Wine - from Tanks to Barrels
We have been filtering our wine and getting it ready to sit in oak barrels. So, today, we are moving the wine from the stainless steel tanks to our oak barrels.
The Filter
We filter the wine so that it is all "clean" and free of yeast and other junk. We use a pad filter to filter the wine. A friend let us use his filter and it has been a great help!
We are only using a few filter pads today because this white wine is already pretty clean. When we filter the reds, we use a bunch more filter pads because they tend to have more "stuff" to filter out.
We use a pump to pump the wine from the tank through the filter and finally into the barrels.
From Tanks
Today we are filtering from tanks to barrels. Sometimes we go from one tank into another tank but this wine is ready for barrels.
To Barrels
We rinsed and steamed the barrels to make sure that they are clean. It is super cold, note the bundled up winemaker! Who says work has to be serious and no fun??? It's not around here.
We do switch out when we are cleaning the barrels, that way the wet person can warm up in the winery.
After the barrels are all clean, it's time to fill them up with wine!
Filling the Barrels
Now it is time to put some wine in those barrels! Each barrel holds 60 gallons of wine.
It is difficult to see the level of wine in the barrels as we fill it. So, we use flashlights to help see better but sometimes we still overflow the barrels!
Stacked Barrels
Now those barrels are stacked up and ready to sit. We let the wine sit in the barrels so that it can mellow and smooth out. It can take awhile, the 2017 vintage sat for two years in barrels.
We staple index cards to the ends of the barrels. On the cards we put the name of the wine, vintage and when we lasted topped off the barrels.
The process of moving the wine from tanks to barrels is complete! Now we just have to wait until the next vintage of wine is ready to move.
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