Greetings and Happy New Year.
Who has a hangover?

I rather enjoy sparkling red wines, especially those made from shiraz
(South Australian of course). I have never succeeded in making a suitable
base wine, the results have tended to be too robust and certainly too
alcoholic. I fact the on the last attempt, the secondary fermentation
using EC1118 yeast failed completely.

Does anyone have some guidelines for making base wine for sparkling red,
covering such things as, fruit ripeness, fermentation temperatures,
skin contact time, tannin additions and fining?

Regards
Ian Anderson