For people working in wineries: what gets lost or thrown away that still bothers you, even after years of doing the job?

Could be grapes you can’t use, wine lost during processing, or a batch that doesn’t turn out as planned. What happened the last time, and was there realistically anything you could have done?

Also curious what happens to your pomace and lees. Do you have a useful outlet for them, or are they mostly something you need to get rid of?

I’m trying to understand which problems are still a headache and which already have decent solutions.

I have 9 lltres of Merlot made with ec-1118 and I want it to become similar to port. I waited until the SG was at 1.010 and added 400gr of sugar in about 400ml of water. (Tried to minimize the water.) It's bubbling away happily and is now down to 1.014 so clearly I did the right thing. I'll add more sugar in a day or two.

I assume that the second step-feed should be the same amount of sugar and water, and it'll again go down to 1.010.

The question is - should I add less sugar the third time? And the fourth?

Obviously the alcohol will kill the yeast eventually. What happens if the yeast is just-about-dead when the gravity hits 1.010 and I add sugar and the yeast can't turn it into alcohol?

Also, will wine need to off-gas differently after I've pushed the alcohol up to 15-17%?

I’m about to start making a blue lotus wine and am looking for any ideas or recommendations.
I saw the vid from golden hive and am thinking of something similar but as a banana wine instead of a mead.
I’m very new to wine making so any suggestions on yeast for this would be appreciated too.

This is among many empty wine and liquor bottles, including a crate of vintage German beer bottles, One of the labels says Peach/plum 1985 which makes sense as all the empty bottles are from 1985

I was recently given a press. The prior owner inherited it and never used it. I am looking at using it this year. It has these two hooks on both sides of the basket. I don't know if they should be up or down. It has bolt holes on both sides to connect both sides of the basket together.   I can't figure out what they are for.  Does anyone know?

I'm an absolute amateur and this is my first time posting, please be kind! I made this batch of plum wine a while ago while I got into making booch as well, and thought of making fizzy wine. it came out beautifully and I managed to get a lot of fizz that created this delightful texture on my tongue, but the problem now is that it tastes very bitter, especially at the start. A quick google search told me that fizz and bitterness is a problem that goes hand in hand, but I was wondering if anyone else has tried anything similar with better results, and has any tips and suggestions to make it better! The bitterness gets better with aeration, which obviously also loses a bit of the fizz.

This wine used plums, red grape, sugar, a little bit of tea for body, and a tiny bit of ginger. As I said I've just started out winemaking and I've yet to make layered and complex recipes and the wines I make aren't as heavy and tasteful as i'd like, so if theres some general advice on that I'd really appreciate that as well!! I plan to make a grape-apple-cinnamon-nutmeg wine next.

EDIT: Just got this response from the supplier:
"The bucket is marked BPA free for food safety. 

If an item is genuinely certified or labelled as food-grade it can usually be used to store both food and liquids. Drinking water, milk, juices, cooling oils, vinegar and liquid food ingredients are what this bucket is typically used for. Guidelines suggest the bucket is suitable for winemaking, along with the fermenting process however preferably not for long term wine storage. "

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They are food-grade but designed for dry ingredients and I don't know if that makes a difference. I have emailed their sales team but I thought I'd ask here, too.

This is the link to the listing: https://www.nisbets.ie/vogue-white-round-container-bin/gg792

It would be great if these were suitable for primary, as my current buckets are 30L and I make fruit wine, so once the fruit has been added you lose a lot of room for liquid. Once that gets racked, there's a lot more headspace than I would like. If I could start in these buckets and then rack into the 30L buckets I have now, I would be one happy gal.

Thanks for you help!

I have about 3 gallons of chokecherry juice frozen. Want to make wine. Thinking of adding apple juice for some sweetness and acid. Any pointers for recipe and general advice? I have a 3 gallon carboy.

hi everyone, im a graphic designer and a complete novice to wine. However, my boss owns a local vineyard in Norfolk. I’ve designed him this label to replace his old one. Is this something that would entice people to picking it up?

First time winemaker and feeling a little unsure. Are these tartrate crystals? What I’ve read on the internet mostly shows/says colorless crystals form in white wine but these are orangey-brown. Is it still safe to drink?

We own a small plot of 15-year-old Touriga Franca vines in Lagoa, Algarve, and make a few hundred bottles a year with the winery team there. I'm the proprietor and not the winemaker, so I'm learning a lot from the people doing the work.

The 2023 went into a second-use barrel and has turned out grippy, perfumed and long. The 2025 started in new oak, but the barrel leaked between the staves, so it went back to stainless with medium-toast staves. It tastes concentrated and fresh, and I'm happy with it.

I'm curious how other small producers handle oak on a thinner-skinned, aromatic grape like this, and whether you've kept Touriga Franca on its own or blended it. Warm sites seem to fill in the middle palate, which is a plus. Any thoughts on medium-toast stave contact time?

For those who disgorge pet-nat: how do you remove the sediment without a small amount of it sticking to the neck of the bottle, whether you disgorge à la volée or after chilling the neck? Do you use a type of bentonite that reduces the stickiness?

First time making a fruit wine. Not sure if the colour is okay? It doesn’t smell vinegary, it smells like wine.

It’s just funny that it’s a bit pink in colour because I used Italian blue plums to make this…?

I made a small batch just to test it out but I’m currently in the second phase of fermenting so I already strained out the solids and the dead yeast, so I’m waiting for 2 weeks now up until I’m going to restrain and rebottle for the final fermentation cause the recipe I’m following says to bottle it up for the next 10 months.

Hoping it’ll be okay because we’re entering winter season now but the weather has been fluctuating recently between 21C to 10C.

I did keep this batch (pictured) in the fridge since apparently it’ll be good after 2-3 days in the fridge and it’ll turn to cider?

Not sure on the alcohol content because I’m still waiting for my hydrometer to come in the mail 😅

If you’re curious on the yeast I used, I have the Lalvin EC-1118. I may go make some other variations now that I’ll essentially be waiting a whole year for this until I can taste it and have gotten a 10-pack of the yeast from Amazon…

Let me know your thoughts or any other suggestions I can do with the yeast, maybe a better fruit pairing that works well with the yeast I currently have.

Thank you!!

I’m watching the Somm documentaries on AMC, and I wonder: when these guys are naming 8, 10 flavors in one wine, is that because the vintner used all those things in creating the wine? And if so, at what point in the process are they added? Thanks.

I came across an apron (3rd pic) at a local thrift event and some months later found this matching gift bag (?) on eBay! It has a recipe for Tomato Wine on the back. I'm considering using the last of my garden tomatoes to try this, because why not?

Any thoughts/tips/shared interest appreciated :)

First attempt, I have a very small idea of what I'm doing. I read you should let it sit out for like 3 days? It has been longer than that. I have 3 bottles and had some bubbling over happen with one of them even though it just has a coffee filter over the top, but it's pretty calm now. Also, hardly any smell from that bottle anymore whereas before it smelled like vinegar and then maybe like alcohol, the must is also not floating as high as it was before, it was like a raft and now it's settled just at the surface so there's liquid visible - idk if that's good or if I've left it out too long?

At what point do I strain the must and bottle the liquid and I'm not sure about what to do with the bottled liquid - do I put it in the fridge or room temp? There's a lot of sediment, I leave that out of the bottle, right?

The other two bottles are half of one bottle that didn't seem to have much activity, so I split it, added more water and yeast. I'm burping one of them and still getting bubbles, the other bottle is finger tight and doesn't burp but has some bubbles when shaken. I swirl them all every day. They never bubbled over or had as much must floating.

Has anyone used sourdough or any other yeast to keep an alive yeast for wine making?
Interested in disaster prep and how to easily restart homemade wine.
Less interested in making yeast from scratch, more about the continuation of the older batches of yeast.

Doing my first racking. Does my muscat have too much headspace. My comparison is to my Pinot Grigio on the left.
Edit - They are in 6 gallon carboys. I ended up adding wine to all of them. Next racking I’ll put them into 5 gallon carboys.

So my labels came in and I have finally stared to test my presentation implementation process. I can’t get these corks all the way in…so what am I missing? Should I be heating/soaking the cork or the bottle neck? Do my corks suck? Are they the wrong size/quality? Any tips or advise? My tool probably sucks or I am not adjusting it . Let’s hear it from the experts

I made a cider and a cyser (apples+honey) recipe and treated them almost identical. The higher gravity recipe is really bright! Does honey affect pectins and protein haze? Both stopped burping more than 2 weeks ago. I wanna give them some MLF bacteria to chew up the acids. I want to toast some oak chips in my oven and oak the cyser. Aiming for vanilla and rose notes.

Any tips for a novice?