Lauren Lejeune

Well folks, for anyone curious if I would ever finish the winemaking saga, this one’s for you. 

I’ll be honest when I say that I was content to let the carboy of homemade wine sit prettily in my living room for much longer. I have an antique tea cart in my living room that is stacked with plants, candles, and a few fun looking wine bottles I’ve collected. The sevenish gallons of dark wine made for great decoration, as well as a story to be told. 

But with the rising summer heat came another problem: the temperature of the wine was rising rapidly, creating more fermentation than the space would allow. I needed to bottle it soon, or buy an air conditioner, which I desperately needed anyway. 

Another confession: I put off buying a wine cooler until the last minute in true Lauren fashion. After doing some very, very rough mental math, I had originally thought that I would end up with around 50 standard bottles of wine. I believed the carboy to be closer to 10 gallons originally, so the hunt was on for something to hold all of the wine. A regular refrigerator was going to be too cold, and I didn’t think that the crawlspace under my house would stay cool enough. Fun Fact: the sweet spot of wine temperatures is roughly between 45-59 degrees, or so the internet has informed me. 

I searched far and wide. Amazon, Lowe’s, Best Buy, you name it and I looked. A cooler of that size was a bit out of my price range, so I had to keep looking. Facebook was next. I inquired in some of the local exchange groups, but nothing turned up. Marketplace was next, and she did not disappoint. Someone was selling a wine cooler that had the space to hold 54 wine bottles, at a great price too! Nate and I picked the cooler up that week, along with an air conditioner (hallelujah). 

Before I could bottle anything, there’s a few steps we had to take to finish out the process. We added in additives to stop the fermentation process, a clearing agent to make sure there wasn’t anything floating around I had missed when we ran it through a strainer, and finally we had to back sweeten the wine. I knew I wanted to leave it fairly dry, but I believe that through The Great Oxidation Fiasco in which Nate had to siphon everything out to save the wine, it lost some flavor and became almost too acidic. To fix it, I simply added a cup of sugar water to the mixture. 

After letting it sit for a few days, it was time for a taste test. Nate’s mom and sister-in-law Kiley came over to help me try it out. Stacey introduced me to the finer things in life (red wine), so her approval was imperative. After getting the green light, Nate and I decided to just bang out the bottling process right then and there. 

We sanitized bottles, corks, the whole nine yards. Nate was in charge of filling them, and did a splendid job of leaving just enough headspace. We lost minimal wine in the process due to not kinking the hose quick enough after a wine bottle was full. The kitchen floor was an explosion of deep purple, right on to the white tile. 

Putting the corks in was a sweet moment, as it marked the completion of my first round of homemade wine, and my second “skill” of the year. Admittedly, the stress of not having to worry about it anymore is also really nice. As my math was incorrect, we ended up with 32 and a half bottles of wine, which leaves space in the cooler for more in the future. 

There are not many feelings that trump those of finishing something you’ve put work into. I am thankful for all of the help I’ve received along the way, and the connections I have made. “Wineshiners” will make for the best Christmas gifts, girls nights or a sweet summer wine.