Truffle Pig Wine

Final numbers on the hydrometer were 13.5 brix -- which I peg to actually mean somewhere in the 15 - 16 brix. That's a bunch less sugar and a bunch more alcohol than I was hoping for, but what are you going to do.

Next year, I'll try to ferment the icewine in the 12 degree C range instead of room temperature -- that should draw out the fermentation and cause it to struggle a little more and should keep it from fermenting too vigorously and losing too much sugar.

The carboy and topping bottles are now snug in a couple cardboard boxes down in the storage locker at the condo. It's an unheated basement which is probably around 5 to 8 degrees C and should help with cold stabilization over the next few months of aging. I anticipate racking once every two months or so until I bottle in late summer. That puts the next racking around the end of March or so.

14.5°B @ room temperature

We're in the death throes. I checked the hydrometer tonight at 6:00 and it looked like 14.5 brix. Then my dinner guests arrived and I quickly cleaned up and left it to sit longer.

15.5°B @ room temperature

That's about enough thank you. I checked the wine around 6:00 this evening (a deadline at work prevented me from doing my measurements at noon) and the cheapo hydrometer read 15.5 — which I peg to about 17.5 brix in the real world.

When I picked up the juice, Kevin Watson estimated that with starting sugars of 37 brix, the fermentation should naturally stop with about 17 brix residual sugar. This would mean 20 brix would have been converted into boozed for roughly 11% alc. by volume.

Given that, I thought I'd give it a helping hand in slowing down. After taking the above measurements, I added 50ppm S02 and put the carboy outside (current outdoor temp is 2 °C) for about half an hour to cool off.

It seems to have worked: as I write this six hours later, it's pushing a bubble through the airlock about 5-6 times per minute, and there is no longer a bubbly froth on the surface.

Unless I hear otherwise from the experts, I think I'll let any fermentation that might be left play itself out, then add 50ppm more S02 and rack it into a 12L carboy for cold storage for the next six-to-eight months.

17.5°B @ room temperature

Hmmmm, this thing is starting to get a little boozy. I'm not sure how I feel about that. At noon today, the hydrometer read 17.5 brix at room temperature. So I'm guessing there's actually something like 19 brix left.

I'd like it to stop fermenting now, so I put the whole carboy outside (the temp is hovering around freezing right now) for about 1/2 an hour to try and drop the temperature a bit and slow down the fermentation.

As for tasting notes, the nose is definitely in the tropical zone with pronounced banana, pineapple, mango and apricot. And taste-wise it's the apricot and mango that are showing the most. The bitterness has largely dropped away as well, which is nice.

If this thing would start to settle down now and stop fermenting after another brix or so, that'd be perfect. I'd have an icewine with roughly 12% alcohol and 18 brix residual sugar. I've got my finger crossed.

19.5°B @ room temperature

The rate of fermentation slowed down overnight, though it's still pushing a bubble through the airlock once every 2 seconds or so. Brix are down to 19.5 (specific gravity 1.082) on my hydrometer, and the juice is back to room temperature.

Given that my original reading on the cheapo hydrometer I'm using was 35, yet Kevin Watson claimed it was 38, I'm going to guess that my hydrometer is off and it's actually around 21-22 brix right now. I prefer my icewine in the 18-20 brix of residual sugar range, so I think it's looking good to stop in that range.

The nicest change is actually in the nose and flavour We're morphing away from banana-heavy fruit-salad into more tropical fruit range: mango is starting to show nicely, the banana is subsiding and the strawberry is making a comeback. It's really quite delightful.

Also, the bitterness has lessened a little, which is nice. I don't like bitter dessert wine.

22.5°B @ 22°C

I checked the numbers again this evening and fermentation is slowing down as the alcohol increases. The hydrometer is now reading 22.5 (specific gravity 1.092), though I think the wine is a few degrees cooler as well.

The smell/taste has changed a bit too — I'm getting more apricot and pear while the strawberry has subsided a bit and the banana is less intense. There's a slight bitterness that's present as well, I'm not sure what that means, or if it'll go away &mdash although my 2004 Viognier had it in spades and it's still there, although subdued quite a bit.

25°B @ 24°C

Wow, this thing is fermenting like crazy. Bubbles are pushing through more than once per second, and there's a head of foam on the top like a pint of beer.

I just took the hydrometer readings and the yeast is indeed ripping right through -- we're at 25 brix (specific gravity 1.102) and the carboy feels significantly higher than room temperature, perhaps 24 ºC. I didn't think this small amount of wine would have enough thermal mass to raise the heat by that much, but it apparently has. Since the higher temperature will effect the hydrometer reading, I'll assume were actually closer to 26 brix.

Sasha at Eno Wines maintains that high heat and a fast fermentation helps bring out the fruit in a wine &mdash so that sounds like it could be a good thing for icewine. Anyone know any differently? What's current icewine best-practice? Who can I ask...

As for the nose, the wine is starting to display a lovely fruit-salad bouquet: strawberry, raspberry, banana and grapefruit. In the mouth the banana pulls ahead a little and some lychee is added on top.

It's also completely carbonated at this point, which is quite lovely. I know Pilliterri makes a sparkling icewine, I wonder how they do it?

--- update, 1:30pm ---

Apparently Karl Kaiser, winameker at Inniskillin, thinks the fermentation should be slow and long.

"The strain of yeast is crucial; high sugar conditions give yeast a challenge. The wrong yeast can move fermentation too quickly; diminishing complexity of the finished wine, or it can fizzle under the pressure of the high sugar, risking a stuck fermentation. Most Icewine is fermented in stainless steel tanks, a process that is long and slow—often taking up to four months to complete—stopping naturally at 10 to 12 percent alcohol."

I've wrapped the carboy in a cooling pad to try and drop the temperature a little — at least back to room temperature.

34.5°B @ room temperature

Last night around 8:00pm I noticed some bubbles coming through the airlock at a rate of about 8 per minute. I added about 10 grams of Fermaid powder, a yeast nutrient I'll use to reduce the chances of generating H2S.

This morning fermentation is a little more vigorous with a bubble pushing through airlock at a rate of 1 every 2 seconds. After taking my brix reading, I gave the carboy a quick stir with the racking cane.

I had a sip and it's quite thick and syrop-ie, and exceptionally sweet. It tastes and smells predominantly of apple-pear cider, with a slight fritz. There's no taste of alcohol yet.

This morning the wine was room temperature, so I spent the morning preparing for inoculation by making acid adjustments and making the yeast starter.

Adjusting the TA

Kevin Watson didn't know the PH or TA or the juice, just that it was 38 brix. But he did recommended increasing the TA by about 0.1% to add a little more crispness to the wine — this will help counteracts the gooey sweetness of the wine once we’re left with ~20 brix of residual sugar.

1 gram of tartaric acid raises 1 litre of juice by 0.1% TA, so I made a slurry of 13 grams of tartaric acid with about 1/2 a cup of juice and mixed it until all the acid crystals disappeared. Once done, I gave it an inquisitive taste (like VERY sour lemonade), dumped the mixture in the carboy of juice and mixed it all around with the racking cane.

Once the acid was adjusted, I took a hydrometer reading, to get the brix before fermentation begins. I should also be taking the temperature, but I don't have a thermometer, so I'll be running on the assumption that it's room temperature — 18-20 ºC. The hydrometer gave a reading of 35 brix (specific gravity: 1.15).

Inoculation

I whipped up the yeast starter using the instructions Kevin suggested. These instructions are for one pail of juice, although I adjusted accordingly because I only had about 2/3 a bucket:

• Add 250ml of warm water (20 ºC) to a bowl
• Add 5g of “go-ferm” and stir in
• Springle 5g of Lalvin RC2 yeast on top and wait 5-10 minutes
• Stir in and add 250 ml of 50/50 mix (equal parts of juice and water combined to 20 ºC)
• Wait one hour and stir
• Slowly pour into the juice

I made the above slurry about 12:00 this morning and had it in the wine by 1:00. The slurry was frothing nicely before it went in.

Once done, I wrapped the carboy in two strips of tinfoil, to prevent light from hitting the juice and damaging the wine.