Question for Eric Texier

I can only ratify ric's findings from our own decade-long winemaking (and bottling) experience.
 
Massive segue and probably a stupid question, but I dimly recall reading somewhere that Dominique Laurent's old '200%' oak treatment was originally an effort avoid adding S02 to his wines. Any truth?
 
Eric (in case you're still following), you point out that the current bib technology, using inert gas, high filling speed, and bags that are permeable to CO2 (preventing its use as an alternative to SO2), requires more sulfur rather than less. Understood, but:

You wrote that you use "30ppm to 40ppm for 5 liters Bib, against oxidation only. Which means around 45 to 60 ppm addition at bottling (to be compared with 20 to 30 ppm for bottles)." 5 liters is almost 6 bottles, so isn't the amount of SO2 actually much less on a per bottle basis?

I've seen sparkling wine in bibs, so there must be CO2 resistant bags. If you used 1000ppm of CO2 in CO2 resistant bags, might that not allow you to deliver wine without adding any sulfur?

I'm beginning to sound like Nigel.
 
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
Eric (in case you're still following), you point out that the current bib technology, using inert gas, high filling speed, and bags that are permeable to CO2 (preventing its use as an alternative to SO2), requires more sulfur rather than less. Understood, but:

You wrote that you use "30ppm to 40ppm for 5 liters Bib, against oxidation only. Which means around 45 to 60 ppm addition at bottling (to be compared with 20 to 30 ppm for bottles)." 5 liters is almost 6 bottles, so isn't the amount of SO2 actually much less on a per bottle basis?

I've seen sparkling wine in bibs, so there must be CO2 resistant bags. If you used 1000ppm of CO2 in CO2 resistant bags, might that not allow you to deliver wine without adding any sulfur?

I'm beginning to sound like Nigel.
Click to expand...

Oswaldo,

I'm not Eric, but PPM (parts per million) can also be described as g/mL. It's a unit of concentration, not a total amount. So the total amount of sulfur in the bibs accounts for the increased volume. Oh and since I'm picking nits 6X750mL bottles of wine is 4.5L.

Sparkling wine in a BIB? Thats news to me, but I don't get around much these days.

I do however, drool at the idea of Eric's CdR in BIB. Sulfur or not I would freaking love to have access to that.

Cheers,

Kevin
 
The question that Eric's response gives me relates to the 1000ppm CO2. What is the purpose of the CO2? Anti microbial activity? I didn't realize (sometimes I'm less cynical than I should be) that some table wines dissolved CO2 was deliberate. I assumed the light prickle which dissapates was due to some minor degree of post bottling fermentation. I know in the case of beer the presence of serious amounts of dissolved CO2 is certainly no deterrent to either post bottling infection/yeast or say in the case of Orval full on Brettanomyces fermentation.

Cheers,

Kevin
 
Kevin, yes, I should have written almost seven bottles. But it still sounds like Eric uses less SO2 in bibs compared to bottles if one calculates on a per bottle basis, no?
 
Say you've got 2 identical 75L vats of wine that you are going to bottle and bib. Assuming that you've got no free sulfur in the wine to begin with (which is a patently false assumption, it just make my attempt at explanation more confusing) Let's say your target concentration for the wine to be bottled, in 100 750 mL bottles, is 25 ppm sulfur and 35 ppm sulfur for the 15 bibs.

25g/mL * 1000mL/L * 75L * 0.001mg/g = 25mg of total sulfur added to make 100 750mL bottles of wine. 25mg/100 bottles = 0.25mg/bottle

45g/mL * 1000mL/L * 75L * 0.001mg/g = 45mg of total sulfur added to make 15 5L bibs of wine. 45mg/15bibs = 3.00mg/bib

Does that make sense?

Cheers,

Kevin

edited to use 45ppm for calculation for bib
 
Kevin, that makes perfect sense (and thank you for the effort) if one interprets Eric's words to contain that conversion. Your giving him the benefit of the conversion may be entirely correct, but what he wrote is that he adds 45 to 60ppm to a 5 liter bib in comparison to 20 to 30ppm for a .75 liter bottle.
 
I think Eric is abbreviating mg for mg/L, which is awfully similar to g/mL.

The added CO2 doesn't make any difference vs. infection (perhaps it brings the pH down a tad, but prob not enough), but it helps exclude oxygen. So substitutes for the antioxidative effects of SO2, but not the antimicrobial ones.

The point of the long elevage is to render the wine a "nutrient desert," as I saw it described somewhere--anything that could feed a bug has already been eaten, so the wine is difficult to infect. This is not the case for wines bottled soon after fermentation.

Kevin, it is very common to bottle with some CO2 in low SO2 circles, and it is deliberate. Refermentation is not unheard of, but is definitely the minority of bottles that I encounter.
 
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
Kevin, that makes perfect sense (and thank you for the effort) if one interprets Eric's words to contain that conversion. Your giving him the benefit of the conversion may be entirely correct, but what he wrote is that he adds 45 to 60ppm to a 5 liter bib in comparison to 20 to 30ppm for a .75 liter bottle.
Click to expand...

Oswaldo,
I fail to see where your confusion lies. 45-60 ppm is a higher concentration of SO2 than 20-30 ppm, right? So he adds more SO2 to the bib, right?

Mark Lipton
 
originally posted by MLipton:
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
Kevin, that makes perfect sense (and thank you for the effort) if one interprets Eric's words to contain that conversion. Your giving him the benefit of the conversion may be entirely correct, but what he wrote is that he adds 45 to 60ppm to a 5 liter bib in comparison to 20 to 30ppm for a .75 liter bottle.
Click to expand...

Oswaldo,
I fail to see where your confusion lies. 45-60 ppm is a higher concentration of SO2 than 20-30 ppm, right? So he adds more SO2 to the bib, right?

Mark Lipton
Click to expand...

Yes, but the 45-60 is spread out over almost seven bottles (if one doesn't presume he means per bottle) whereas the 20-30 is for one bottle.
 
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
originally posted by MLipton:
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
Kevin, that makes perfect sense (and thank you for the effort) if one interprets Eric's words to contain that conversion. Your giving him the benefit of the conversion may be entirely correct, but what he wrote is that he adds 45 to 60ppm to a 5 liter bib in comparison to 20 to 30ppm for a .75 liter bottle.
Click to expand...

Oswaldo,
I fail to see where your confusion lies. 45-60 ppm is a higher concentration of SO2 than 20-30 ppm, right? So he adds more SO2 to the bib, right?

Mark Lipton
Click to expand...

Yes, but the 45-60 is spread out over almost seven bottles (if one doesn't presume he means per bottle) whereas the 20-30 is for one bottle.
Click to expand...

The unit is a concentration, meaning that each volume has the same amount of solute per volume. So two volumes give you twice the solute (SO2). Think of salt in the ocean. Two buckets at the beach give you twice as much salt as one bucket, but the concentration in the ocean is the same.
 
originally posted by SFJoe:
I think Eric is abbreviating mg for mg/L, which is awfully similar to g/mL.

The added CO2 doesn't make any difference vs. infection (perhaps it brings the pH down a tad, but prob not enough), but it helps exclude oxygen. So substitutes for the antioxidative effects of SO2, but not the antimicrobial ones.

The point of the long elevage is to render the wine a "nutrient desert," as I saw it described somewhere--anything that could feed a bug has already been eaten, so the wine is difficult to infect. This is not the case for wines bottled soon after fermentation.

Kevin, it is very common to bottle with some CO2 in low SO2 circles, and it is deliberate. Refermentation is not unheard of, but is definitely the minority of bottles that I encounter.
Click to expand...

Thanks Joe,

This is quite interesting to me. I nearly always think of sulfur merely as a antimicrobial agent, I forget its anti-oxidative properties (even though Eric mentioned it in his post) and that CO2 could perform the same role. I would have been surprised if the pH lowering effects of CO2 would have been enough to really have any antimicrobial activity (beer example) but that doesn't mean that people wouldn't do it (misguidedly) for that reason.

I especially like the "nutrient desert" comment. This jives very well with my understanding of things. Wines with long elevage simply have less sugars for something to ferment. The less there is for brettanomyces and other "spoilage" organisms, the less harm can come post bottling. (Especially among the more ardent sans-soufre types.) Which is quite interesting with my homebrewing experience. My favorite "wild" (which is about as frustrating a term as "natural" is with wine) beers, both homebrewed and commercial, are those that use a standard saccaromyces fermentation for ferment most of the simple sugars, then have one or more of a cocktail of any or all of brett. bruxellensis, brett anomalus/clausenii, brett. lambicus, lactobacillus delbruckii, and pediococcus. But since most of the sugars are consumed by an ordinary sacc. yeast, the brett/sour/"wild" character seems more balanced. I know I keep mentioning it, but Orval is produced this way. The other style of "wild" or sour beer (I'm neglecting authentic lambic here and mainly discussing the american/scandinavian micro movement here) is to do a fermentation solely with a brett strain or a brett strain with and/or lacto/pedio. These can be interesting (anomalus) or they can be harder to handle (Russian River Sanctification among others-straight brett brux)

The irony of calling a beer "wild" when pitching strains of yeast in a packet from a lab is not lost on me.

Cheers, and sorry for the beery ramble,

Kevin
 
originally posted by SFJoe:
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
originally posted by MLipton:
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
Kevin, that makes perfect sense (and thank you for the effort) if one interprets Eric's words to contain that conversion. Your giving him the benefit of the conversion may be entirely correct, but what he wrote is that he adds 45 to 60ppm to a 5 liter bib in comparison to 20 to 30ppm for a .75 liter bottle.
Click to expand...

Oswaldo,
I fail to see where your confusion lies. 45-60 ppm is a higher concentration of SO2 than 20-30 ppm, right? So he adds more SO2 to the bib, right?

Mark Lipton
Click to expand...

Yes, but the 45-60 is spread out over almost seven bottles (if one doesn't presume he means per bottle) whereas the 20-30 is for one bottle.
Click to expand...

The unit is a concentration, meaning that each volume has the same amount of solute per volume. So two volumes give you twice the solute (SO2). Think of salt in the ocean. Two buckets at the beach give you twice as much salt as one bucket, but the concentration in the ocean is the same.
Click to expand...

Dude, but you have twice as much.
 
Thanks for the concentration explanation, Joe, the penny has dropped (and I now understand Kevin and Mark). So, we could solve the oxidation problem with CO2, but not the microbial problem.
 
The point of the long elevage is to render the wine a "nutrient desert," as I saw it described somewhere--anything that could feed a bug has already been eaten, so the wine is difficult to infect. This is not the case for wines bottled soon after fermentation.
Click to expand...
Right, I understand that, but my question is how a wee beastie that turns a wine bad in bottle does not do so if instead allowed to munch away in barrel. Is it that countermeasures can still be taken? Or is there something about the chemical state of wine in barrel vs. bottle that's important? Or are you merely saying that if that beastie hasn't acted in barrel, by the time the wine's in bottle there's nothing in the wine that's of interest to it...the assumption being that if something did happen in barrel, either counter-measures would be taken or the wine would be discarded before bottling?
 
Here's a possiblity: many brett strains are not very cold tolerant. They don't die at cool, say 50F, temperatures, but they don't grow much either. It doesn't take much in the way of a weak link in the shipping chain (up to and including retail shelves and warm "cellars") to "wake up" the brett or whatever else in the wine. Since most of the sacc. strains (the ones that won the growth race and dominated the fermentation) have fermented everything that they can ferment, the warming up does little to wake them, but since there are things that brett can ferment (dextrins in beer, trioses) that most sacc can't, there is actual fermentables for the brett, which causes growth and over time brett will grow enough to cause flavor impact. Whether its a symptom of weak shipping chain or too warm of a "cellar" (My basement is far warmer in August than it should be, and that doesn't include the year my AC died in August, my basement was in the low 80s, never mind the rest of my house) once the brett is awakened it will grow. The same bottle in the cellar at the domaine will not show anywhere near the same brett character.
 
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