Customer Reviews

Second Batch notes Review by Clark

Rating

Moved onto a second batch and am still waiting to bottle. Did a sampling this week and am very happy with the results so far.

Used the BDX yeast, decided to use the oak chips in the primary fermentation, which lasted 12 full days. Racked into glass carboy for another 10 days - no oak. Racked back into a bucket and added the sulphites and fining agents. Stirred with a degassing pedal attached to a drill, for a total of 15 minutes of stirring.

Racked into a glass carboy and used a Vacuvin wine saver to help pull more gas out - amazing how much gas stays trapped in the wine. Added oak cubes (American Medium Toast Plus) and stashed it away in a 70-degree corner of my guest bedroom.

Advise using the vacuvin for several days in a row - I was still drawing a ton of tiny bubbles of gas out of the wine on the third day. Previous batch was amazing, but had more trapped gas than I wanted. (Look this up on Youtube for a live demonstration of what it does.)

Let the clearing batch sit for 6-8 weeks - if you smell sulphur, rack immediately and toss the wood cubes for fresh ones - if the nose isn't showing sulphur, leave it. (instructions say clearing is only a 20-day process, but the oak will give maximum flavor transfer for a minimum of six weeks and the wine benefits from the longer soak.)

I then racked the wine at 2 months old into another carboy, added fresh oak cubes and have let it sit for nearly 2 more months in bulk. Compared a bottle of my first batch with a sample of the current batch and the differences are there.

Fruit is more subdued, oak is far bigger (better be!), and the wine is almost perfectly flat, no fizzy gas trapped in the wine. Planning to let it sit until the end of November and bottle as my XMas wine. Will have spent 22 days in fermentation and over 140 days in clarification/aging.

It will drink well from 2 weeks to 6 years past bottling - though I severely doubt any of it will make it past 2012. (Posted on 10/18/11)

A big hit with my friends Review by Dee

Rating

I have made 2 batches of this oak, velvety wine. I have a hard time waiting for it to age, and it does get better for each month you let it age. I will be keeping a carboy of this wine kit going for some time. (Posted on 9/26/11)

Wonderful wine Review by Bowserboy

Rating

I have been making CellarCraft Wine kits for just over a year and after each bottling I consume a bottle and say to myself that it will be very good in a year of so. Howeveer, I just bottled a batch of the Red mountain Cab and I am blown away by it and can only imagine how good it will be in a year or so. i have already ordered 2 more kits. Great wine. (Posted on 5/17/11)

Unbelievably hard to walk away from! Review by Web

Rating

I've been making wine, beer, and mead for several years. I use my own home-grown grapes, fruit from here and there, and kits. Without a doubt, this kit made one of the best, most tasteful wines I've ever made! The fruit, the oak, and the bold fragrance is well balanced. After making the kit, I siphoned off four bottles for immediate consumption, and put the rest in a new oak barrel for short-term aging. Bold, fruity, oaky, just a wonderful tart grape flavor as I would expect from a cab. I've had a glass right before bed every night since racking to the barrel- and it's VERY hard not to have a second! Truly one of the nicest wines I've ever tasted! As excellent as it is unaged, I can't wait to see how it develops over the next couple of years! (If it lasts that long!) (Posted on 4/29/11)

What Locals Know Review by Clark

Rating

Inside the state of WA, you can try dozens of examples of Red Mountain Cabs - if you are willing to spend $25+ for the bottle. It is gaining a reputation as a superb growing AVA and finding juice of this quality is a nice coup for Cellar Craft. My first kit just went into bottle after 2 1/2 months of clearing (and medium toast Hungarian Oak cubes). I immediately bought another kit to give it a more serious treatment. The sample I tasted during bottling was already quite gorgeous and drinkable. It had a heft of fruit and a whiff of oak. I can only surmise that the fruits will mellow and bring out a few more subtle tones and the oak/leather will move up in the taste profile.

This one warrants multiple oak stages and multiple racking to bring out the grape's power. It is such a great value - based on what I have tasted and what I recall of WA cabs, this is worthy of a $30/bottle tag for comparisons.

If you are going to make the kit from Northern, I suggest the BDX yeast strain - it is more purpose-crafted for a Cab of this weight and should yield a better nose than the Champagne yeast strain included. Also suggest ditching wood powder at fermentation and adding a second bag of cubes in the clearing stages. As long as you can be patient and give the juice a minimum of 6 weeks in the clearing stage, you should yield a better wine. (Posted on 4/25/11)

A Hint of Orange Review by barbandchuck

Rating

We are eagerly awaiting for this year's harvest so that we can again order this kit. Our first bottles are barely a year old and they are hard to resist. The remarkable thing about this cab is the hint of orange peel amid the dark fruit flavors. Unlike others that have written reviews, we added just the oak provided and would probably make it the same way again. Subtle, silky, rich this is one to add to your cellar. (Posted on 10/18/10)

the only kit I've made twice Review by tom sawyer

Rating

My first one of these kits spent a couple of months in a Hungarian oak barrel which sped up the aging and added oak flavor. its been bottled for nearly a year now, a mere babe for a Cab. The wine already has tons of color and nice legs, and a full-bodied mouthfeel. It has a very peppery aroma, and the flavor is dark fruit with pronounced cedar and a hint of orange. Its a fine example of a cabernet and one of the richest and most distinctive wines I've made. When this wine hit three years old, look out! (Posted on 9/30/10)