Next, transfer the containers to a place where the wine will be
thoroughly chilled, even down to freezing. This precipitates more
suspended matter and unwanted ingredients, and encourages clarification.
Assuming that the wine was made in early fall, hold it in cool storage
until after the first of the year. By then it should have "fallen
bright" and be stable. To test its clarity, hold a lighted match behind
the bottle.
The wine is then siphoned once again from its sediment, and another dose
of meta added at the same rate of ¼ teaspoon per 5 gallons.
If the wine is brilliantly clear, one container of it may then be
siphoned into wine bottles, corked or capped, and is ready for immediate
use. Despite the common impression, most wine does not gain greatly by
aging once it is stable. It continues to evolve, but not necessarily for
the better.
The rest of the wine is held until after the return of warm weather to
make sure there will be no resumption of fermentation, which would blow
corks if the wine was bottled. By mid-May that hazard will have passed,
and the wine is ready for its final siphoning, its final dose of the
same quantity of meta, and bottling.
_Fining._ If in January the wine is not brilliantly clear, it should be
"fined". This consists of dissolving in a small amount of hot water and
mixing in, at the time of siphoning, ordinary household gelatin at the
rate of ¼ ounce (2 teaspoonsful) per 5 gallons. This will turn the wine
milky when mixed in and will slowly settle, dragging all impurities and
suspended matter with it. In two weeks to a month the process of
"fining" will be complete. The wine is then ready to be siphoned from
the fining sediment and treated as above.