Our stock of my first wine kit, a Winexpert Cabernet-Merlot, is slowly dwindling. It is developing bell pepper notes, in both nose and on the tongue. Definitely entering a stage of maturity now, but only 6 more bottles left anyway.
Tag archive: cabernet merlot
We opened the 2007 “Overlook Heights” Cabernet-merlot tonight, the first wine I made. Two and a half years later, this wine has come together really nicely. Very smooth, no more foam! Yummy aromas of dark fruit and cocoa, with juicy flavors of plum, black cherry, and blueberry with hints of spice and milk chocolate. Unfortunately, […]
Still very foamy. Decanted, tasted shortly after decanting. Nose of sour cherry and herbs. Tart flavors of cherry, strawberry, raspberry with nicely integrated oak toastiness. Coming together very nicely. Quite drinkable now, but I think time will make it even better. It still tastes very young.
VERY foamy. “Soapiness” mostly gone, nose predominately of red fruits, including bing cherry and plum. Very smooth flavors of cherry, strawberry, and raspberry, slightly tart but not overwhelming. Pretty long finish as well. Coming together very nicely, even if it is taking its time!
Opened for cooking and decided to have a taste. Nose developing nicely, lots of strawberry and overripe fruit. This bottle has a slight fizz. Flavors getting richer, good plums and black cherry with hint of leather or earthiness. Not so sour. Not a depth of richness, though, but it is changing so much over the […]
The fizziness seems to be gone. The wine is deep rub-red and very clear, although it was not filtered. Still a little weird soapy odor on the nose; underlying that is rich fruits. Still a little sour, flavors of plums, blackberries, and a little strawberry or cherry is really developing and mellowing out. Definitely still […]
A few notes on the latest wines. It is a little early for most of them, but you don’t know how they’re developing without tasting! Australian Chardonnay: A little soon after bottling to taste, but I couldn’t help myself. Still too young, but nice. Buttery nose, lots of heavy oak in the attack and flavors […]
Happily the wine was very clear at the last racking, so I was confident that it was fine to bottle after 2 more weeks. I had added extra Kmeta (potassium metabisulphite) for long-term aging when it was racked previously. There was a little layer of goop in the bottom, so I opted to rack the […]
The wine sits an additional 8 days for the clarifying agents to do their thing and bind to all of the junk floating around in the wine, mainly yeast carcasses at this point (yummy!). They clump the junk together forming heavy particles that will fall to the bottom of the carboy faster then without the […]
Luckily I had not been told yet to read and follow the directions exactly, and so I waited more than the 10 days indicated in the instructions to do the next step: stabilizing and clearing. I didn’t want to cut the time short, and I really only had time to deal with the wine on […]