Modified 'chianti' recipe

[tonyhibbett]

Some time ago I bought 5 litres of pure red grape juice concentrate and the book Winemaking with Concentrates. Most of the recipes state the bleeding obvious and refer to varietal 'styles' of concentrate which no longer seem to be available. The stuff I got has a very ordinary taste when mixed with water and although high in sugar ( sg 1080), it's also fairly high in acid (pH 3.2), and certainly not going to produce a wine of any distinction if used on its own, although probably better than red grape juice. 1 recipe stood out and was for generic concentrate, 570 ml, combined with 110 g of dried elderberries, which I also have and need to use up. When made up to a gallon with water and 340 g of sugar, the sg was a mere 1070 and the colour was pale. So I added 300 ml of concentrate, which corrected these deficiencies, but did not improve the bland flavour. I found a better recipe in Award Winning Wines, which additionally included more sugar, a bottle of morello cherries, and fresh raspberries, blackberries and blackcurrants plus oak chips. I have tried using cherry syrup previously and found it had little or no effect on the flavour of a red wine I was making, but I found a pack of frozen 'fruits of the forest' in my freezer, which consisted of the fresh ingredients mentioned. Once defrosted, mashed and added to the brew, the effect on the flavour was an amazing improvement. The pH is 3.5, which is good. The cost is a little high, at about £1.40 per bottle. This could be reduced by substituting some of the concentrate with cheap red grape juice.

 

[tonyhibbett]

The raspberry flavour is dominant, even though there is only about 100 g of them
I found another chianti recipe which enables me to use up existing stock. I have modified it somewhat to improve the colour and acidity:
150 g dried elderberries
350 g pack of frozen blueberries, thawed and crushed
200 g sultanas, chopped
600 ml red grape juice concentrate
340 g jar of honey
6 g oak chips
1 teaspoon each of tannin, nutrient, pectolase and yeast
Water to 1 gallon
Sg 1090, pH 3.5.
After straining, the liquid will need to be topped up with grape juice, made up from more of the concentrate. At the moment, the elderberry is the dominant flavour, which goes to show just how bland the concentrate is. The principal grape variety for chianti is sangiovese, said to be high in tannin and acidity with a plum/prune flavour, which is not included in either recipe.

 

[tonyhibbett]

Clearly, the 150 g of dried elderberries was too much. This part of the original recipe (100 g) was correct. I bought a can of prunes, mashed them and added them to the second batch, with the syrup. This put the elderberry flavour back in its rightful place. Amazing what these 'black-coated workers' can do! I haven't tasted them for ages due to bad memories, but things have changed. They are now really delicious. Then I read the label: '...in pineapple juice!'
I needed another bucket with lid to make the second batch. I retrieved an empty 5 kg bucket of general purpose mortar, which I knew would come in useful 1 day. Washed and scrubbed, it proved ideal. It holds a gallon, with plenty of room to spare for expanding pulp, with a sealable lid and carry handle.

 

[tonyhibbett]

The 1st batch has been strained and transferred to a jar. The colour is virtually black!
I used the 400 g of strained pulp as a starter for a third batch, using up the last 130 g of dried elderberries, 750 ml of the concentrate and 450 g of sugar, topped up with water. The used pulp will contribute little flavour, but a significant amount of colour.
I read the label of a bottle of chianti, which made no mention of prunes, but wild berries, so I guess elderberries are on the right track.
I found a litre bottle of pure Californian prune juice, no additives, but rather expensive at £3. However, it's worth considering as a flavouring additive for a large batch of red wine.

 

[tonyhibbett]

As expected, the 3rd batch has good colour, but mediocre flavour, so having strained the second batch (delicious!), I added its pulp to the 3rd batch.
I have no more elderberries to put into a 4th batch, but I found some frozen cranberries in the freezer, but they don't have much flavour. I went in search of basic prunes and found expensive packs treated with sorbate, so I bought the pure prune juice. It tastes, unsurprisingly, like prunes, unadulterated with pineapple juice, and is dark brown rather than red. Not something I would relish as a drink on its own

 

[tonyhibbett]

I strained the 3rd batch as it tasted slightly bitter, probably because the pulp is now mostly skin and seed, and put it in a jar. The colour is slightly lighter but still intense.
Moving on the batch 4, I tried to crush the defrosted cranberries with a potato masher with little success, so I had to crush them by hand individually, followed with 500 ml of boiling water. To this I added 1 third of the litre bottle of prune juice, 750 ml of grape concentrate, 350 g of sugar, water to 4.5 litres and the pulp from the previous batches, plus the usual additions. Fermentation commenced immediately.
I can see where this is leading. There will be a 5th batch and the whole lot will get mixed together, treated to a malolactic fermentation and end up in a new oak barrel to mature.

 

[tonyhibbett]

I racked and tasted the batches. The first is too fruity, the second has the right balance, the 3rd has a prominent elderberry flavour and associated tannin and the 4th is slightly bitter. I mixed the first 3 and added a gallon of purely grape juice from the concentrate, leaving the 4th batch to continue fermenting on the pulp.
I have ordered the barrel.

 

[tonyhibbett]

Now all the batches have been merged, none of the added fruit flavours dominate, they simply make the grape concentrate richer. The volume is now down to 21 litres, partly due to losses caused by fine pulp sediment. After more racking and fining, the volume will be about 20 litres. Since I have some prune juice left and an opened carton of white grape juice, I mixed these with the stained pulp, which still has some mileage, as the cranberries have not broken down much, despite having been frozen. The result was a brown liquid, so I added some of the remaining concentrate and topped up with water and sugar to a total volume of 4.5 litres. After fermentation, straining and initial racking, I should end up with 3 litres, which I can use to top up the main brew to make up for losses. In future it would make sense to start with about 25 litres.

 

[tonyhibbett]

The barrel has finally arrived. The delay was due to the fact that it was built to order. There's service for you! It's slightly different to the previous ones, being varnished, apart from the ends. This reduces the loss rate of liquid while still allowing some breathing. The tap is also fully coated. I have filled it with water. It leaks slightly, but that is normal at this stage.
Meanwhile the top up batch has gone from muddy brown to healthy red overnight, as the cranberries start to break down. This pulp has become a red wine engine, releasing tannin, colour, oak effects and has a fast fermenting yeast colony and pectolase. I am inclined to keep it going, like a rumtoft, feeding it with fruit, red grape juice, sugar and water on a gallon by gallon basis.
The main brew has dropped below 21 litres, with an sg of 1025 and pH 3.5. Apparently, I should rack it at sg 1010 and get rid of the bulk of dead yeast.

 

[tonyhibbett]

The top up batch, once strained and later racked, left 3 litres of somewhat murky red liquid, which I added to the main brew, which now stands at 24 litres. This would be enough to fill 30 screw top wine bottles, but I expect to lose at least a litre before it is ready.
This would be a good point to start a malolactic fermentation.
The barrel has lost 500 ml of water. Probably less, as it will have expanded. I fitted the soaked tap, which this time went in very easily, and topped up with water. It is still leaking slightly. I solved the problem of where to put it by inverting another barrel stand and placing it on top of the 10 gallon barrel, creating a stack.

 

[tonyhibbett]

MLF well under way and the must tastes very smooth, but still sweet at 1005. I racked it, expecting to find a lot of sediment, but found very little.
I topped up the barrel with 100 ml. There is still a very slight leak.

 

[tonyhibbett]

Now the sg is down to 1000, it tastes rather too acidic, although the pH is 3.6. Apparently mlf reduces total acidity. We shall see. It seems the cranberries were not a good idea, as they impart a bitterness.
As an offshoot, I used the last 500 ml of concentrate to make a 4 litre batch. This is a 50% grape juice formula, as used in Cellar 7 kits, which produces good results for red wine, but clearly not with the concentrate I am using, as the result is pale, thin and lacking in all respects. I mixed it with the remaining pulp, with little improvement, so the pulp is clearly exhausted.
I topped up the barrel with 40 ml of water. The tap design is a great improvement, as it has stopped dripping already, but the barrel is still leaking slightly.

 

[tonyhibbett]

Sg down to 998 and still fermenting. This may be the mlf. I tested for residual sugar using a blood glucose monitor which gave the message 'too little glucose to register a reading.' Alarming for a diabetic, but good news for the wine! Nonetheless I racked it and added sorbate. This time there was the expected amount of yeast sediment. After de-gassing, I added finings at the medium rate. All fermentation has ceased. The pH is 3.5 and the taste is good, without the acidic taste I previously had.
I topped up the barrel with 25 ml of water. There is still a slight leak. I decided to check the other barrels. The pinot noir has been in for 4 months, so time to rack. I used a sludge trap, which was just as well, as there was about half a bottle of sludge, despite the fact that the wine went in fully fined, or so I thought. So the total liquid lost so far is about 5%. The wine tastes good, but I will give it another 4 months. The same applies to the cabernet sauvignon, except it has a better flavour and the sediment was much less dense.

 

[tonyhibbett]

The finings did a pretty good job. Another, light dose should clear up the slight haze. I'm not convinced the sorbate stopped the mlf completely, so I added sulphite to make sure. The volume is now 22.5 litres (5 gallons). The barrel actually only holds 18 litres (4.5 gallons), not the claimed 20. Clearly they are built as the traditional 'pin' (on which old bulk recipes are based) and incorrectly renamed 20 litre, whereas the polypin has a stated capacity of 20 litres, but actually hold 5 gallons, (22.5 litres). It's a simple matter to reduce the capacity of the polypin, whereas the barrel is rigid. In this respect, a 21 litre kit is a good choice if it is intended to cask mature it, as at best you end up with 19 litres and the remainder can be used for topping up after racking and make good losses from evaporation. In practise, it's probably not worth bothering, but it certainly is with wine made from fresh grapes. I have 3 such batches, but the 3rd has been maturing in a polypin with oak chips and the difference in quality is very obvious, the latter being bland and without character or depth and tastes comparatively young.

 

[tonyhibbett]

The sulphite helped the finings, by knocking out the bacteria I introduced to produce malolactic fermentation. The wine is now almost perfectly clear and tastes good, but needs to mellow. The pH is still 3.6, which is fine. I transferred 18 litres to the barrel. which left 3 full bottles, plus a half, which can be used for topping up. The barrel no longer leaks but the tap started dripping. However that stopped after a while, having soaked up some wine.

 

[tonyhibbett]

Hard to comment on the wine. I recall many years ago in Florence tasting some local wine which was cheap and cheerful but unremarkable, so unmemorable. I could go further about my Italy experiences, but let's just say it's a little thin on substance!

 

[tonyhibbett]

The tap continued dripping very slowly, but the overnight loss was just a few mls.

 

[tonyhibbett]

I bought a bottle of Tesco Simply chianti for £5 and compared the two. They were similar, although the genuine article was better and was 2 years old, boasting cherry and blueberry, a good aroma and a bit stronger at 13%.

 

[tonyhibbett]

In conclusion I have to say that the pursuit of emulating commercial brands of wine will never quite succeed. In the case of chianti, for example, there are numerous variations and not all of them are good, while some are beyond reach. Nonetheless it is possible to produce good quality red wines which are respectable in their own right and most importantly, enjoyable to drink.

 

[tonyhibbett]

This is a complex wine, with an elderberry aroma and a fruity taste, with subtle raspberry notes in the flavour. The complexity is hardly surprising, given variety of fruit, the oak and the malolactic fermentation. Essentially, it is 60% red grape from concentrate, 20% other fruit, mostly elderberry with raspberry, blackberry, blackcurrant, blueberry. cranberry, prunes, prune juice, pineapple and white grape, with oak chips and tannin, the rest being 10% sugar and 10% water.