Bottling with Periple

Monday we helped Angie Riff and crew bottle Periple's Syrah and Pinot Noir. We bottled more wine in 1 day than we bottle all year!  It was great to get to work with Angie and learn from her.  We didn't get to taste the Pinot, but the Syrah was terrific! It will be hard to wait the 6 months before opening a bottle. 
 
The bottling initially was planned on a large automated bottler but it turned out the bottles weren't compatible so we ended up using a 6-spout stationary bottle filler and an electric corker (labels and foils to be added at a later date).   The automated bottler runs at 2,400 bottles per hour, or 40 per minute.   We did pretty good on the 6-spout filler and managed about 18-20 bottles per minute. We started the bottler using a siphon but ended up using an air pump to transfer the wine.  The bottling process was very similar to what we have been used to, except we got to start with brand new (clean!) bottles and there was A LOT MORE WINE!  We learned that a pallet can hold 56 cases (134.4 gallons) of wine...if you stack it right.
 
Angie pays a lot of attention to sanitation. She used TSP, Water, Citric, Iodine and Water to clean, nutralize, sanatize and rinse the hoses. For the bottler we used proxycarb, citric and water.  And as a final cleaning step every part that came in contact with the wine or bottles was sprayed with alcohol (Vodka).  She also works hard to make sure the wine doesn't come in contact with oxygen by covering the wine with a blanket of nitrogen and adding nitrogen to the bottles before filling them.  Angie used Rich Xiberta Natural Cork with the Periple's name printed on them. Corks were added directly to the automated corker without touching them. Cheryl was the perfect height for adding corks to the machine. ;)
 
Angie added a modest amount of Meta to the wine before bottling to help protect it during the process and in the bottle. She started with 18ppm and targeted 35ppm (see blog photo for her calcs.)  She explained that much of the SO2 is lost in the first 6 month and the majority is gone after 2 years in the bottle.