Lees Wine - where does your's go?

Cellar Rats (ITB)
1

Title says it all. What do you do with your lees wine?
Cheers

2

Drain.
Best, Jim

3

Thanks Jim.
I put a bit to the side to try once in a whole from two lots.

4

I give it to Lee. After all, it is his. [tease.gif]

5

nice [cheers.gif]

6

collected and settled.

once i can’t squeeze any more out of it, to a local company who either distills it or makes vinegar out of it

7

I’ve tried that and have had very poor luck.
Best, Jim

8

Sorry to hear that.

It has paid for itself many dozens of times over for me.

9

Gérard Chave has used his Hermitage lees for cooking whole foie gras – one of the most extraordinary and unforgettable dishes I’ve ever had. Maybe you should think about that, Ray: foie gras poached in lees of Chambertin – that’s getting pretty high up the the unbeatable luxury scale.

10

collect and settle is the best and only reasonable thing I could think of to do with lees. Let it settle in bbl or keg for a few weeks to a month and rack clean off the settled lees. Free topping wine for the next month if you’re diligent about it.

11

Now that sounds like an idea. I have a stainless tank with the lees from Chambertin and Charmes-Chambertin mixed in, I think I will give it a try. [cheers.gif]

12

If it smells ok, I resettle to get a little topping wine. I have also found that red wine lees make an exceptional cleaning agent. On two occasions, new stainless steel drums and kegs have arrived with a bit of a petroleum smelling liquid still inside. After trying other commonly used cleaning agents and plenty of very hot water but with no success at removing the odor, pouring in and agitating and soaking a couple of gallons of lees for a day removed all detectible traces of the product.

13

For heavier lees, I have heard of the stuff being used as a marinade. One of the guys I work with has for the last 20 years used pinot lees to marinade his beef for boeuf bourguignon.

14

Some get poured down the drain. Other lees are used to improve other wines.

15

Ray since you’re a history buff I thought you might appreciate the following book from the early 1900s that UCD has put on the web … http://www.scribd.com/doc/34733393/1912-The-Art-of-Distillation . Yes it is “The Art of Distillation” with a few references to using lees as the starting material…Cheers, Gary

16

I have a few customers that will take some of our Merlot lees to marinate pheasant in. I have not tried it but it always sounds good.

17

I agree with the others about settling and using for topping but below is something interesting that I did with actual lees…

One lot of my 08 chard which was native, got reeeeallllyyy sluggish. Rather than reinoculating I just kept the barrels topped up nice and had the free SO2 hang out at about 5. The following vintage I inoculated the same vineyard lot of wine with the William Selyem liquid yeast for a rock solid ferment. The second it was done I racked, collected the yeast lees and distributed them into the stuck 08 barrels (which were now in the sun).
Worked like a charm. The 08’s finished quickly (and were damn good) about a month before we bottled.