Cold stabilization

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Cold stabilization is a process used in winemaking to reduce tartrate crystals (generally potassium bitartrate) in wine. These tartrate crystals look like grains of clear sand, and are also known as "wine crystals" or "wine diamonds". They may appear to be sediment in the wine, but they are not.

Cold stabilizing is the process of dropping the temperature of the wine, after fermentation, to close to freezing for 1-2 weeks. This will cause the crystals to separate from the wine and stick to the sides of the holding vessel. When the wine is drained from the vessels, the tartrates are left behind.

During "heat stabilization", unstable proteins are removed by adsorption onto bentonite, preventing them from precipitating in the bottled wine.