[Chris Vais]

One more comment regarding the metal tap. Wine is acidic with a pH of around 3 give or take. It will corrode anything metallic that it comes in contact with. Not only will it ultimately destroy the metal object, it will also become contaminated with dissolve metal. Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc, both of which are toxic to humans in sufficient quantity. It is surmised that one of the reasons for the downfall of the Roman Empire was that the lead glaze they used on their ceramic drinking cups contaminated their wine leading to widespread lead poisoning in the general population. The only metal you will ever see in contact with wine in a winery is stainless steel.

 

You should be able to find a wooden tap or one made from stainless steel.

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[Roboman]

Good point Chris, and the inside of the tap is definitely corroded. When I'm allowed out again I'll see what I can find; the DIY store has a winery section. Shame as its a delightful little tap, but no matter as in the end it is the wine that of paramount importance. Cheers

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[Rap]

So is your wine now contaminated?

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[Chris Vais]

They only way to know whether the wine is contaminated is to take a sample to a lab for analysis. The other alternative would be to dump the wine clean out the barrel and start over. 

 

Copper is occasionally used in winemaking to remove hydrogen sulfide from wine. It can also occur in wine if the soil in which the grapes are grown is high in copper. Copper based fungicides are permitted for use in organic vineyards. So there is a small amount of copper that may be found in wine.

 

Zinc finds its way into wine via soil and is found in the yeast used to ferment wine grapes. Zinc is not hugely toxic.

 

The US legal limit for copper in finished wine is 0.5ppm. From a toxicological perspective, the upper threshold limit for copper is 1000 micrograms per liter.

 

In the EU, recommended concentrations for copper and zinc are 1.0 mg/L and 5.0 mg/L respectively.

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[Roboman]

So is your wine now contaminated?

Rap are you trying to ruin my confinement  :whine:  :whine:  :whine:  :whine:  ... only joking

 

A fair question and I don't have a lab on hand to analyse a sample and hence give an answer.

 

However, I have examined the tap and the way it unites to the barrel.  Looking at the depth of the thread on the tap, the tap just screws into the wood and not through into the wine itself.  The hole in the tap through which the wine passes is well oxidised and so, I believe, should create a barrier between the wine and the brass.  The tap was in contact with the wine for about 24 hours, I'm not sure of contaminant diffusion rates.  And finally the guy my wife bought it from didn't seem gaga!

 

So all said I would suggest the chance of contamination is low..... but now that the notion has been raised, I think I shall have it analysed once life returns to its new normal.  It'll be fun/interesting to have our wine professionally analysed (hopefully not too expensive).

 

Thanks guys for your advice, information, and ideas, I'll let you know.

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[Chris Vais]

Robert,

 

Testing may be more expensive than you want to pay. Given the small amount of wine in total and that you only recently added new wine, the chance of significant copper being present is probably low.

 

The bottom line is that if you want to make wine successfully you need to keep a sterile environment, no contact with metal except for stainless steel, and no use of any chlorine containing cleaners. 

 

More questions just ask. 

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[Rap]

Ruin your confinement? Good lord I only ask because I care!

 

while this is the wrong place to post and no doubt will earn me a severe rebuke from our Administrator I thought I’d pass this on. For those of you who are having trouble finding products in stores, do some homework and see who the large food service providers are in your area. Many of these are backed up and overstocked with food and other products including tp and towels. Why? Because restaurants have cancelled orders. They are desperate to unload stock at bargain basement prices. How do I know? Because I just bought items that were unavailable elsewhere and at rock bottom prices. $1 for a lb of chicken for example. No it’s not rotten, Just something I thought I’d pass on. It never would have occurred to me but my daughter works at a national vendor

and called me to ask if I wanted anything.

this is my good deed for the day.

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[Roboman]

Ruin your confinement? Good lord I only ask because I care!

 

And I thank you for that Bob, seriously, no worries at all about your comment 

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[Roboman]

The bottom line is that if you want to make wine successfully you need to keep a sterile environment, no contact with metal except for stainless steel, and no use of any chlorine containing cleaners. 

 

Thanks Chris, in the past it has been typical glass and cork contacting the wine (and a food grade siphon hose).  It's only because I wanted to experiment with oaking that this has happened.  Still, good learning curve and we'll see how things work out.  I'm also aware that we probably over-watered our vine this year and hence the wine is a little light/less intense.  Last year the sg started around 1115, this time was around 1095, and so the potential alcohol level was around 13% this time as opposed to a previous 16%.  live and learn.  Pretty much all of our 2017 vintage went down the drain so I gave us three years to turn out drinkable wine else give up.  But last year's was okay so we battle on, and the other thing is what to do with the grapes ..... because at harvest time everyone in the region has more than enough of their own; you can't give them away!

Enough for now, decorating to do.

 

Ugh, sorry, another question .... what do you use for sterilisation??  I've just looked up the content of sterilisation tabs: 1% sodium hypochlorite (NaClO) and 16.5% sodium chloride (NaCl; common salt).

 

I must be falling into all available pitfalls

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[Chris Vais]

The chemicals I have ever used for sterilization of everything in a winery are:

 

Potassium metabisulfate and Citric Acid solution - 8 teaspoons of metabisulfite and 1/2 teaspoon of Citric Acid. Use this solution to clean everything. Once this solution has been applied, also it to remain in contact for a minute or two then rinse with clean water. 

 

If you have a barrel that will remain unused for a period of time, even a brief period of time, wash out the barrel with freshwater and then add a couple of gallons of the metabisulfite/citric acid for a 225 L barrel, less for a smaller one. When you are ready to use the barrel, dump out the solution and rinse with fresh water.

 

You can also use a product called ProxyClean. ProxyClean is sodium per carbonate, sold as a granular product that is used for sanitation and stain removal. If you use it, use it before the metabisulfite/citric acid solution. Do not use it inside of barrels. This chemical is classified as an oxidizer which means that it has the potential auto ignite in the presence of fuel such as diesel, gasoline, or methanol.

 

Do not use any cleaner that contains chlorine. Cork taint is caused by a chemical called 2,4,6-trichloroanisol (TCA) which is formed in the presence of chlorine. There was a time when chlorinated phenolic farm chemicals were used in cork tree orchards. It is formed when cork trees infected with mold are treated with a chlorinated phenolic fungicide. It is possible to produce TCA by using a chlorine cleaner, such as bleach to clean a barrel. Every winery I ever worked in does not permit chlorine cleaners to be used anywhere including the lab, kitchen, and bathrooms.

 

There is such thing as too many wine grapes, ramp up production!!!

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[Roboman]

Thanks Guys, I shall need to review all this before starting again next year.

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[Roboman]

So this is the only wine from the US that I been able to locate in a relatively nearby store (about 40Kms away).  It was okay to drink, not rough, but not much in the way of complexity.  However, given that it was only about Euro10, I had no great expectations, but also no complaints.

 

   

 

I'm pleased to say that this afternoon the main Cooperative will be open for a few hours so that "essential supplies" can be purchased.

 

I hope you are all well.  Yesterday was market day in the village.  A pathway has been created so that people move single-file through the market, place their orders, and the marketeers fetch the produce.  It is a strangely weird dance, almost like the court dances from palaces past.... much "bowing" from a distance, a little circulating around each other, hands stretch towards each other in genteel fashion, then another "bow" and moving on to the next person.

 

Keep safe all, Robert

 

 

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[Chris Vais]

Beringer is the oldest continuously operating winery in California. They were able to stay open during prohibition by making sacramental wine for the church. They produce some very good high end wines and they also produce a large volume of wine for the mass market. You'll notice the appellation for the bottle you purchased is California. That means the grapes could have come anywhere in the State of California and are produced in bulk, with no barrel aging. 

 

There is process call micro-oxidation which bulk wine producers use to artificially age wine. The net effect is that they can bring a young wine to market sooner because the micro-oxidation process gives the wine a flavor profile and mouth feel of a wine that has had some bottle age.

 

A member of my extended European family sent me some pictures from Paris. The streets are absolutely deserted. Shops and Cafes closed. Some of my family live in Paris, Marsailles, Milan, Rome and Settimo Vittone, the ancestral home of my paternal grandmothers family.

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[Rap]

The pictures run by the news program that I watch of various empty cities really is quite stunning. I drove to by Mom’s to deliver some food to her yesterday and empty parking lots and dark buildings are views most of us have never seen. Pa. Was a blue state years ago and I have some limited recollection of that but this seems more vivid and stark. on a side note I don’t consider myself to be a whack job AOC green nut but it’s hard not to think about how positively the shutdown is affecting the quality of Mother Earth. Mind you I still do terribly miss the smell of oil, gas, rubber and the sound of screaming engines at the track but that’s another thread!

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[ds968]

I can actually detect the smell of cleaner air, and a significant difference at that, when I go in the back yard, or when out for a grocery run. There was a report on TV the other day which showed satellite images over China and also a few other regions of the world, including California, during the shut down, compared to the before images.. to say it was a stunning difference, would be an understatement, it looked like two different planets with identical continents, lol. And although not surprising it was still a wow and encouraging moment, albeit short lived when you soon realize once things get back to normal, the destruction of our environment will also resume to normal. Not an extreme , radical , AOC tree hugger here either , but I do love nature and preservation of it to the greatest extent practical ( and, therein lies the challenge ). Are we going to compromise industry in favor of cleaner air ? Pretty sure China wont ..nor will India , nor will Russia , or any of the other gross polluters. U.S. and much of Europe might make some steps toward that goal, but IMO its wont be nearly enough to make much of a difference. Sigh.


Oops, this ( and maybe also RAPs post above ) probably belong more in the Covid 19 thread rather than this wine making one...?

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[Chris Vais]

Winemaking has its own set of environmental benefits and detriments. Vineyards provide a haven for beneficial insects because most vineyards practice integrated pest management which relies on natural methods for pest control. Vineyards also capture a fair amount of moisture and act as reasonably effective fire breaks as we have learned from the wildfires in California's wine country. The cover crop between the vine rows suppresses erosion and helps keep streams clear of silt, a benefit to certain fish species. Perhaps most importantly vineyards convert sunlight and CO2 from the atmosphere into sugar which is then fermented into wine. 

 

The biggest environmental detriments to wine production is the air pollution that results from the transport, mostly by motor vehicle, of wine cases the weight 40 to 50 lbs. each. Some wine producers are shipping wine in bulk tanks to bottling plants closer to where their major markets are in order to save on shipping costs with a side benefit air pollution reduction. The CO2 released during fermentation turns out not to be a significant source of air pollution. Water usage has become a major environmental concern with the global warming we are experiencing. It used to be that vineyards were all dry cropped, no irrigation after the first few years in most California vineyards. The only dry cropped vineyards left are the oldest, many planted 80 to 100 years ago. The winemaking process uses a lot of water, however the larger wineries with associated vineyards take water used in the winemaking process and place in oxidation ponds where it is aerated and over time the biological contaminants are consumed. The water from the ponds is used to irrigate the adjacent vineyards. Wineries without vineyards treat their wastewater in a simple treatment plant and  the water can then be used for landscape irrigation.

 

As the planet warms irrigated vineyards could very well become to costly to maintain and wine grapes will be grown at higher elevations in cooler, wetter climates.

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[Roboman]

I thought you guys might like this photo as it is spectacular here at the moment. Apart from Spring in glorious bloom look at the sky, not a cloud or vapor trail to be seen and we are about 10mins flight time from an EU international airport. As you can see it is work as normal for the vigneron, it is just before noon so this little guy is heading home for lunch.


   




As a comment on your earlier post Chris .... The AOC Fitou (and I think Corbieres) do not permit irrigation, so the growing season is always a bit fretful..... too much rain, too little rain ??? Thanks for the info on Beringer, I was glad to read it.

Cheers all, Robert

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[Rap]

Bet the air smell fresher too.

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[Roboman]

Bet the air smell fresher too.

Yes, I think so, but that could be effected by the impact on my senses from the general clarity of the atmosphere.  Obtusely, I was admiring the view whilst walking yesterday when I stepped on the edge of a pothole and badly twisted my ankle.  So now I'm getting around with the aid of crutches and cannot do much apart from sit with my leg up and write to you guys!  Keep well all

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[Chris Vais]

The spring bloom is just beginning here in Oregon. Went out to go to the market only to find my Brilliant Black Audi A5 has changed to pollen yellow.

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