Hi all.

I am doing a SUPER TUSCAN wine kit from Winexpert Selection series.
After pouring the concentrated grape juice into the primary and normal
starting steps - they have a bag of grape skins, you are to mix in.
Which I did.

In a week, I'm suppose to put a little filter attachment on my hose and
let it strain out the floating skins. I did a kit similar to this (a
Pinot Noir, with skins) and the little nylon filter kept clogging.
Finally, I poured the must through a course bag to get out the
"floaters". Maybe this introduced too much air to my must. ? Anyways...
I have a better idea this time.

My question is: Could I just take a strainer and swish it around the
must and take out most of the floating skins that way? I would sterilize
it of course. I have a plastic one, and could press it to get out the
most liquid.

Since I'm dealing with only 6 gallons, this makes sense to me. Any
expert opinion or wise-cracks? :*)

--
DAve
p.s. I read this newsgroup almost daily, really learn from most of you,
and some of you... I am amused by. haha. Both are appreciated.

How big are the skins? I can see taking a small mesh bag and tying it
to the delivery end of the siphon, capturing all the skins (assuming
they're properly sized to pass through the racking tube. Then, if
you're racking into a carboy, pulling the bag through the neck of the
carboy is likely to squeeze out a lot of the juice trapped in the
skins. The trick is to not have a little filter attachment, but a big
one, big enough that the skins don't become a dam for the wine moving
through. Big enough bag should handle that...

I like your skimming idea, that may be a start, followed by the racking
into a bag idea. That should get the most out of it.

Now, a wise crack, and this is absolutely true. I'm at a grocery
store, where the checker has passed around to the other employees a
list of jokes wherein the joke is aimed at people with lighter colored
hair. One of which was "did you hear about the blond who was trapped
for 4 hours at the mall during a power outage? She was riding the
escalator at the time." OK, so the joke wasn't funny, but... and I
swear this is true... I know this was one of the jokes because she was
*explaining* it to another employee who happened to be blond. And no,
the second employee wasn't playing dumb.

Gratuitous, but I swear it's true...

Rob

Dave Allison wrote:
Hi all.

I am doing a SUPER TUSCAN wine kit from Winexpert Selection series.
After pouring the concentrated grape juice into the primary and normal
starting steps - they have a bag of grape skins, you are to mix in.
Which I did.

In a week, I'm suppose to put a little filter attachment on my hose and
let it strain out the floating skins. I did a kit similar to this (a
Pinot Noir, with skins) and the little nylon filter kept clogging.
Finally, I poured the must through a course bag to get out the
"floaters". Maybe this introduced too much air to my must. ? Anyways...
I have a better idea this time.

My question is: Could I just take a strainer and swish it around the
must and take out most of the floating skins that way? I would sterilize
it of course. I have a plastic one, and could press it to get out the
most liquid.

Since I'm dealing with only 6 gallons, this makes sense to me. Any
expert opinion or wise-cracks? :*)

--
DAve
p.s. I read this newsgroup almost daily, really learn from most of you,
and some of you... I am amused by. haha. Both are appreciated.

Rob,
I like that idea, I'll have to see if my hose is big enough for the size
skins, it may not be. But the concept of trapping after makes more sense
than prior to getting into the hose, since it clogged so much last time.
I think I'll go from primary bucket to another primary bucket so i can
use the bag at the end trick. Then put into carboy.

Married to a blond, I am careful about these type jokes, especially
since she is incredibly smart (top of class, always top performer at
work, etc.) but since she doesn't read this newsgroup - ROFL! I loved
it. And blond jokes can be modified....

....did you hear about the terrorist that was sent to blow up a car in
the market? He burned his mouth on the tailpipe!

ok, so that's the best I can do. haha.

--
DAve

Rob wrote:
How big are the skins? I can see taking a small mesh bag and tying it
to the delivery end of the siphon, capturing all the skins (assuming
they're properly sized to pass through the racking tube. Then, if
you're racking into a carboy, pulling the bag through the neck of the
carboy is likely to squeeze out a lot of the juice trapped in the
skins. The trick is to not have a little filter attachment, but a big
one, big enough that the skins don't become a dam for the wine moving
through. Big enough bag should handle that...

I like your skimming idea, that may be a start, followed by the racking
into a bag idea. That should get the most out of it.

Now, a wise crack, and this is absolutely true. I'm at a grocery
store, where the checker has passed around to the other employees a
list of jokes wherein the joke is aimed at people with lighter colored
hair. One of which was "did you hear about the blond who was trapped
for 4 hours at the mall during a power outage? She was riding the
escalator at the time." OK, so the joke wasn't funny, but... and I
swear this is true... I know this was one of the jokes because she was
*explaining* it to another employee who happened to be blond. And no,
the second employee wasn't playing dumb.

Gratuitous, but I swear it's true...

Rob

Dave Allison wrote:
Hi all.

I am doing a SUPER TUSCAN wine kit from Winexpert Selection series.
After pouring the concentrated grape juice into the primary and normal
starting steps - they have a bag of grape skins, you are to mix in.
Which I did.

In a week, I'm suppose to put a little filter attachment on my hose and
let it strain out the floating skins. I did a kit similar to this (a
Pinot Noir, with skins) and the little nylon filter kept clogging.
Finally, I poured the must through a course bag to get out the
"floaters". Maybe this introduced too much air to my must. ? Anyways...
I have a better idea this time.

My question is: Could I just take a strainer and swish it around the
must and take out most of the floating skins that way? I would sterilize
it of course. I have a plastic one, and could press it to get out the
most liquid.

Since I'm dealing with only 6 gallons, this makes sense to me. Any
expert opinion or wise-cracks? :*)

--
DAve
p.s. I read this newsgroup almost daily, really learn from most of you,
and some of you... I am amused by. haha. Both are appreciated.

Dave Allison wrote:
Hi all.

I am doing a SUPER TUSCAN wine kit from Winexpert Selection series.
After pouring the concentrated grape juice into the primary and normal
starting steps - they have a bag of grape skins, you are to mix in.
Which I did.

In a week, I'm suppose to put a little filter attachment on my hose and
let it strain out the floating skins. I did a kit similar to this (a
Pinot Noir, with skins) and the little nylon filter kept clogging.
Finally, I poured the must through a course bag to get out the
"floaters". Maybe this introduced too much air to my must. ? Anyways...
I have a better idea this time.

My question is: Could I just take a strainer and swish it around the
must and take out most of the floating skins that way? I would sterilize
it of course. I have a plastic one, and could press it to get out the
most liquid.

Since I'm dealing with only 6 gallons, this makes sense to me. Any
expert opinion or wise-cracks? :*)

Buy a fine mesh bag, put the skins in that, tie the bag closed and then
drop them in the must? Squeeze the juice from the bag at the end and
then rack?

hi, Alien,


Actually, I've done that with fruit wines, but when I contacted the wine
maker (WinExpert), they suggested for their skins, having it contained
in a bag would reduce the complexity given to the must, thus making the
wine less complex. But I DO do that with pumpkin, cranberry, etc. Since
those are less likely to be complex.

I'd be interested in your input and others on the "bag the skins"
technique against getting complexity from the skins. thanks for the input.

--
DAve

alien wrote:
Dave Allison wrote:
Hi all.

I am doing a SUPER TUSCAN wine kit from Winexpert Selection series.
After pouring the concentrated grape juice into the primary and normal
starting steps - they have a bag of grape skins, you are to mix in.
Which I did.

In a week, I'm suppose to put a little filter attachment on my hose
and let it strain out the floating skins. I did a kit similar to this
(a Pinot Noir, with skins) and the little nylon filter kept clogging.
Finally, I poured the must through a course bag to get out the
"floaters". Maybe this introduced too much air to my must. ?
Anyways... I have a better idea this time.

My question is: Could I just take a strainer and swish it around the
must and take out most of the floating skins that way? I would
sterilize it of course. I have a plastic one, and could press it to
get out the most liquid.

Since I'm dealing with only 6 gallons, this makes sense to me. Any
expert opinion or wise-cracks? :*)

Buy a fine mesh bag, put the skins in that, tie the bag closed and then
drop them in the must? Squeeze the juice from the bag at the end and
then rack?

I'd go with Alien in the future - can't imagine how it would "limit the
complexity" since what you're pulling out of the skins are molecules
smaller than a fine mesh bag. It may be that they're concerned about
circulating the liquid of the must through the skins to assure that
there's not a high chemical concentration in the bag preventing further
extraction. But I'd doubt it being a real effect, and certainly if you
occasionally swirled the bag around the fermenter during fermentation
the point would be moot. Don't forget that during fermentation of
regular grapes, most of the time the grape bodies are floating at the
top (or even above!) the liquid, so it's not as if this would be
terribly different than regular winemaking.

Thinking more now, I'd say in a mesh bag with the occasional swirl
(acting almost as a cap punch), I'd go for in a minute.

I have a sister-in-law who's very blond but also smart, so we've tended
to drop the blonde jokes. It was just that it was a blond asking for
the explanation of the joke that made it so funny!

Rob

I would treat it the same way I would a fruit wine. Fermint on the fruit
(in this case the skings) then when going from primary to secondary, pour it
through a fine mesh bag and squeeze th eback by hand. If you are doing
large batches you may want a press, but for small batchs just do the above.

Ray

"Dave Allison" wrote in message
.. .
Hi all.

I am doing a SUPER TUSCAN wine kit from Winexpert Selection series. After
pouring the concentrated grape juice into the primary and normal starting
steps - they have a bag of grape skins, you are to mix in. Which I did.

In a week, I'm suppose to put a little filter attachment on my hose and
let it strain out the floating skins. I did a kit similar to this (a Pinot
Noir, with skins) and the little nylon filter kept clogging. Finally, I
poured the must through a course bag to get out the "floaters". Maybe
this introduced too much air to my must. ? Anyways... I have a better idea
this time.

My question is: Could I just take a strainer and swish it around the must
and take out most of the floating skins that way? I would sterilize it of
course. I have a plastic one, and could press it to get out the most
liquid.

Since I'm dealing with only 6 gallons, this makes sense to me. Any expert
opinion or wise-cracks? :*)

--
DAve
p.s. I read this newsgroup almost daily, really learn from most of you,
and some of you... I am amused by. haha. Both are appreciated.