WINE LEES.
The Lees should not be neglected, because, for want of proper care, the wine which is extracted from them will contract a very disagreeable taste, which is due to its too long sojourn on the deposit, and which would be prevented by drawing it off in time.
Therefore, in order that the wine extracted from them should not lose all its value, the lees should receive particular attention, and be stored in places free from variations of temperature.
The Quantity of Wine Contained in the Lees varies from 30 to 90 per cent. From those of fined wines an average of 70 per cent. may be extracted without pressing.
The Dry Parts of the Sediment contain a great quantity of insoluble matters, tartar, or argol, several other vegetable and mineral salts, divers compounds, ferments, mucilaginous matters, and the residue of animal and vegetable matters (albumen and gelatine), which have been employed in fining.
An Analysis of Dry Lees by Mr. Braconnot, a distinguished chemist, establishes the presence of the following substances: bitartrate of potash (cream of tartar), tartrate of lime, tartrate of magnesia, nitrogenous animal matter, fatty substances, coloring matter, gum, and tannin.
The Composition of Dry Lees varies with the age, nature, and quality of the wine which produces them; but in all, the bitartrate of potash or cream of tartar predominates. The lees of mellow wines contain mucilages, and we find in the lees deposited by sweet wines great quantities of saccharine matter which may be utilized. The different uses to which dried lees may be put will be mentioned further on.
Treatment of the Lees.—Lees will settle by repose, but the wine which comes from them, if left long upon the heavy lees, contracts a disagreeable flavor, owing to its contact with the insoluble matters forming the sediment, and with the ferments found in the lees with the residue of the substances used in fining. The surface wine is often in a state of fermentation, and remains turbid, contracting at the same time a disagreeable bitterness, unless soon withdrawn from the influence of the ferments.
By proper care and attention, not only can all the liquid be extracted from the lees, but the wine so extracted will have no bad flavor, no vice, in a word, will partake of the same qualities as the wine from which the heavy lees were deposited. The casks into which they are to be put should be washed in the same manner as those destined to contain limpid wine, and double the quantity of a sulphur match employed in the case of racking new red wines, should be burned in each. As fast as the casks are emptied in drawing off, the lees are turned into a pail, and immediately poured into the cask intended for them. In emptying them into the pail, care should be taken not to introduce dirt, mould, etc., and if there is debris around the bung-hole, it should be swept away before removing the bung. As soon as the cask is full of lees, it should be stored, bung up, in a proper place, as mentioned, and should then be ulled and bunged, and the date of storing may be marked on it, with the kind and age of the wine from which it came.
When the casks are not completely filled the same day, and it is necessary to leave them with ullage, they should be bunged tight, after having again burned a square of a match in each, and the sulphuring should be renewed as often as the lees are added, if left so for several days, in order to avoid access of air, and to prevent the action of ferments. In a word, casks containing lees, without being full, should always be well bunged and sulphured, and guarded from variations of temperature.
The casks, when stored, should be regularly ulled once a week with limpid wine, and re-bunged, and after two weeks’ repose, the first drawing off takes place, and should be renewed once or twice every month. All the clear wine will be drawn off at each racking, by following the precautions indicated further on. By drawing off thus frequently, fermentation, to which such wine is subject, will be avoided, even in summer. Thus, also, will be avoided the disagreeable taste of the lees, of acrity and bitterness, which wine contracts when left long on the deposit, and moreover, much more clear wine will be withdrawn. Lees from diseased wine should not be mixed with the rest, but should be put aside and treated according to the malady by which the wine was affected.
Extraction of Wine from the Lees.—Lees preserved under the conditions indicated naturally free themselves from a great part of the foreign substances which they contain, by rest, for they are insoluble, and specifically heavier than wine, and settle of their own accord. The wine should not be fined till drawn from the heavy lees.
The racking off of the clear wine may be performed in two ways, either by the use of a glass siphon or of a faucet. For the first rackings the glass siphon is most appropriate, and by its use the boring of holes high up in the end of the cask is avoided. It is introduced about eight inches into the full cask, a proper vessel to catch the wine is placed under the end, with another vessel close at hand, and the wine is started by the breath; but the siphon must be held with the hand, or otherwise sustained so that it will not go too deep into the cask. By holding a candle below, it can be seen if the wine is any way clear; and as long as it runs sufficiently limpid, the siphon is lowered into the cask, little by little, till the level of the turbid wine is nearly reached. When one bucket is filled, the other is slipped under the stream without stopping it. Two men are usually required, one to attend the siphon, and the other to empty the buckets. As soon as the wine runs muddy, it is stopped. If the cask of lees is sufficiently elevated, the stem of the siphon may run into a funnel placed in the empty cask.
When the casks have all been drawn from, the remaining heavy lees are filled into those containing the greater quantity, so as to transfer the least quantity. Before filling, however, the casks should have a double square of sulphur match burned in each, to prevent subsequent fermentations.
The use of the faucet is preferred, when the lees are thick, and the casks which contain them are near the ground, and are only used for storing lees. In the latter case, the injury to the cask by boring holes in the head at several heights, is of little consequence. A greater quantity of wine may be drawn off by the use of the faucet than with the glass siphon, but it is generally less clear than if carefully done with the latter; and one man can do the work.
First, it is necessary to ascertain how far down the clear wine reaches, by means of gimlet holes, and the faucet-hole should then be bored just above the level of the heavy lees. If the faucet has been placed too low, the sediment which runs through it at first may be put aside.
After the drawing of the clear wine has been repeated several times, and the thick lees united as above mentioned, the casks should not be filled until heavily sulphured, and they must not be disturbed, for the least agitation may stir up the sediment already formed, and cause bad flavor in the wine, and even produce putrid fermentation, especially in those from fined wines which contain large quantities of animal matter introduced in the finings. Casks emptied of heavy lees should be washed with a chain, to remove the sediment clinging to the inside, which must not be allowed to dry on.
Fining Wines Extracted from the Lees.—These wines often are not sufficiently clear; and they are generally more difficult to clarify completely by the usual methods than the wines which produced the lees.
It is noticeable that these wines have less color and less alcohol than other wines produced in the ordinary way.
The difficulty in obtaining their complete clarification arises from the great quantity of insoluble matter which they still hold in suspension, and their relative feebleness in alcohol and tannin.
The want of color is due to the mechanical action of the insoluble matters which the lees contain; these matters in precipitating carry down a part of the coloring matter remaining in solution in the liquid. It follows that the older the lees, and the oftener the wine has been drawn from them, the feebler the color.
Red Wines extracted from the lees, to be completely clarified, should be fined with a heavy dose of albumen (the whites of 16 or 18 eggs to 100 gallons), previously well beaten up in a pint of water in which half an ounce of sea salt has been dissolved to give it density. If the alcoholic strength is below nine per cent, they should be fortified by the addition of two or three quarts of brandy or alcohol to each 100 gallons. Red wines from this source should not be fined with gelatine, or it will diminish the color too much.
White Wines of this kind may be fined with albumen also, if strong in alcohol; but otherwise, they should be fined with a heavy dose of gelatine, three tablets. But before fining they must be tannified by adding 4 or 5 gallons of tannified wine, or an ounce of tannin for each 100 gallons.
Wines from lees should remain on the finings only long enough to precipitate the matters used, about ten days; after which they must be carefully racked, and cared for like other wines.
Pressing the Thick Sediment.—After the lees have undergone three or four semi-monthly rackings, the rest of the wine which they contain may be extracted by pressure, and this amounts on the average to fifty per cent. More wine might be extracted by further racking, but by allowing the wine to remain longer in contact with the finings and other sediment, it will contract the disagreeable flavors already alluded to, which may be avoided by pressing the lees after the first three or four rackings; and an excellent result is obtained by using a filter press after the first racking, and the wine obtained will have no bad taste.
The pressing is performed in small sacks about eighteen inches long. They should be made of cotton cloth, as those made from hemp, even after being used several times, give a disagreeable flavor to the wines passed through them.
It is not necessary to provide more than sacks enough for one cask of lees. The cloth of which they are made should be fine, and of close and regular texture.
To make a cheap press, one head of a cask is removed, and the pieces of this head are fastened together by nailing on two cross pieces to keep it in form, and enough of the wood around the edge is removed to allow it to pass freely into the cask as a follower. The cask is then placed upright, and a hole is bored in one of the staves close to the lower head, into which is placed a faucet. This cask, which is to contain the sacks, may be placed high enough to allow the wine to run from the faucet directly into the bung of another cask to hold the wine. If the casks containing the lees are placed on a horse or platform, the latter may be run from the faucet-hole directly into the sacks, which may be fastened to the chime with small hooks, and be kept open with the hand or a small hoop. A dish should be placed under before withdrawing the spigot. Or, to avoid fouling the outside of the sack with the lees, they may first be run into a tub, and dipped into the sacks, the tub being provided with a sack-holder. As soon as a sack is sufficiently filled, it should be strongly tied with a bow-knot which can be easily untied, and laid in the cask provided; and a few small sticks should be placed over the inner end of the faucet so that it may not be stopped by a sack coming in contact with it. Sacks are placed in the cask till it is full. The faucet is left open, so that the wine, as fast as filtered, may run through a hose into a well washed and well sulphured cask, placed in position to receive it.
When the cask is full of sacks, the cover is placed on them and they are allowed to drain for several hours, weights being gradually placed upon the cover or follower. Further pressure is applied by means of a lever rigged for the purpose, one end made firm, and the other having weights attached.
It is best that the pressure be gradually applied, leaving the sacks to drain for several hours, then applying the lever, but loading it with weights several hours later, or the next day.
When the wine no longer runs, say twenty-four hours after loading the lever, the sacks are removed.
If the lees are not very thick, but little will be found in the sacks, and they may be refilled without removing it, and subjected to a second pressure. Then they must be thoroughly washed with water. Lye should not be used.
Where large quantities of lees are to be pressed, larger presses may be used, vats being employed instead of casks.
It is impossible to obtain all the wine by simple filtration without pressure, owing to the fact that the filters soon become foul, and the wine ceases to pass through.
If the first wine which runs off is turbid, it may be put by itself, and the clear wine caught separately. It is apt to run turbid when additional weight is applied.
Use of Dry Lees.—They have a certain value, and after being removed from the sacks they may be sold to the manufacturers of cream of tartar, if they are virgin lees. Lees from fined wines are of little value for this purpose. They may be dried on well-aired floors, or in the sun. They are also used for the production of pearlash by burning them. The ash produced is of a greenish gray color, and is crude pearlash. Good lees, perfectly dry, produce about 30 per cent. of this alkali.
Lees are also valuable as a fertilizer. Those from sweet wine contain considerable sugar, which may be utilized by fermenting and distilling the alcohol produced. This, however, will render them less valuable for making cream of tartar, a portion of which will be dissolved by washing.