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Hi! Guys, I am trying to keep busy here but anyway, welcome to another version of Winemaker’s minute and in this installment, we will be talking about acid based chemistry. I not going to get too technical on everybody here so, I do not want anybody rolling their eyes but, what we want to do is tell you the importance of pH and TA which actually is Total acidity sometimes referred to us Titratable acidity as well. But what is the purpose and what is the importance of pH value and also TA value in your wines? Really that is directly correlated as to the style of wine you want to make.
Let say you are making a Chardonnay, a Chardonnay that has oak aging in there and it has got this nice round, creamy texture to it due to malolactic conversion, which in a later version of winemaker minute, we will be touching on, you are going to be looking at pH value that is probably in the neighborhood 3.5-3.6 with a TA of around 6 grams per liter. But let us back up and find out what is exactly pH. pH is actually the measurement of the acid strength in the wine. And when it is in the due stage, there are a lot of very sharp acids in the wine including Malic acid, and this acid actually give you a lower pH.
Probably in the neighborhood of anywhere between 3.3 and 3.5, as wine undergoes fermentation primary as well as the secondary which is malolactic, the pH does raise in value and change the mouth fill and the profile of the wine. TA, total acidity to some extent is correlated to pH, however, the strength of that acid is really what is important here. Whether you have 5 grams per liter of total acidity or 6 and a half grams per liter of total acidity, if your pH is in the low end of the spectrum between 3.2, 3.3 and 3.5, you are going to have a wine that is very crisp and very vibrant, very refreshing too.
And if you are in the higher range with pretty much that same TA and by high range I mean 3.7-3.85, you have a much weightier, creamier type of wine that is a little bit more partial to the more robust red wines. And that is where also the differences in the varietals as well as the styles.
To give you some examples with the wine that are made here at CrushPad, if we are talking a crisp silver neon black from Rodafort, you will be looking at probably at pH of 3.25-3.3 and a TA of a roughly 7 and a half to 8 grams per liter. That makes the wine very crisp, very citrus in flavors as well as very refreshing, a great wine to have in the summer time.
To go in the other end of the spectrum, let us talk about a Cero, a nice Southern California ,Santa Barbara Cero very, very fruit forward, very jammy, very lush. You could be looking at the pH of around 3.75 and a TA of around 5 and a half grams per liter.
The other thing everybody should be aware of is how the change in the pH spectrum changes the color. As you are going up that spectrum, you are actually go from a red color to a more purple color. We are not talking a big range here 3.2-3.9 when you looking at the whole pH spectrum, which is 0-14, but everybody knows that wine is an acidic product and the higher that range goes from 3.2-4, the more darker the color becomes, the more purplish hue you get into your wine.
So be looking at and maintaining that healthy pH level of 3.5-3.75 and if you are looking at making a wine that you want to put down, lay down for a few years, give us some good age ability, having it closer to 3.55-3.65 is ideal. That makes a wine that is a little bit tight when it is young but really benefits from a number of years in the bottle so you can get some real nice aromatic in bottle bouquet developing overtime.
It was good talking to everybody at this point and I want to get back to shooting some hoops and I am sure we will touch face again.
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