On Jul 29, 8:30*am, "Paul E. Lehmann"
wrote:
Has anyone experimented with cold soaking crushed Chardonnay before pressing
or fermenting Chardonnay a short time on the skins? *My goal is to make a
crisp somewhat aromatic Chardonnay without ML or use of oak.

I have quite a bit of Chardonnay on the vine right now and trying to think
of different ways of fermenting for slightly different styles.


My experience has been crisp and aromatic are at the opposite ends of
the spectrum. Short term ferment on the skins will give a very nice,
crisp wine, but it tends to leave out the aromatic qualities you might
be looking for. Short term for me has been 12 to 18 hours on the
skins. Options you might look at would include extending that time.
If you have a lot of grapes and wish to experiment, then allow some to
be over-ripe before you start in enhance the aromatic quality of the
grape. I, myself, will pursue several different kinds of maceration
this year. A word of caution; going for an aromatic wine fragrance
can easily produce flabby wine, so you need to watch your acid levels
very closely.

Tom