Old Vine Zinfandel w/ Skins - 6 Gallon Wine Kit - Master Vintner® Sommelier Select®

Great Wine, a Mess to Make

I have made this wine several times. It has a very warm berry flavor right after bottling. I have manages to age a few bottles for three years and they are superb. The tannins mellow out and the mouth feel is silky. But beware of the termination phase. We have a 6.5 gallon brew jug, but it still bubbles over with the grape skin bag in it. I would advise filling the jug to no more than 5.5 gallons and then adding a similar finish wine to the carboy during the clarification stage. Cleaning up all that grape juice is a pain!

Just as promised

Had our first bottle last night. As always, it was wrll appreciated.

Old Vine Zin (with skins)

I have made this kit 5 times in the past. I cannot figure out what was different with this one. Every other one has been fantastic. For some reason the finished wine from this kit has an odd taste to it. I used only half of the oak chips that came with the kit. Despite that, the odd taste is either too much oak or the juice was spoiled in some way. It is drinkable but was a disappointment to me. I have back tracked all of my steps and equipment and cleaning procedures and can't find anything I did differently.