Fly in my wine

WINE TALK
1

I know bugs and gnats get into the barrels. It’s a part of the process. It also doesnt help that most wines are not filtered prior to bottling. But last night, there was literally a big dead fly in the bottle. Should I be mad over this? I guess I really dont care, but I had never had such an experience.

2

Is this true? I actually don’t know. [scratch.gif]

We always run the wine at least through a “bug catcher.”

3

You know better than me. Guess that makes sense. So, humor me. If this was a Match Bottle (it wasnt), would you want to be notified of the problem? Or should the customer just laugh it off and drink up?

4

In all seriousness, it would all depend on what kind of bug we are talking about. If it were something small and could fly around…say a honey bee, fruit fly, house fly, etc., it really wouldn’t bother me as it could have flown in right before bottling. If it were a beetle or a roach of some sorts, that would mean it got in the bottle or wine by some other means. I would complain if there were a German Cockroach in a bottle.

5

Pretty much where I came out. Still emptied the bottle and I’m alive this morning. Figure the 14.5% ABV killed off any bacteria and gave the fly a good going away party.

6

Of course! I have been wondering what happened to Seymour! [cry.gif]

Seriously, I would think that any winery would want the chance to make good if a customer was displeased with their product but then, I am a tad naive.

7

This is a good thread! I’m actually curious if they say “unfiltered” means there is zero filtering at all (even through a bug catcher) or just that there isn’t the microscopic filtering.

8
9

Excellent.

10

Last night a rep came in with a bottle for us to taste, Randy poured himself some and saw fruit flies that poured out into his glass. It was already opened but still not the best first impression.

11

Ive had wine on my fly…

12

Customer “Waiter what is that fly doing in my Wine!”
Waiter “I think it’s the backstroke”
(couldn’t resist) [whistle.gif]


Cheers
Rip

13

Maybe 15 years ago I was on St Croix and we went to the Cruzan Rum distillery. This was before they got popular and it was just a decent cheap rum. I was dumbfounded by the giant swimming pool vats in a big open air building. Bugs were flying around and dying sweet deaths in the delicious sugar, barn swallows were flying around and nesting in the rafters (and presumably shitting in rum vats), and if I were a rat, I could think of few better locales to hunt and scavenge.

I still drink the rum…I guess 40% alcohol kills most things (including the few brain cells I have left)

14

I can top that… I’ve had wine on my fly on my fly.

15

Well…this one is pre-distillation…a little different…
The home made version of Puerto Rican rum (called cana) was banned well because of taxes but the public reason was because human excrement was being used in the fermentation process (amongst other things.)

16

I had a whine about the wine on my fly on my fly.

17

Whoa, Humberto… as one who has consumed his fair share of ron caña in PR, I’ve never, gracias a Dios, seen feces. I’ve seen meat, platanos, fruits, etc. And banned? My neighbors were still making and burying their jugs of ron up til fairly recently… .

18

I had a customer return a bottle of Mouton Cadet with a huge beetle in it that they only discovered after drinking half the bottle [barf.gif] I guessed the beetle was in the bottle when it was filled and was too big to be sparged (sp?) out during bottling.

19

It could mean that but highly unlikely. Even moving the wine from one barrel to another is a type of filtering if you don’t take the entire contents of the first barrel (it seems like vintners allow the barrels to settle before transferring wine around in many cases). Sweet wines are either sterile filtered or pasteurized (otherwise you have a ticking time bomb on your hands).

20

[rofl.gif]



I remember Rico T (of Mt. Nebbiolo fame) found an entire large spider in his mouth after gulping some Ch. Beaucastel. That would have made me barf.