Like hungry teenagers, wine fermentations require not only a yeast to start the fermentation, but regular “meals” of yeast nutrients. Adding nutrients to fermentations is almost a daily event and last week, we concentrated on feeding Iowa Frontenac and Iowa Marquette Rosé.
Fermentations of red wine leave sediments of grape skins, seeds, and dead yeast lees and they are separated in the press. Last week, we took care of Iowa Sabrevois and Iowa Petite Pearl and they are now chilling in our refrigerated truck.
Fermentations of white wines also leave sediments but only of dead yeast lees and maybe a little pulp from the grapes. So we separate the wine from solids by taking advantage of the fact that the solids are at the bottom of the tanks. We pump off the mostly clear wine and move it to another tank and then open the tank door at the bottom and let the solids just flow out into the trench drains that are connected to our waste water treatment lagoons. The wines we worked on last week included Iowa Edelweiss, Iowa LaCrosse, and Iowa Brianna.
We are working on our game plan for bottling the Oskyfizzante® Pink, Iowa White, Red, and Cranberry. We need our refrigerated truck for these bottlings because the glass must be quite cold when the wine flows into the bottle.
