Wine tastes like vinegar ?

I Made a batch of Zin Blush wine from a Spagnols kit. I brew beer, so I decided to try wine.
I followed the directions to the letter.... I sterilized everything that came in contact with the wine.
The wine tasted ok at bottling time although it was a little rough around the edges. That was 12 Sep.
This evening, the wife decided to taste it, so I uncorked a bottle. She says it is beginning to taste like vinegar.
Any one with any input ???
Joe

It may just be that bottle or you may have a couple cases of vinegar. If you used natural cork, that can be a real pain to sanitize.

But I think Blush Zins are a stench in the eyes of the goddess, anyway.

I would try out another bottle -- it could well be that only the 1 bottle went sour.

Did you do a campden treatment before bottling?

Probably not much you can do for that bottle.. If it got infected, you could try letting it continue all the way (there are some good articles on making vinegar, though I haven't tried it..)... allow the Acetic fermentation to run for a little while... Make yourself a high quality cooking vinegar.

Tell us how the next bottle comes out.

John

Ok, I'll wait and try another.
It's not supposed to be ready until around Christmas.
If it's all gone, oh well, I've got good vinegar.....
Thanks.
Joe

Lots of Salad for Christmas, I gave had bottles go bad but never whole batch. that is bottling and corking problem. Like mentioned above by David, natural corks can be a problem. I now boil them when corking. and the water has K-met in it. Bottling seems to be where every infection I have gad has happened.

mmadmikes1,
Seems you may be correct.
I sterilized everything that came in contact with the wine using Star-San EXCEPT the corks. They were new in a plastic bag..... whoda thought...
The wife tells me the first bottle she tried was OK until it sat for the few days it took to consume it....

kb2kir said:

mmadmikes1,
The wife tells me the first bottle she tried was OK until it sat for the few days it took to consume it....

Click to expand...

Ah Ha! The final clue!

Open the bottle... Let it sit around for a couple days while you drink on it.... and it gets vinegary...

Wine will do this...

Perhaps smaller bottles are in order... or just help her drink the whole bottle!

Thanks

John

If you are not going to consume all of the wine immediately, get yourself a wine saver setup. Most LHBS have them available. It is well worth the investment.



Salute!

I made quite a few batches of wine with good success but the last two came out vinegar tasting. I am very clean in my brewing process but my six gallon batches are made in nine gallon tanks. I have been told that oxygen got to the wine causing that vinegar taste.
I also have been told there is no remedy for the wine I made. That's bad because I made almost sixty bottles. I decided to drink them anyway.
Somewhere along the way I got a crazy idea and put a couple dozen red grapes in the bottle and vacuum sealed it until the next day. I'm sure you won't believe me but the vinegar taste is gone.
The wine doesn't taste like it is supposed to, there is a slight taste of raisin but I like it much more than vinegar. I am experimenting the number of grapes to see if I can tone down the grape taste.
I have done this to my Cab and Pinot Noir with success. I don't know if it would work on white wines. Perhaps you would have to use white grapes.
A warning to those who try this; don't eat the grapes. They're horrible.

I am curious about this. What type of grapes, you said to vacum seal...do you mean to recork? Interested in this procedure. I have some Cab that has a vinegar taste...I think it had too much oxygen in the carboy...too much head space.

it takes months of oxygen exposure to naturally turn wine into vinegar, the wine would not have gone to vinegar naturally in 3 days unless it was already turning to vinegar when she opened it... Also mother of vinegar likes hot weather so as long as you store you wine under 70 degrees you should never have to worry about vinegar...