with virtually no time required to destem and crush.  It was then off to the fermenter.  

I went through my usual protocol of Ex-V, Optired, and FT Rouge before pitching BDX for the Merlot and BM 4x4 in the Cabernet Franc.  The fermentation went smoothly, with my normal 2 punchdowns per day.  In 5 days, it was all done.I waited another day for it to be truly over...and then it was on to pressing....