Info on how to bottle bulk wine
Here are some tips for bottling home wine now that you enter the right stage of practice. The demijohns and bottles must be well cleaned and washed. Be careful not to use strong detergents with the risk of leaving the flavor on the bottles. The wine must be bottled within about three days from the purchase of the demijohns. Therefore plan the operations before buying the desired quantities. Leaving it too much in the demijohns would compromise the entire bottling operation.
The wine should be stored in a dark and cool place, with a maximum temperature of 18-20 degrees. Failure to follow these instructions puts the quality (of Lambrusco) at risk, which is obviously guaranteed at the time of purchase both by the name of the winery that sells it and by a series of checks carried out by the same consortium of producers. There are further warnings, in particular for sparkling wine such as Lambrusco di Modena, in fact: it is necessary to use “heavy” bottles, which resist pressure (more or less the same ones that are used to contain sparkling wines).
The bottles should be filled up to 10 cm. from the mouth; storage in a cool place must be constant, even in the summer. For the quieter types of wine the bottles can be filled up to 1 cm. from the bottom of the cap. The best time to bottle, according to what many believe to be popular beliefs, follows the phases of the moon. For Lambrusco, however, the first three months of the year are good for bottling, while other types of wines require you to wait until later in the year. Popular belief or not, the moon phase calendar is useful for setting the best times to bottle. It is also better to avoid windy days or with too extreme weather conditions.
The bottling calendar
The periods considered the most suitable for bottling coincide with the months of March and September. In the month of March, it is recommended to bottle wines to be consumed within the year because during the winter following the harvest, most of the substances suspended in the wine are deposited on the bottom, therefore, after this cycle it is rather easy to bottle clear wine. For wines that are not to be consumed in the year following the harvest but in the one that follows, the month of September may be preferred; in any case, the day chosen for bottling must be sunny, mild and windless; in fact with the cold the wine would absorb more air and, enriching itself a lot with oxygen, would age prematurely.
BOTTLING WINE ACCORDING TO THE PHASES OF THE MOON: TRUTH OR JUST POPULAR BELIEF?
Many popular traditions indicate the best times to bottle wine based on the phases of the moon as the collective imagination attributes to our satellite the power to influence biological events. In reality there is no proof of the veracity of these beliefs, indeed scientific investigations in this regard deny them. The only certain influences that the Moon has on Earth are the tides, a certain influence on the reproductive behavior of some marine organisms and some forms of tropism on certain types of plants. Everything else is more reasonable to consider it as a legacy of popular superstitions that attributed a magical meaning to the Moon linked to its cyclical increase and decrease.
In the specific case of wines, probably to explain the reasons for completely different results from one year to the next, in the past, when scientific knowledge and current technologies were not even conceivable, the results were attributed to the positive or negative influence of the Moon. actually due to the microbiological state of the product during production. In any case, according to tradition, it should be bottled at the first quarter of the moon to obtain sparkling wines, at the last quarter for wines with long aging and at full moon any type of wine. In particular, during the first new moon of spring, that is, during the week of Easter (which is celebrated on the Sunday following the first full moon of spring), the resumption of the activity of microorganisms would be hindered. It is not wrong to bottle in these periods but it is wrong to think that the influence of the Moon has real positive or negative consequences on the result of the operation, an influence that is actually exercised by a more complex set of factors.
However, following the calendar of the phases of the moon still has something fascinating today and, however, recognizing what science affirms, we must recognize that it is also a wise thing to pass on traditions from generation to generation.
The best times
The moment in which you decide to bottle the wine is crucial. The season and the phase of the moon affect the choice.
Some wines, such as sparkling wines, are more affected by climatic and seasonal conditions in the bottling phase, so it is necessary to consider the moment in which this operation is carried out in order to obtain a good final result.
The best times
We report the best times for bottling wines, following, as tradition, the phases of the moon.
In any case, experts suggest bottling in clear and windless weather.
Recommended for lively wine
From January 17th to January 26th
From February 16th to February 25th
From March 18th to March 26th
From March 28th to March 31th
From April 16th to April 24th
Fro May the16th to May the 24th
*the wine must have residual sugar for refermentation in the bottle to take place!
n.b.: 1% residual sugar fully fermented develops a pressure of approx. 2.4 atm. !!
Recommended dates for still wine to be aged
From June 14th to June 22th
From July 14th to July 22th
From August 12th to August 20th
From September 10th to September 19th
From October 10th to October 19th
From November 8th to September 17th
From December 7th to December 19th
*the wine must be ‘dry’ (%sugar=0)
Bottling according to lunar phases
New moon, black: period not recommended for bottling any wine.
First quarter, hump to the west: suitable period for bottling lively, sparkling wines
Full Moon, white: suitable period for all wines.
Last quarter, hump to the east: a period suitable for sweet wines and long ageing wines
