Wine has a fiber optic connection to every vicissitude of lifeās meaning. The palateās nerve-endings head straight through the domain of emotions in the same way that smells can jump the memory banks directly to a specific location or event. I will remember this wine as a great wine, but I will remember it more for its connection to the night I tasted it: the night before we dropped off our son at college.
Just like the occasion, this wine hit intensely from the first sip from the first pour. There was little alcohol wafting up to distract from the rich berry aroma, the smell you get when you stir the filling for a blackberry pie, or blackberries in a can that have been set to warm in the sun. The deep purple was so thick that no light penetrated it, unless you count the corona of crimson where glass met liquid. This wine clings to a glass as if it doesnāt want to say goodbye to the cup. I left the glass for at least 20 minutes, and, when I returned, legs were still very obviously oozing their way back to the bowl.
The first sip was just as direct as the aroma. I again return to the blackberry flavor, and the impression was that I was tasting a homemade jam. Sweet and dry are oftentimes words that are used as opposites, but I daresay that there is little in that contrast. While the wine wasnāt sweet, I could sense its natural sugars. The wine was assuredly dry, and that slight pucker got more pronounced as it opened up. Only wine can combine hints and sensations that are contrary in a whole that makes sense, another way in which wine echoes life.
It was the perfect wine for the occasion: the inky color; the bold, deep fruits; the wallop of catching a fastball of brash flavors. A Cabernet Sauvignon with its everything-is-so-okay competence wouldnāt have fit, nor would a Zinfandelās pizza-wine flavor have done. As we sat sipping on the living room couch, near the pile of boxes that comprised my sonās new life, and the old, it fit the mood. Rich and dark and serious and full ā just enough muscle to bring down the bubble of emotions riding in our throats.
Iād love to provide a confident day two to the wine. However, despite our best efforts, it got a little beat up after a five-hour car journey, a long sit in a parking garage, and several hours in a wine fridge in the hotel room. The aroma was generally the same. The flavors were there, but they were very, very dry ā almost a chalky coat on the teeth and tongue. While it was still a bold palate slugger, it was much sharper and less round, more acute. However it did open up more and more as we sipped. There was no sediment in the bottle.
The website said that it was barreled in 2016 and 2017, and the two yearsā worth was blended in 2018. This is a very young wine made carefully in small batches (3 barrels/72 cases). I tend to buy only when it is between 10 and 15 dollars per bottle. I feel like this wine could be in the 15-20 dollar range, and, given its youth, I would guess that it might have cellaring potential, although I am not an expert in that. This is a thoughtfully made wine, and I would recommend its purchase.
@ejrunion Very well said. Have you written any books? I want to read more because your ārattageā pulled me right in to the the scene! and it also made me want to try some of todayās offer, before it sells out.
@KitMarlot Thanks for the complement. It wrote itself because of what I was feeling! I have written reviews mimicking āThe Ravenā and the opening to Camusā The Stranger. I teach writing and literature, so I like to find ways of letting it all hang out!
Oooh. A Petite Sirah, itās been a while since Iāve had one of these. I uncork the wine and take a sniff of the bottle. Immediately I smell pepper and then a fruity flavor.
I pour a small amount into my (what was once lovely, but thanks to the dishwasher missing itās logo) casemates tumbler. Wow! Very deep, plum like color.
Swirling it around the glass, the legs seem to last forever. Iām surprised by how long the legs last. Realizing then the alcohol content, it makes more sense. You can smell the alcohol coming off of the glass, along with a nice peppery - blackberry scent to it. First taste my mouth is smacked by the tannins! Definitely a bold, full bodied wine. It lingers a while in your whole mouth for quite a while. Once Iām over the tannins I can taste the fruitiness of this wine. Nice blueberry and blackberry flavors come out. I can tell itās dry, but well balanced.
I let the glass breathe for a while and it opens up a bit. The tannins are a little less in your face, now. You can tell this is a younger wine and letting it decant a bit enhance the wine for me. I think that after a few years this would be interesting to come back to and see how it changes.
If youāre into bold, full bodied red wines, this is a steal at this price and I would recommend it.
Blackberry and blueberry jam front and center in classic Petite Sirah fashion, but lurking below are black cherry, rose petals, hibiscus, peppery spice blend and a hint of pomegranate. Ample fine-grained gritty Petite cocoa-and-black-tea tannin on the back palate and low acid as is the norm, uncluttered by oak sweetness. Like all Prima Materia wines we are focused more on earth and tactile mouthfeel than soft, oaky fruit and hedonistic beverages.
Recommended pairings: Burgers, grilled meats and veggies, barbacoa, oxtail pasta
Vintage and Winemaker Notes
Planted in 2011, we have only 120 Petite Sirah vines, clone 03 on St. George roots, planted east/west on a 10-degree slope. California sprawl trellising, opting for a circa-1976 style.
Bin fermentations lasting 13 and 16 for both vintages, a little bit of whole cluster, temperatures kept low to minimize tannin extraction. Pressed dirty into barrels and aerated once then returned to barrels and original lees to age.
2016 was quite boring and modest, especially after a bizarre 2015. 2017 was hugely challenging with rain, fire, heat, and lots of disease pressure, but it rewarded those of us who worked extra hard in the vineyard with delicacy, nuance, and layering. This non-vintage blend managed to capture the essence of both.
Prima Materia Winery grows grapes and crafts wine and food with an Old World voice that celebrates uncommon grapes and their unique histories here in California and abroad.
Prima Materia is the product of two decades spent in vineyards, wineries, and cooking in restaurant kitchens that ranged from Michelin starred to hamburger consulting. I planted most of Prima Materiaās grapes at 1,450ā of elevation in Lake Countyās red volcanic soils, and every bottle hopes to capture a distinctive, Old-World inflected voice in harmony with Californiaās vast and evolving wine history. Prima Materia is a bottom-up adventure that begins with digging holes, pounding stakes, and constant time spent in the vineyard. I am proud to work within an ancient agricultural tradition, and that vast, sometimes cyclical history is a central part of Prima Materiaās story and trajectory.
The wines are crafted in criminally small batches of two to ten barrels each. The winemaking and grape growing are intensively hands-on and sustainable, using stems and time, gravity and buckets, rather than fancy impersonal machinery or mechanized processes. Prima Materiaās wines are unsulfured for much of their lives, allowing them to evolve as living things and new oak is rarely used. The wines are unfined, unfiltered, hand harvested, and hand bottled.
Available States
AZ, CA, CO, DC, FL, ID, IL, IA, ME, MI, MN, MO, MT, NE, NV, NM, NY, NC, OH, OR, TN, TX, VA, WA, WV, WI, WY
How much more are you saving by buying a full case?
(Note: Tax & Shipping not included in savings calculations)
NV Prima Materia Petite Sirah - $40 = 22.21%
@losthighwayz Whatās your upper limit? Do you have a lower limit? Do you scale for TA, or are you a straight-up (log) parts Hydrogen person?
Question for the winemaker (or any chemist out there): How precise is the last decimal place on the wineās pH? I know it is a difficult quantity to precisely measure with consumer grade equipment (but I expect that a commercial wineryās pH meter has greater precision.)
@losthighwayz That is fair enough, but Petite Sirah is a notoriously low acid grape, plus pH wonāt tell you the total acidity. We have heavy potassium content due to acid volcanic soil, and the raises the pH by buffering it while actually having decent acidity.
@PrimaMateria This is what makes Casemates the premier outlet for wine. Vintners stopping by to discuss geology and buffering capacity. I love what you are doing!
@PrimaMateria
Thanks for joining inā¦
Hoping you could discuss a bit more ānormalā ranges of pH and TA, and when we do see a pH in the higher 3ās what ranges of TA does it take to keep things balanced and avoid perceived flabbiness?
Do make TA adjustments for this?
I know Iāve read the chapter about high pH wines by @clarksmith in his book a number of times, but still wonder how things work out in the bottle.
@KitMarlot Hi there. I am by no means well-versed in the chemistry of wine making (or any Chemistry!) That being said, I enjoy wines with zipping acidity (whites and roses) and reds that are more austere and bright. In my experience, whites and roses in the 3.2-3.3 range hit my spot. Reds typically in the 3.4-3.6 range. I donāt think I have ever seen a wine over the 3.8 before. Please note that the pH number has worked for me as an indicator of what I like and I donāt spend much time with the impact TA and other measurements have on the acidity of a wine.
@KitMarlot@losthighwayz
Your last sentence says it all - pH is not the same thing as acidity. As the winemaker mentioned, thatās the total amount of (combined) tartaric, malic, and lactic acids, expressed in grams per litre or as %. pH is the result of the acids in the wine along with the positive ions in solution (like the potassium s/he mentioned) buffering each other to equilibrium. If the acid is a simple one like hydrochloric, then these two things end up being the same. For the complex (and most importantly, multi-protic) acids in fermented grape juice the relationship is anything but simple.
Clark is fond of saying that the acidity you perceive on the palate is the titratable/total acidity. And since his wines have high TA alongside high pH, Iām going to trust him on this one. If the TA number here was in the low/mid-4s then I agree itād probably be a flabby wine.
So yeah, pH is a good indicator (I use it a lot as well) but without the context of TA itās hard to draw a definitive conclusion of the palate perception. In the end, isnāt that what itās all about? Thatās why Iāll trust the ratsā impression of acid balance over the numbers. (But if I only had the numbers I would probably also be inclined to pass.)
@KitMarlot@losthighwayz @klezman said it better than I could. I guess you could say that a normal range these days for a red from a warm climate would be 3.5-3.8pH, but there are a lot of factors, not to mention that ānormalā has floated up quite a bit. Is there residual sugar in the mix, softening the perception of acid?
I have two vintages of carmenere bottled at 4.01 and 4.03 pH in 2011 and 2013 from the California Central Valley (hot!) that are still vibrant, not a trace of brown, and drinking great. These numbers should not work, and sulfur is pretty much useless in that range. It really depends on the grape. As Clark Smith would say, much depends on the reductive strength of the grape. Something durable like Petite Sirah has a very different range than our Sangiovese for example. For our location I like to see 3.6-3.65pH at the most for the finished wine with a TA of 6+ - for me it should be nervous, jumpy and high-strung even after 24 months in barrel. For our Barbera it usually sits at 3.5-3.55pH and 6.5 TA or so, and we could push that acidity higher but I think part of the charm of Barbera is a sense of juicy ripeness.
Of course, since we grow our own grapes, the whole point is to not need to make additions or subtractions to the wine - that said the Petite Sirah is one of the most challenging to get tannin ripeness without losing acidity.
@KitMarlot@klezman@losthighwayz Well stated @PrimaMateria!! I like to look at some of the wine numbers as a starting point, but not use them as defining the whole picture. If your strictly a numbers person, then you need to understand the importance of standardized equipment, non-expired standards, and Measurement Uncertainty Analysis (MUA) which NASA uses on all their measurement equipment. How do I know this? Spent my long career working in labs, managing labs, and working on NASA contracts for 13 yrs. With wine, I keep an open mind because of the many variables that drive the finished product such as what @PrimaMateria mentioned. Sounds like he understands his vineyard terroir and grapes. The only thing that I judge wine as to whether I like it is my palate! So it sounds like @losthighwayz uses historical data in which he follows the numbers that his palate likes, that is, only if those numbers are always truly accurate!
@Boatman72@KitMarlot@klezman@losthighwayz
One other note: when people give numbers, the harvest pH of the grapes will be very different from the finished wine. A harvest pH of 3.5 for a red can be a finished wine of 3.75/3.8 pretty easily, especially if there is a lot of malic acid or a lot of potassium in the grape skins. Press wine will have a much higher pH because of this and some people blend it all together - some donāt. I have a friend with Aglianico near Bakersfield and he says that the grapes respire all of their malic acid before picking!
There is also a peculiar instability point around 3.65 pH due to the tartrate precipitation curve. Usually it is pretty linear in my experience with reds from my location (hopefully whites will be blow this level) but around that point it is possible to actually loose potassium and have the pH start dropping rather than floating up in some cases!
@Boatman72@KitMarlot@losthighwayz@PrimaMateria
Now Iām a bit confusedā¦if thereās more malic acid in the skins wouldnāt that reduce the pH? Or is it that it comes in as potassium malate instead, which then provides a lot more buffering capacity to the wine and sops up all that free hydrogen (lowering the pH)?
@Boatman72@KitMarlot@klezman@losthighwayz
Sorry I should have clarified. When the malic acid transforms to lactic acid (during malolactic fermentation) which is less strong typically pH will rise .1 - .15 for us. Cool climate grapes can see even more of a shift upward.
Prima Materia ā Petite Sirah, NV.
Wine has a fiber optic connection to every vicissitude of lifeās meaning. The palateās nerve-endings head straight through the domain of emotions in the same way that smells can jump the memory banks directly to a specific location or event. I will remember this wine as a great wine, but I will remember it more for its connection to the night I tasted it: the night before we dropped off our son at college.
Just like the occasion, this wine hit intensely from the first sip from the first pour. There was little alcohol wafting up to distract from the rich berry aroma, the smell you get when you stir the filling for a blackberry pie, or blackberries in a can that have been set to warm in the sun. The deep purple was so thick that no light penetrated it, unless you count the corona of crimson where glass met liquid. This wine clings to a glass as if it doesnāt want to say goodbye to the cup. I left the glass for at least 20 minutes, and, when I returned, legs were still very obviously oozing their way back to the bowl.
The first sip was just as direct as the aroma. I again return to the blackberry flavor, and the impression was that I was tasting a homemade jam. Sweet and dry are oftentimes words that are used as opposites, but I daresay that there is little in that contrast. While the wine wasnāt sweet, I could sense its natural sugars. The wine was assuredly dry, and that slight pucker got more pronounced as it opened up. Only wine can combine hints and sensations that are contrary in a whole that makes sense, another way in which wine echoes life.
It was the perfect wine for the occasion: the inky color; the bold, deep fruits; the wallop of catching a fastball of brash flavors. A Cabernet Sauvignon with its everything-is-so-okay competence wouldnāt have fit, nor would a Zinfandelās pizza-wine flavor have done. As we sat sipping on the living room couch, near the pile of boxes that comprised my sonās new life, and the old, it fit the mood. Rich and dark and serious and full ā just enough muscle to bring down the bubble of emotions riding in our throats.
Iād love to provide a confident day two to the wine. However, despite our best efforts, it got a little beat up after a five-hour car journey, a long sit in a parking garage, and several hours in a wine fridge in the hotel room. The aroma was generally the same. The flavors were there, but they were very, very dry ā almost a chalky coat on the teeth and tongue. While it was still a bold palate slugger, it was much sharper and less round, more acute. However it did open up more and more as we sipped. There was no sediment in the bottle.
The website said that it was barreled in 2016 and 2017, and the two yearsā worth was blended in 2018. This is a very young wine made carefully in small batches (3 barrels/72 cases). I tend to buy only when it is between 10 and 15 dollars per bottle. I feel like this wine could be in the 15-20 dollar range, and, given its youth, I would guess that it might have cellaring potential, although I am not an expert in that. This is a thoughtfully made wine, and I would recommend its purchase.
@ejrunion impressive!
@ejrunion Very well said. Have you written any books? I want to read more because your ārattageā pulled me right in to the the scene! and it also made me want to try some of todayās offer, before it sells out.
@ejrunion Woah, thatās quite a LabRat report. Love to know what youāre writing nextā¦
@ejrunion
@KitMarlot Thanks for the complement. It wrote itself because of what I was feeling! I have written reviews mimicking āThe Ravenā and the opening to Camusā The Stranger. I teach writing and literature, so I like to find ways of letting it all hang out!
@ejrunion @KitMarlot I thought so. I know talent when I read it. Thanks!
Oooh. A Petite Sirah, itās been a while since Iāve had one of these. I uncork the wine and take a sniff of the bottle. Immediately I smell pepper and then a fruity flavor.
I pour a small amount into my (what was once lovely, but thanks to the dishwasher missing itās logo) casemates tumbler. Wow! Very deep, plum like color.
Swirling it around the glass, the legs seem to last forever. Iām surprised by how long the legs last. Realizing then the alcohol content, it makes more sense. You can smell the alcohol coming off of the glass, along with a nice peppery - blackberry scent to it. First taste my mouth is smacked by the tannins! Definitely a bold, full bodied wine. It lingers a while in your whole mouth for quite a while. Once Iām over the tannins I can taste the fruitiness of this wine. Nice blueberry and blackberry flavors come out. I can tell itās dry, but well balanced.
I let the glass breathe for a while and it opens up a bit. The tannins are a little less in your face, now. You can tell this is a younger wine and letting it decant a bit enhance the wine for me. I think that after a few years this would be interesting to come back to and see how it changes.
If youāre into bold, full bodied red wines, this is a steal at this price and I would recommend it.
PS? check
Rats? check
Vintner participation? check
Looks like a fun wine to try? check!
/giphy witty-shivering-sidecar
Tasting Notes
Blackberry and blueberry jam front and center in classic Petite Sirah fashion, but lurking below are black cherry, rose petals, hibiscus, peppery spice blend and a hint of pomegranate. Ample fine-grained gritty Petite cocoa-and-black-tea tannin on the back palate and low acid as is the norm, uncluttered by oak sweetness. Like all Prima Materia wines we are focused more on earth and tactile mouthfeel than soft, oaky fruit and hedonistic beverages.
Recommended pairings: Burgers, grilled meats and veggies, barbacoa, oxtail pasta
Vintage and Winemaker Notes
Planted in 2011, we have only 120 Petite Sirah vines, clone 03 on St. George roots, planted east/west on a 10-degree slope. California sprawl trellising, opting for a circa-1976 style.
Bin fermentations lasting 13 and 16 for both vintages, a little bit of whole cluster, temperatures kept low to minimize tannin extraction. Pressed dirty into barrels and aerated once then returned to barrels and original lees to age.
2016 was quite boring and modest, especially after a bizarre 2015. 2017 was hugely challenging with rain, fire, heat, and lots of disease pressure, but it rewarded those of us who worked extra hard in the vineyard with delicacy, nuance, and layering. This non-vintage blend managed to capture the essence of both.
Specifications
Price Comparison
Not for sale online, $384/case MSRP
About The Winery
Winery: Prima Materia Winery
Location: Kelsey Bench, Lake County, CA
Prima Materia Winery grows grapes and crafts wine and food with an Old World voice that celebrates uncommon grapes and their unique histories here in California and abroad.
Prima Materia is the product of two decades spent in vineyards, wineries, and cooking in restaurant kitchens that ranged from Michelin starred to hamburger consulting. I planted most of Prima Materiaās grapes at 1,450ā of elevation in Lake Countyās red volcanic soils, and every bottle hopes to capture a distinctive, Old-World inflected voice in harmony with Californiaās vast and evolving wine history. Prima Materia is a bottom-up adventure that begins with digging holes, pounding stakes, and constant time spent in the vineyard. I am proud to work within an ancient agricultural tradition, and that vast, sometimes cyclical history is a central part of Prima Materiaās story and trajectory.
The wines are crafted in criminally small batches of two to ten barrels each. The winemaking and grape growing are intensively hands-on and sustainable, using stems and time, gravity and buckets, rather than fancy impersonal machinery or mechanized processes. Prima Materiaās wines are unsulfured for much of their lives, allowing them to evolve as living things and new oak is rarely used. The wines are unfined, unfiltered, hand harvested, and hand bottled.
Available States
AZ, CA, CO, DC, FL, ID, IL, IA, ME, MI, MN, MO, MT, NE, NV, NM, NY, NC, OH, OR, TN, TX, VA, WA, WV, WI, WY
Estimated Delivery
Thursday, September 12th - Monday, September 16th
Prima Materia Petite Sirah
4 bottles for $59.99 $15/bottle + $2/bottle shipping
Case of 12 for $139.99 $11.67/bottle + $1/bottle shipping
NV Prima Materia Petite Sirah
How much more are you saving by buying a full case?
(Note: Tax & Shipping not included in savings calculations)
NV Prima Materia Petite Sirah - $40 = 22.21%
PH is off the charts! Not in my wheelhouse.
@losthighwayz LOL.
Thatās just plain silliness.
Iāve never paid attention to that stuff in my life and never will.
@michaelvella May be silly to you. To each their own, right?
@losthighwayz Whatās your upper limit? Do you have a lower limit? Do you scale for TA, or are you a straight-up (log) parts Hydrogen person?
Question for the winemaker (or any chemist out there): How precise is the last decimal place on the wineās pH? I know it is a difficult quantity to precisely measure with consumer grade equipment (but I expect that a commercial wineryās pH meter has greater precision.)
@losthighwayz That is fair enough, but Petite Sirah is a notoriously low acid grape, plus pH wonāt tell you the total acidity. We have heavy potassium content due to acid volcanic soil, and the raises the pH by buffering it while actually having decent acidity.
@PrimaMateria This is what makes Casemates the premier outlet for wine. Vintners stopping by to discuss geology and buffering capacity. I love what you are doing!
@PrimaMateria
Thanks for joining inā¦
Hoping you could discuss a bit more ānormalā ranges of pH and TA, and when we do see a pH in the higher 3ās what ranges of TA does it take to keep things balanced and avoid perceived flabbiness?
Do make TA adjustments for this?
I know Iāve read the chapter about high pH wines by @clarksmith in his book a number of times, but still wonder how things work out in the bottle.
@KitMarlot Hi there. I am by no means well-versed in the chemistry of wine making (or any Chemistry!) That being said, I enjoy wines with zipping acidity (whites and roses) and reds that are more austere and bright. In my experience, whites and roses in the 3.2-3.3 range hit my spot. Reds typically in the 3.4-3.6 range. I donāt think I have ever seen a wine over the 3.8 before. Please note that the pH number has worked for me as an indicator of what I like and I donāt spend much time with the impact TA and other measurements have on the acidity of a wine.
@KitMarlot @losthighwayz
Your last sentence says it all - pH is not the same thing as acidity. As the winemaker mentioned, thatās the total amount of (combined) tartaric, malic, and lactic acids, expressed in grams per litre or as %. pH is the result of the acids in the wine along with the positive ions in solution (like the potassium s/he mentioned) buffering each other to equilibrium. If the acid is a simple one like hydrochloric, then these two things end up being the same. For the complex (and most importantly, multi-protic) acids in fermented grape juice the relationship is anything but simple.
Clark is fond of saying that the acidity you perceive on the palate is the titratable/total acidity. And since his wines have high TA alongside high pH, Iām going to trust him on this one. If the TA number here was in the low/mid-4s then I agree itād probably be a flabby wine.
So yeah, pH is a good indicator (I use it a lot as well) but without the context of TA itās hard to draw a definitive conclusion of the palate perception. In the end, isnāt that what itās all about? Thatās why Iāll trust the ratsā impression of acid balance over the numbers. (But if I only had the numbers I would probably also be inclined to pass.)
@KitMarlot @losthighwayz
@klezman said it better than I could. I guess you could say that a normal range these days for a red from a warm climate would be 3.5-3.8pH, but there are a lot of factors, not to mention that ānormalā has floated up quite a bit. Is there residual sugar in the mix, softening the perception of acid?
I have two vintages of carmenere bottled at 4.01 and 4.03 pH in 2011 and 2013 from the California Central Valley (hot!) that are still vibrant, not a trace of brown, and drinking great. These numbers should not work, and sulfur is pretty much useless in that range. It really depends on the grape. As Clark Smith would say, much depends on the reductive strength of the grape. Something durable like Petite Sirah has a very different range than our Sangiovese for example. For our location I like to see 3.6-3.65pH at the most for the finished wine with a TA of 6+ - for me it should be nervous, jumpy and high-strung even after 24 months in barrel. For our Barbera it usually sits at 3.5-3.55pH and 6.5 TA or so, and we could push that acidity higher but I think part of the charm of Barbera is a sense of juicy ripeness.
Of course, since we grow our own grapes, the whole point is to not need to make additions or subtractions to the wine - that said the Petite Sirah is one of the most challenging to get tannin ripeness without losing acidity.
@KitMarlot @klezman @losthighwayz Well stated @PrimaMateria!! I like to look at some of the wine numbers as a starting point, but not use them as defining the whole picture. If your strictly a numbers person, then you need to understand the importance of standardized equipment, non-expired standards, and Measurement Uncertainty Analysis (MUA) which NASA uses on all their measurement equipment. How do I know this? Spent my long career working in labs, managing labs, and working on NASA contracts for 13 yrs. With wine, I keep an open mind because of the many variables that drive the finished product such as what @PrimaMateria mentioned. Sounds like he understands his vineyard terroir and grapes. The only thing that I judge wine as to whether I like it is my palate! So it sounds like @losthighwayz uses historical data in which he follows the numbers that his palate likes, that is, only if those numbers are always truly accurate!
@Boatman72 @KitMarlot @klezman @losthighwayz
One other note: when people give numbers, the harvest pH of the grapes will be very different from the finished wine. A harvest pH of 3.5 for a red can be a finished wine of 3.75/3.8 pretty easily, especially if there is a lot of malic acid or a lot of potassium in the grape skins. Press wine will have a much higher pH because of this and some people blend it all together - some donāt. I have a friend with Aglianico near Bakersfield and he says that the grapes respire all of their malic acid before picking!
There is also a peculiar instability point around 3.65 pH due to the tartrate precipitation curve. Usually it is pretty linear in my experience with reds from my location (hopefully whites will be blow this level) but around that point it is possible to actually loose potassium and have the pH start dropping rather than floating up in some cases!
@klezman Youāve spoken like the true Scientist that you are!
@Boatman72 @KitMarlot @losthighwayz @PrimaMateria
Now Iām a bit confusedā¦if thereās more malic acid in the skins wouldnāt that reduce the pH? Or is it that it comes in as potassium malate instead, which then provides a lot more buffering capacity to the wine and sops up all that free hydrogen (lowering the pH)?
@Boatman72 @KitMarlot @klezman @losthighwayz
Sorry I should have clarified. When the malic acid transforms to lactic acid (during malolactic fermentation) which is less strong typically pH will rise .1 - .15 for us. Cool climate grapes can see even more of a shift upward.
Dammit.
/giphy bewildered-grumpy-starfish
Iām always intrigued by a Petite Sirahā¦ rats?
/giphy incredulous-flirty-hat
Lots of fun looking wine on the winery website! Hope they become regulars here
/giphy visible-dry-minister
No Indiana? Too bad for meā¦
@jsr914 me too!
How can the Fast Shipping option be sold out? Limited quantities of ice packs?
/giphy relaxing-misunderstood-line
@MarkDaSpark Youāre using fast shipping??!!
Not enough PS to drink already?
@MarkDaSpark @rjquillin LOL
@rjquillin. Never enough! Plus need new ice packs.
@MarkDaSpark just had my 4th to last bottle, totally enjoying itā¦it is aging very well, held its own with an Iowa chuck roastā¦
BTW did the wine with the fast shipping get there yet?