QI recently inadvertently added the wrong yeast to a new batch of frozen Chardonnay juice. I had planned on using Lallemand’s ICV-D47 but picked up Red Star’s Côte des Blancs, it was four days into the fermentation before I caught the mistake. I immediately went to Daniel Pambianchi’s book Techniques in Home Winemaking to learn about the qualities of Côte des Blancs and found out it is not recommended for malolactic fermentation, which I had planned on doing. The wine is fermenting at a temperature of 58 °F (14 °C) and the SG is 1.042. When I started, the readings were S.G.: 1.102, pH: 3.4, TA: 0.72. My question, why is Côte des Blancs not recommended for MLF? If I do inoculate what are the down sides, if any? Bill HolderBrantford, Ontario AI’m glad you wrote in this question. It points to the importance of thinking about our wines in the big picture sense. Decisions we make in the beginning can affect what decisions we may be able to make — or have to make — later on. In your
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