Dear E C Kraus,

Before i launch these questions at you, i wanted to thank you for your excellent customer support. It is very helpful.

i wanted to add some toasted French oak chips to my red wines. i understand it varies with individual taste, but on the average how many packages do i need per 6 gallon container? Your catalog sells 4 oz packages.

Is it better to go with the real chips or how does the Oak Wood Extractive compare to this? Is one better than the other?

Also, i seems to think that oak chips just go with red wine. Is that correct or can/should i add oak chips to my white wines too? Again, thank you so much for your support.

Looking forward to your answers,

Mariette
_____

Dear Mariette,

Thank you for the positive feedback. It's always good to hear that we are doing something right.

These are very good questions. I'll take them one at a time:

Most people will be happy using 2 ounces of oak chips for every 5 or 6 gallons of wine. It can be added any time after the fermentation has completed and the wine has had time to clear. The amount of time to keep the oak chips on the wine does vary, but it is usually somewhere between 2 and 4 months. The general rule of thumb is the "bigger" the wine the more oaking it can benefit from.

Having said this, we always recommend sampling the wine throughout this maturation process. What you do not want to do is over oak the wine. We also recommend boiling the chips before using them. This is to release the excessive tannins that are in fresh oak chips. Doing this will put a less woody, more toasty character in the wine.

Most people would agree that oak chips are a better benefit to the wine than oak extractives, however the oak extractives have an immediate effect on the flavor whereas oak chips take time. This is a big benefit for someone who is ready to bottle their wine now. While you would want to lean towards using oak chips, oak extractives are certainly a viable solution for any wine that has no oak character at all.

Oak chips can be used in any white wine, however traditionally only heavier whites such as Chardonnay or Sauvignon Blanc are considered for oaking. Unless you are using a wine ingredient kit that provides a pre-tested, specific amount of oak, oaking a white wine can be a treacherous endeavor--the biggest risk being over-oaking. White wines are very delicate and can be easily overcome by the oak. If you do decide to oak a white on your own we recommend using only one ounce per 5 gallons, and definitely monitor the flavor very closely.

Best Wishes,
Customer Service at E. C. Kraus

Now you can create your own professional-looking wine labels and share your wines with pride. These labels can be customized for any type of wine or for any occasion--weddings, birthdays, holidays, etc. It`s a personal touch that makes a grand statement and one that allows you to present your wines with an more attractive look.

You can customize them by

using your computer's word processor and then running them through any sheet-fed printer. You get a total of 28 labels. Seven pages of 4 labels on a standard 8-1/2" by 11" sheet. Each label is pre-gummed and die cut. They adhere very easily to any wine bottle. Just peel and stick. The actual size of each wine label is 4-3/4" by 3-5/8".

You can get more information and see the styles we offer by visiting our website.

Dear Kraus,

I recently made KenRidge Chilean Chardonnay and bottled it at the end of December. While the taste of the wine is fine, any wine left in the bottle (re-corked) for two days turns the color orange.

The wine fermented correctly, all directions were followed, and the wine was filtered prior to bottling.

What is the cause of the wine turning orange in color? is this a

health hazard?, and is there anything I can do now to prevent this colorization?

Thanks,
Terry
_____

Dear Terry,

The answer is very simple. Your wine is oxidizing.

Oxidation is a process that occurs when a wine is exposed to excessive oxygen for too long of time. Once the cork is pulled from a wine bottle, you are allowing air to enter the bottle which starts the oxidative process.

The first signs of oxidation will show itself as light orange tinge that will later turn to a light amber, then dark amber, then brown. It is perfectly safe to drink, however you will probably notice some deterioration in the wine's overall character.

There are some things you can do to help reduce the occurrence of oxidation:

Add sulfites to the wine at bottling time. Doing this will delay the oxidative process once the bottle is opened. It will also help the wine to keep better while in storage.

Keep partial bottles in the refrigerator. Cooler temperatures will slow down the oxidative process.

Use a Vacuvin Wine Saver on partial bottles. The Vacuvin Wine Saver allows you to pump the air out of the bottle, keeping it fresh for weeks. Very effective.

-- And, then there's the most effective solution of all... drink the whole bottle!

If you want to read more about oxidation and how it effects a wine you may want to take a look at the article, "Controlling Oxidation In Your Homemade Wines."

Best Wishes,
Customer Service at E. C. Kraus

Hello Kraus,

Can I make my wines sweeter than the wines I buy at the store?

Thanks,
Dewayne
_____

Any wine you make can have the level of sweetness you desire. You have complete control.

This is one of the major advantages to making your own wine. You can create it to your own liking. It's a much nicer situation than rolling-the-

dice at your local wine shop. There you can only make a rough guess as to how a wine will taste.

It's really very simple. Any sugars that are available to the yeast at the start of fermentation will be turned into alcohol. Any sugars you add after the fermentation, when it's time to bottle, will contribute to the wine's sweetness. You simply add to taste.

The only thing you need to remember is that wine stabilizer must also be added at the same time you sweeten the wine. This is to prevent any chance of refermentation while in the bottle.

What you sweeten the wine with is up to you. Most home winemakers will use table sugar, but you can use honey or even sweet grape juice that's been held back from the fermentation. It's your choice.

Best Wishes,
Customer Service at E. C. Kraus

Hello EC Kraus,

I want to know what is the difference between bread yeast and wine yeast, what are the benefits of one against the other.

Sincerely
Thomas G.
_____

Dear Thomas,

This is a question we get quite often. Many people have been making wine with bread or baker's yeast and have done fine to meet their own satisfaction. But, the fact of the matter is they could be doing so much better if they would use the correct strain of yeast for the job. Certainly, money could not be the issue with a packet of wine yeast costing around a dollar.

To say, "yeast is yeast" and it all makes alcohol, is close to saying that a dog is a dog and one can hunt as well as another. When you make wine with baker's yeast, you are hunting with a Chihuahua.

Different yeast have different characteristics. There are thousands of strains that have been identified and they all behave differently. Some are only capable of fermenting up to 6 or 7 percent alcohol. Others will ferment to higher levels, but will also produce foul tasting enzymes in the process. Some are more sensitive to temperature than others.

In the case of bread yeast there are several issues that should be brought to light:

Baker's yeast will only ferment up to around 8% with ease. After that, the yeast must work much harder, producing all kinds of off-flavors that are normally associated with an over-worked yeast.

Baker's yeast is packaged under food-grade conditions not sterile conditions. This is perfectly acceptable when the yeast only needs to be active for an hour or so to rise a batch of dough, but when making wine, the yeast will be working for days not hours. You need it to be packaged with no traces of contaminants such as mold or bacteria that will have plenty of time to grow as well.

Baker's yeast does not clear out very well. When you open a pack of yeast, you will see little granules. These granules are not the individual yeast cells themselves, but rather, each granule contains millions of yeast cells dried together. Once the granules are saturated within a liquid, they will break apart to a consistency that is as fine as flour. In the case of baker's yeast, this silty mix is so fine it has a hard time settling to the bottom of a fermentation vessel. What you end up with is a cloudy area towards the bottom that never seems to clear out all the way.

Wine yeast is trained or bred to cling together through a process of "selective mutation". This "clinginess" is referred to as flocculation. The more the yeast flocculates, the faster and more firmly it will settle out. This allows you to have a clearer wine sooner.

With all this being said it is hard to imagine why someone would want to use a baker's yeast. There is simply no upside to using it, and with all the hard effort you are putting into your wine why would you not give your wine the best.

Hope the helps you out.

Best Wishes,
Customer Service at E. C. Kraus

We still have in stock a few of the video "Making Wine" on VHS tape. This is the exact same video that we now sell on DVD for $19.95, but only in the VHS cassette tape format. We have lowered the price of this VHS version to only $9.95.

If you've been toying with the idea of making wine at home but are just not sure, this is a great opportunity to learn all about it. It is a great introductory video that clearly shows you how to make wine at home. It covers all the basics, step-by-step, and then goes into some of the finer details. Plenty of information to get you started.

VIEW SAMPLE PREVIEW: Double-click on the picture below with your mouse to preview a sample of the "Making Wine" video.

For more information go to the following link on our website:
http://www.eckraus.com/VD110VHS.html

GOOGLE GROUPS
The amount of information on the internet today is astonishing. It's getting to the point that you would be hard pressed not to find an answer to your question or a fulfillment to your curiosity just by doing just a bit of typing.

This has been a liberating revelation for home winemakers. In the past, a source for information was always the one thing lacking within the hobby. If you had a question, you could ask your supplier or thumb through the two or three books you had picked up. If the answer wasn't there you'd end up scratching your head--at a total loss as to what to do next.

One great resource on the internet is Google groups. Google has set up an incredible number of groups that act as forums for individuals to either contribute to or learn from that cover different topics from computers to home health. One of these groups is "Winemaking". They currently have over 600 members and are continually discussing a variety of topics surrounding home winemaking.

While becoming a member and posting your own questions is strongly encouraged, one does not have to become a member just to simply read through all the valuable posts. You can even do a search through the postings to find information on a specific subject such as "bottling" or "wine yeasts."

Dear EC Kraus,

I really enjoy the information in your newsletters. I bottled my first wine, a California Merlot, last Oct (picked 2006, bottled 2007). It aged in 6.5 L carboys and had 8 months of French oak chips. I racked it twice. It is still a bit young, but interestingly, if I decant the wine and drink it 24 hours later, it is a much better wine. Can you speculate as to why letting it breath for 24 hours improves it so much?

Thank James

-----

Dear James,

What is really going on when a wine "breathes" is it is being introduced to fresh air again, something that it hasn't had contact with for quite some time. By pulling the cork and simply letting the bottle stand or by pouring the wine into a carafe, the air will start a mild oxidative process that will soften the rough edges of the wine's tannins. It also allows time for any odd gasses to escape that may have developed during aging. Allowing a wine to breathe has also been known to intensify both the flavor and bouquet of a wine--something that can be a problem for wines that have not been fully aged.

While allowing time to breathe can benefit some wines, for most it will have no benefit at all and for others it may even bring damage, particularly with older wines whose flavor structure has been known to collapse very shortly after decanting. The wines that are most likely to benefit from breathing are younger, heavy reds that have not yet had time to take complete advantage of the aging process.

How long you should let the wine breath is another question. Usually we are talking minutes not hours. More than likely 60 minutes would have been just as good as the 24 hours you mentioned with your Merlot. As a general rule-of-thumb the younger the wine the more time it may need to take full advantage of breathing and vice versa, but to say a wine needs 24 hours is excessive by any perspective. Think in terms of 10 or 20 minutes.

With all this being said, unless you have previous experience with decanting a specific wine, giving it time to breath is a crap shoot. In the case of your Merlot, you have specific experience with it, so I would not hesitate to let it breath for 30 minutes and see what you think. In the case of an unfamiliar wine, if it is white, breathing is pointless; if it has been aged more than 4 years, not necessary; and if it has been aged 8 or more years, risky. Stick with the red wines that are heavy in tannins and short on aging.

Best Wishes,
Customer Service at E. C. Kraus