Aussiedistiller, Home Distilling, Moonshine, Home Brew

I have access to 14x cases of Petaluma 1998 Merlot ($70/bottle when it was available). In short, the boss's brother bought heaps a long time ago and forgot he stored it in our warehouse. It is supposedly not drinkable as wine anymore, way past prime. I've never drank expired wine before, doesn't last that long around my house, so not sure exactly what it tastes like now. I can get it very cheap or maybe free.

https://www.nicks.com.au/1998-petaluma-coonawarra-merlot-24497

Can I chuck this in my 5* Nuetralizer and make a nice brandy? I know brandy is distilled wine, but what about old expired wine? Despite it not being drinkable as is, I don't want to be responsible for taking $10,000 of wine and making it into something nasty when it belongs to my boss's family! Not a good way to assure job security....

I am currently doing the same with some faulty bulk wine I was given. Do two stripping runs followed by a spirit run and you will get an acceptable neutral.
If you do a blind taste test against shop purchased Vodka you will note the wine neutral will have a very slight back ground taste which most people can’t pick... though knowing its origin it’s low level brandy.
I’m using the spirit in a range of things with success. P.s because it’s fruit based you will get more methonal and acetone that you will need to tossed during your cuts. Also I wouldn’t pay for the faulty wine... return via Aussie Cream or Lemoncello etc.
Good luck with it.

Unless your into brandy I wouldn't bother, it’s an acquired taste. It's the oldest stock I have now at over 3 years :laughing-rolling: :laughing-rolling: it would just taste like oak now. I couldn't give the stuff away.

I use old wine for neutral all the time and works fine :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Would undrinkable wine make good brandy? Can't answer that sorry.

I'm not a huge brandy drinker myself, but I didn't like tequila, lager, or white wine when I first tried them ... I can't say that now! :)) I can always give it to the family blugers at BBQ's.

If I want a brandy tasting product, rather than neutral, I'm thinking I should run it on my bubble plate still like a whiskey or rum? 4x plates and no packing? Or more like a vodka with 5x plates and copper packing?

Further... If the wine is now undrinkable it has no value.... I have found I am getting bored spending a lot of time making neutral from it to give away in the form of liquors etc.... I want to get on and make some grain based spirits. You could take a few cases and give it a go.... remember that wine faults can be different.
Like the others above, forget trying to make brandy... that’s my view.

If you want to go for the brandy I'm guessing you should run it like a whiskey, 4 plates no packed section. That's how I'd do it :handgestures-thumbupleft:

woodduck wrote:If you want to go for the brandy I'm guessing you should run it like a whiskey, 4 plates no packed section. That's how I'd do it :handgestures-thumbupleft:

:text-+1:

Brandy is ... difficult to drink, for me, so I guess you could strip then spirit run it and you may get something with a bit of nice flavour... Cognac (apart form a specialised variety of grape) is brandy redistilled ... food for thought.

But when I think on it, wine is supposed to be stored for long periods of time and should, at least in theory, get better with age! Have you tried this wine? You could be on a gold mine here...

Its free run it :handgestures-thumbupleft: as wooduck said no packed section if going for brandy. I think most of the off flavours will get left behind but I may be wrong :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Some maths,the total volume of wine would be about 120lt ifn they are 700ml bottles,at 10%ABV gives a total of 12lts @95%ABV,after cuts say 6-7lts@95%ABV,wich would give about 15lts@40%ABV,wich is 21 by 700ml bottles at a value of say $30 each is $630 worth ,not a very good return for $10000 worth of wine (wich is only worth f#*kall ifn its undrinkable) anyway,as long as you explain ta them how much you stand ta get out of it and its all cool then why not,with such a small amount of an unknown wine I would run it all to neutral ,with two passes thru the neutralizer nice and slow.cheers hillzabilly :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Why mess around and let your liver do the work?
What one person finds undrinkable another might find fine.
At least try a bottle before you run it through a still. You might end up with a heap of wine that's not bad.

And wine only ages well in the right conditions. If'n its been stored in a nice hot warehouse it may be cooked beyond salvaging.

Petaluma 1998 Merlot if you look on Google they sold 3 at $33 at auction in 2015 so if drinkable could be sold by auction it seems to be 14% so may be OK and collectors of wine may be interested if bottle looks to be in good condition because there only for show.