Sour Wine

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Jarov

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So I made a Mezza Luna red kit vinter's reserve by wine expert around a month ago and I just racked a sample off after degassing and adding sulfites and sorbate last week, and it tastes pretty sour. Is my wine turning to vinegar or does it just need time to age?
 
"Sour" is not a good sign.

How sour do you mean? Like tart, or like a lemon? Or worse, vinegar?

Like tart, nowhere near as bad as vinegar, but the sourness is in the smell as well as the taste. The kit said the finishing gravity would be around 0.098 but I finished at 0.092, so I wonder if that has anything to do with it.
 
Like tart, nowhere near as bad as vinegar, but the sourness is in the smell as well as the taste. The kit said the finishing gravity would be around 0.098 but I finished at 0.092, so I wonder if that has anything to do with it.

You're missing a digit there. I think you mean .992. The difference between .998 and .992 is pretty negligible, and not the cause of a tart or sour smell or taste.

You can let it sit, and see if it improves, but it sounds like a sanitation issue.
 
You're missing a digit there. I think you mean .992. The difference between .998 and .992 is pretty negligible, and not the cause of a tart or sour smell or taste.

You can let it sit, and see if it improves, but it sounds like a sanitation issue.

And that seems weird to me, it may have been a fluke I missed but everything and I mean everything that touched the wine was sanitized. I was worried that was it, so I'll have to be extra extra careful about that next time. I'll check my carboy for scratches and my other equipment.
 
Ok, so I was trying to wrap my head around where the infection would have come from, and I think I know where. I used water from my bathtub, so I wouldn't have to drag my fermenter upstairs. I'm thinking the spigot may not be entirely clean, so I won't be getting my water from there anymore. Lesson learned, although it sucks learning lessons the hard way, so now should I just dump the wine? It's too sour to be considered drinkable.
 
Ok, so I was trying to wrap my head around where the infection would have come from, and I think I know where. I used water from my bathtub, so I wouldn't have to drag my fermenter upstairs. I'm thinking the spigot may not be entirely clean, so I won't be getting my water from there anymore. Lesson learned, although it sucks learning lessons the hard way, so now should I just dump the wine? It's too sour to be considered drinkable.

Unless you need the carboy, no harm will come to the wine by letting it sit. Top it up, and ignore it, and see what happens. It may improve, it may not. You may have a drinkable wine, or you may have 6 gallons of wine vinegar.
 
Unless you need the carboy, no harm will come to the wine by letting it sit. Top it up, and ignore it, and see what happens. It may improve, it may not. You may have a drinkable wine, or you may have 6 gallons of wine vinegar.

Well I guess there's no harm in letting it age in the carboy for a few months, I'll have to buy a new one to do that but I need a new one anyways. I'll give it a few months and taste it, and if it doesn't taste good, I won't waste bottles on it.
 
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