Bottling
Your hard work has come to and end and the last thing you now have to do is bottle your wine. As this is the last step in the wine making process it is vital to make sure all of your equipment is sanitized (as it should have been for all other phases) Make sure you are using clean sanitized bottles. You can use used bottles, however, I caution that you not use a bottle where there was ever any mould activity present. Yes, it can be washed out; however, I would not risk contamination at this point so just stay clear of mouldy bottles.
If you do keep your used bottles and re-use them, I strongly suggest washing them out immediately after you have emptied them with hot soapy water and then store them on a bottle tree upside down for future use. This should be enough to ensure there is no mould.
For bottling, you will need your bottling siphon hose, a corker (a hand corker will do but if you are like me and despise hand corkers, go spend the extra money on a stand up corker – they make the job much more enjoyable), corks, and if you’re real enthusiastic some labels. (I use masking tape).
Make sure you are only using new/unused dry corks. Make extra sure your bottles are sanitized and rinsed properly. To do this you can use a hand pump action bottle sanitizer and a sink attachment bottle rinser. (Both can be purchased at your local wine making store) Fill up your wine bottles so that the wine is level with the base of the neck and then cork the bottle.
Once you have bottled and corked all of your wine make sure you keep track of the date the wine was bottled on. As I mentioned, I use masking tape and write on it the type of wine it is and the date it was bottled on. This helps me keep track of how long it has been bottled for so I know when to drink it later. You can use fancy labels for this as well if you have more time.
Now that your wine is bottled and labelled it’s time to store them. You can now move on to the next phase.