The Wine Maker's Toy Store™

Bringing family and friends together...One sip at a time!

Welcome to Pressing News, the monthly newsletter published by Fine Vine Wines, LLC, designed exclusively to assist the home vintner in the pursuit of their hobby!

THIS MONTH ON THE VINE!

WELCOME

I would like to take this opportunity to welcome you to Fine Vine Wines, LLC, "The Wine Maker's Toy Store". Whether you need home wine making or home brewing products or just need information, we are here to serve you. I want to extend my thanks again for making The Wine Maker's Toy Store your home for your wine making and beer brewing needs. It continues to be my hope that every time you visit our web site or retail store, you find something of value.

As a reminder, we continue to add products and content to the web site; therefore, if you have any special requests, please let us know. We like to hear what you have to say about our site, our products and/or our customer service, good or bad. Please send your comments and/or suggestions to winemaster@finevinewines.com.

WINESTOCK - THE FIRST ANNUAL WINE MAKER'S TOY STORE CONFERENCE

We are proud to announce Dallas' first conference devoted to home wine making. This year we will be honored with the presence of Tim Vandergrift, Technical Services Manager for Winexpert. He is the man behind all of those great Winexpert kits. Tim will share with us the evolution of the wine kit, the sources of the juice and how to properly make a wine kit. Tim will also be available for your questions.

We will start Friday, May 5th at 4 pm with a mixer and wine tasting. The price of admission is $10.00 per person or one bottle of your home made wine. The mixer will run until 8 pm.

On Saturday, registration will start at 9 am, with seminars commencing at 10 am. We will have 4 sessions running until 5:30 pm. Lunch will be served, as well as morning and afternoon refreshments. The cost for Saturday is $75.00 if you register before April 21, 2006 and $100.00, after that date. This price includes lunch. In addition, when you show up, you will get a $50.00 gift certificate for use in the store.

We will have lots of door prizes and wine making kits and equipment on display.

Don't miss this opportunity to learn about home wine making from one of the masters!

NEWSLETTER SPECIALS

To reward those of you that take the time to read our newsletter every month, we are adding a newsletter special. We promise to offer an outstanding value each month via this feature and this special pricing will only be available through a link from the current month's newsletter. A link to the newsletter special will appear somewhere in the newsletter.

BIRTHDAY CLUB

We now have a Birthday Club for registered users. Log into your account, give us the month and day of your birth (we don't want the year!) and we will send you a coupon to use during the month of your birthday. In order to receive the coupon for the current year, you have to have registered and entered your birthday before the start of the month of your birth as we will send the coupons out at the same time as we send the newsletter.

CUSTOMER REFFERAL PROGRAM

In case you missed it, we have a customer referral program that provides additional discounts to registered users. We will give you a coupon worth 10% of the first order placed by any person that you refer to our web site. The stipulations are as follows:

That's all you have to do to get another discount from finevinewines.com.

CUSTOMER APPRECIATION PROGRAM - FVW GROWERS CLUB

Please check out our FVW Growers Club. You can get all of the details on our web site, but the bottom line is we want to buy your loyalty! Once you spend $500 with us, you get a 5% discount on everything you buy from us. Find out more on the web site.

FORUM

When you have a question or just want to learn more about wine making, don't forget our forum! We have over 345 registered users, including some extremely knowledgeable wine makers with loads of valuable information and willing to assist you in your wine making needs. As of the printing of this newsletter, we have over 15,000 posts. We also have 4 moderators and an administrator. Responses to most posts are made within minutes.

Whether you are an expert or a novice, it is an excellent place to ask questions, exchange ideas and meet other home wine makers. If you haven't logged into the forum, try it sometime. I think you will find it most informative and enjoyable, as well as, a great place to meet fellow wine makers. We are also known to have a contest or two only available to forum members.

FEATURED ARTICLE - CAN ADDING OAK IMPROVE THE QUALITY OF YOUR KIT WINE?

Most of us have read that different types of oak will impart different characteristics to a wine. Reading however is not the same as tasting. To taste the differences for myself and to find which type of oak I prefer, I decided to conduct a side-by-side comparison of readily available oak types. My experiment was in part inspired by James Alexander’s article Oak Cubes: An Alternative to Barrels which appeared in the February-March 2004 issue of WineMaker and several discussions with George Cornelius.

For the wine, I chose the Winexpert Selection Cabernet Sauvignon. The kit was made according to instructions including the addition of oak chips during primary fermentation. My only departure from the instructions was at step 5:Bottling. Instead of bottling, the wine was racked and allowed to age on oak before bottling.

For the oak, I used the StaVin oak cubes packaged by L.D. Carlson. StaVin makes their cubes from 3-year air-dried oak. The longer the wood is air dried the more subtle the flavors imparted to the wine. They import their oak from France and Hungary and the American oak is from Missouri and Minnesota. The oak is toasted and then cut into cubes.

There are three grades of toasting: Medium, House and Heavy. In addition to the source of oak, the level of toasting also adds to the flavor and bouquet of the wine. Since I have not experimented with the level of toasting, its impact on bouquet and flavor comes from what I have read and not my taste buds. Medium Toast will impart more vanilla overtones than the other levels of toasting and allows more of the fruit to show. The House Toast is darker than the medium and has overtones of honey and toasted bread with a hint of coffee. The Heavy Toast provides more caramel and pronounced coffee overtones.

For my experiment, I chose the French, Hungarian and American oak cubes with the medium toast.

To obtain the equivalent of new barrel extraction, StaVin recommends using 2.0 to 2.5 ounces of cubes for a 5-gallon carboy. The recommended minimum contact time is 8 weeks and the cubes have a useful life of about 12 months. I have read that the softer flavors obtained from 2 – 3 years barrel aging require at least 4 – 6 months contact with the cubes.

StaVin packages their cubes in a poly-metal barrier bag to seal in flavors and aromas and to provide sanitary conditions. Since the cubes I used were repackaged and I don’t know the conditions or processes used, I did a quick rinse of the cubes in a sulfite solution before use. StaVin recommends that the cubes not be soaked since some of the flavor will be extracted into the soaking solution and discarded.

After the wine was clear and stable, it was racked to five 4-liter jugs containing about 40ppm of metabisulfite (this is roughly equal to ¼ teaspoon in 6 gallons). To each of three jugs I added the selected oak cubes at the rate of ½ ounce per gallon. The remaining jugs contained no oak addition and were used as a reference and for top up if necessary. The wine was allowed to age on oak for 10 weeks. I had enough patience to wait more than the minimum 8 weeks, but not enough to wait longer than 10.

At bottling, each wine was racked from the cubes and any sediment formed during aging into a clean and sanitized 4-liter jug. This racking also ensured a thorough mixing of the oak essence. Since wine bottled in small bottles ages faster than wine in large bottles, 375 ml bottles were selected to allow for faster bottle aging (that patience thing again).

There was an initial tasting after three months of bottle aging and a subsequent tasting after six months in the bottle. The objectives of the tasting were to determine what the oak contributed to the wine and to determine any preference for oak type. The wines were tasted in the following order: No oak added, French, Hungarian and American.

On several forums I have read that adding oak will increase the body of the wine. Both visually and in terms of mouth feel, I noted no difference in the body. In my opinion, aging in an oak barrel will increase the body of the wine, aging on oak cubes will not. This is because the evaporation and concentration of the wine that occurs in the barrel does not occur during the short period the wine is in a glass carboy.

When the bottle of no oak added Cabernet was opened, it immediately filled the room with its fruity aroma. This may have clouded my judgment on the intensity of the aroma of the oak added samples. I did note that the black cherry and berry aromas were significantly more pronounced in the oak added samples compared to the no oak added sample. My untrained nose was unable to detect any vanilla or spice overtones in the bouquet.

On tasting the wine, the differences were very noticeable. The wines with oak added had more intense fruit flavors and a longer finish than the wine with no oak added. The French oak was very smooth and had some slight chocolate overtones. The American oak had a more aggressive oak taste and contained more tannin. This made it slightly more astringent than the others, though it was not excessive. The American oak also showed some notes of spice. The Hungarian oak was not as smooth as the French and not as assertive as the American.

Time in the bottle does make a difference. The wines at six months had better bouquet and taste than they had at three months. The most significant improvement was in the wine with Hungarian oak. At three months, the addition of Hungarian oak detracted from the wine and it was not as good as the wine with no additional oak. At six months it showed improved aroma and taste.

Some of the tasters preferred the smoother, rounder wine containing the French oak. Other tasters preferred the more forward oak and tannin in the wine containing the American oak. All tasters did agree that the addition of either the French or American oak were an improvement over the no additional oak added wine.

I was a little disappointed in the Hungarian oak. I believe this was due to my expectation that it would be very similar to the French oak and therefore a less expensive alternative (possible bias on the part of this taster). Also, none of the tasters expressed a preference for this wine. I believe it suffered in the comparison because it was in the middle, not as smooth as the French and not as assertive as the American. In a side-by-side comparison with only the no oak added wine it would likely have shown better. In a few months, I will open a bottle and find out.

From this experiment I learned that oak cubes significantly improve the bouquet and taste of a kit wine. I have also experienced the contributions that the different types of oak can make. Although I was concerned about ending up with a wine containing too much oak, this did not happen. Using the recommended ½ ounce of cubes per gallon enhanced the wine and did not overpower it.

My personal preference was for the medium toast French oak in this Cabernet kit. Had the kit been a Merlot or Shiraz or Zinfandel, my preference may have been different. There are many potential experiments with different types of oak, different oak toasts and different blends of type and toast. The problem is that patience thing; it’s so long between start and taste. Oh well, on to the next experiment.

This article was written by Joseph Schuitema. For his efforts, he received a $100 gift certificate from Fine Vine Wines. You too, can receive a $100 gift certificate. Just send us an article we can use in our monthly newsletter and the gift certificate is yours.

TOYS OF THE MONTH

This month, we have something for the fresh fruit wine maker. All of our straining bags are on sale for $1.00 off the regular price. If you have made fresh fruit wine and discovered how much of a mess it can be removing the pulp from your wine, try using a straining bag. Put your pulp in the bag, tie off the top and put the bag in your must. Then, everyday during the primary fermentation, just press the bag to extract the flavor, color and tannins from the fruit. When you rack your wine off the pulp, press the bag firmly (do not squeeze the tar out of it!) to extract the juice. Untie the bag and throw the pulp away. Clean and sanitize your bag and it will be ready for your next batch.

The small size is good for one gallon batches. The large size is good for up to 3 gallons, while the extra large is good for up to 6 gallons of wine.

This month's special pricing is listed below:

Part Number	Image	Description	Regular Price	Current Price	Order
5056		Straining Bag, Large Coarse Coarse, 17" X 19"	$3.49	$2.49	Order
4722		Straining Bag, Small Coarse Coarse, 12" X 19"	$2.99	$2.49	Order
4724		Straining Bag, Small Fine Coarse, 12" X 19"	$4.49	$3.49	Order
5054		Straining Bag, Large Fine Fine, 18-3/4" X 19"	$6.99	$5.99	Order
5057		Straining Bag, Extra Large Coarse Coarse, 24" X 36"	$6.49	$5.49	Order

NEW PRODUCTS

We have added 10 and 20 gallon fermenters with lids and the Wine-On-Tap. To see these new products, as well as, all of the new products added last month, go to our New Products Page.

If you are looking for a product that I do not carry, my primary distributor is LD Carlson and you can see their complete product list at their public catalog. If you find anything you would like me to add, please let me know.

CALL US!

If you have any questions about our products, our service and/or wine making, please call us. We are not Corporate America! We are here to serve you. I bring this up, because a number of my callers apologize for bothering me or using my toll-free line. You are definitely not bothering me and I have a toll-free line so you WILL call me.

Sometimes, I am unable to answer the phone. If you get the voice mail, please leave your name, number, brief message and a best time to call. I will return your call as soon as I can. I now have the Company Line forwarded to my cell phone when I am not in the store. As a result, I am now available almost 24-7. I do need to sleep!

If you don't want to call, just send me an email. I usually answer my email daily. In addition, your emails and/or calls do not have to relate to wine. I will discuss any topic you like, so please remember, I am your resource and I am here for you.

WINE OF THE MONTH

This month we are the Vieux Chateau Du Roi in both the Vintner's Reserve and Selection Premium kits and the Crushendo Montagnac Vieux Chateau d’Oc. All three are based on the Chateauneuf-du-Pape. This is a wine that is a complex blend of varietals and one of the heartiest, richest wines you will make. It is extremely dark in color and tannic in flavor, with a hint of plum and excellent aging potential. It is one of our favorites.

Please note that my specials have been moving very fast. I have been bringing in extras, but I have not been able to keep up with the demand. As a result, these wines may not ship as fast as normal. The wines listed below are marked down as much as 15%:

Part Number	Image	Description	Brand	Regular Price	Current Price	Order
13200		Vieux Chateau Du Roi Full-bodied yet soft. Contains oak chips to enhance its fine aromatic qualities.	Vintners Reserve	$54.99	$48.99	Order
13259		Vieux Chateau Du Roi (Chateauneuf-Du-Pape) Full-bodied, complex character, yet soft & quick to mature.	Winexpert Selection Premium	$81.99	$70.99	Order
13116		Crushendo Montagnac Vieux Chateau d’Oc. This is a bold wine, ruby red in color with a deep, dark plum and blackberry bouquet showing subtle accents of chocolate with a hint of spiciness that follows through with a firm, tannic finish on the palate.	Winexpert Selection Estate	$124.99	$111.99	Order

CUSTOMER FEEDBACK

We appreciate all of your comments, whether good or bad. To demonstrate our commitment to outstanding customer service, I have created a web page with your feedback. As we receive emails that comment about our service, I will post them on this page.

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