Barco Estate's Wine Making Adventure: Day 8 - Quick, Someone grab the Resolve.

Monday. Oh, what a Monday.

I get home from work and go straight to the gym with the neighbors. All day I was wondering if today would be the day.

SPOILER: IT WAS - Jump to pictures if you wish to discontinue reading.

I get back home and immediately pop the lid on the PF (primary Fermenter). After washing my hands and cooking up a batch of sanitation liquid, I drop in the hydrometer andCha CHING, 1.008. Then 1.010, then 1.012. Okay, what's gone on? I take the hydrometer, pick it up and drop it back in gently. Now it reads 1.014. At this point I'm in disbelieve because I swear I saw 1.008 on my original reading. I re-sanitize the hydrometer and drop it back in. BOOM, 1.008. I noticed this time that if you have a freshly sanitized hydrometer and drop it in your fermenting wine, the wine bubbles disperse away from your hydrometer as if you put a drop of dish washing liquid into a dirty pan. The hydrometer starts moving around as it settles and floats into the wine foam. My theory: the wine foam sticks to the hydrometer lifting it slightly which skews the reading. What matters is that the reading , 1.008 is between 1.000 and 1.020 which means its stage 2 time. With a sanitized carboy, racking siphon and tube, I prepare to transfer my wine.

I put the PF on my kitchen counter, the glass carboy on my linoleum kitchen floor and siphon in my sanitized water bucket. I have a auto racking cane which is super easy to use. I put the siphon hose into the glass carboy, the racking cane in the PF and start the flow. The instructions say for this step you should allow splashing for a little aeration. My tube is hanging about 6 inches from the bottom of the carboy so I should be good. The whole transferring process took about 8 to 10 minutes. I made sure to keep the racking cane few inches from the bottom in the PF to not transfer any sediment.

I start getting down to bottom of the PF, I tilt the bucket towards me to get as much of the precious wine transferred as possible... my precious. All of a sudden, I hear slurping coming from the PF. I look in but there's still a good amount of liquid in the PF with wood chips stuck to the end of the racking cane. I'm trying not to waste a drop because I want a full 30 bottles. I shake the racking cane and continue transferring. It happens again and again and again. I finally get down the the bottom and accept about a 1-2 cup loss of wine.

Here's where it gets interesting. 3 things happen: 1) My primary focus is on the PF, 2) I didn't notice is the lodged wood chips in the end of my racking slowing the rate of transfer from the PF to the carboy and 3) A lack of logic: when I lifted the racking cane out of the PF, the tube inside the carboy lifted out as well. The siphon, still full of liquid, was flowing slowly. And here I thought it was empty. When the tube came out of the carboy, it started to swing and spilled wine all over my carpet. My wife was sitting on the couch reading. I looked up to see if she saw, yeah, she was totally into her book. I put the grab the tube and put it back into the carboy and say, "Uh, hey babe, can you help me out of a sec." Her reply, "No, this whole thing is your deal." I say, "Yeah, could you run to the neighbors really quick and get some resolve because I kind of spilled a little." She wasn't furious but wasn't a huge fan either. I soaked the wine with resolve and moved to the final steps in this process. I put the end of my giant spoon into the small carboy opening and stir the wine around for about a minute or 2. The instructions say to do this for initial degassing. I pop on the rubber stopper and secure the airlock.

BTW, moving your wine in a glass carboy is a pain in the ass. There isn't any place to get a secure grip and that bad boy is heavy. I moved the plastic shelf top to the kitchen and put the carboy on it.

Hydro Reading with bubbles lifting it up - 1.014