I got an email from Dave today, he and Paul checked out the merlot and petite sirah on Friday. Since this is our second year in the barrel, neither wine is very oaky yet. By this time last year the wine in the barrels had much more oak.  The petite sirah is a little more vegetal than he likes, but that will probably (hopefully?) mellow out over time.  Otherwise, everything looks and smells fine.

Dave asked about the syrah, which I haven’t really tasted since I racked it in December.  So, I felt that I should get a taste, to see how it’s progressing.  It’s already very clear, a lovely ruby-garnet color.  It has great aromas of a lot of fruit with a hint of spice.  It tastes like cherry cough syrup, though.  Not necessarily in a bad way, because it’s so early, the fruit and spice just needs to integrate better.  Also, it did not complete MLF, which I want to try again in a few months.

Then I checked on the bottle of the petite sirah that was rescued from the dregs, but had a weird white layer on top.  It seems to be regrowing a white layer, so this bit of wine will likely be fed to my vinegar jar.  There has been some debate over the cause of the white layer, I’ve been told it could either be acetobacter or a film yeast infection.  Either way, I’m not going to risk ruining the rest of the wine.