View Full Version : Homebrewers / Winemakers - a few questions about elderberry wine.
I recently got 5 demijohns (1 gallon ones) for free, bought a fermenting tub, hydrometer and other assorted tat for winemaking and am going to go and harvest a load of elderberries to start a wine. There are plenty still good on the trees around here so should have more than enough for a couple of gallons of the stuff.
Firstly, I got some advice from the owner of the brew-shop I bought the tat from and he suggested freezing the berries on their stems and then shaking them off to avoid the mess of stripping them off with a fork. Good advice? Will freezing affect the fruit in any way that might make for a poorer (or indeed a better) wine?
In another thread someone suggested (using the fork method) stripping the berries off the stems over a sink of cold water to separate the ripe and unripe ones. Do I need to worry much about a few unripe (but still purple) ones getting into the mash or will it be fine with some in there?
My recipe calls for chopped raisins, the brew-shop guy suggested using grape juice (think it's a concentrate) he sells instead. Any verdict on that?
Finally, when I'm stripping the berries off the stems, how careful do I need to be to avoid stems getting into the mash? Do they really affect flavour a lot or should I relax a bit and not worry if a fair few small stems (just where they attach to a berry) get in too?
Can't wait to get this on the go now!
British Red
21-09-2009, 22:16
I don't freeze - but I do use the fork trick! I tend to take a fork out with me and come them off into a huge tupperware gathering tub. A few unripe wont hugely affect the flavour or a few tiny bits of stem.
Raisins and grape juice improve the "vinosity" (wine like) character of the drink and overcome the slightly "woody" flavour of elderberries. I prefer raisins TBH but its also good without. I have also used yeast nutrient before but don't find it necessary.
Any questions - shout
Red
Thanks, Red.
Do you know if the grape juice would likely make a decent wine on its own? I'm half thinking about making the elder wine with raisins but don't want to waste the juice.
It's that or make a gallon of elderberry wine with raisins and a gallon with juice. Of course, only having one bucket that would mean either making the mash in a demijohn (messy) or freezing half the berries while one is in the bucket - but that adds another variable and I won't really know which I prefer! I don't really have the space (or the money right now) to have 2 big buckets on the go either.
I've got yeast nutrient already. You've got me wondering whether or not I should use it now.
I'll be sure to give you a shout if I have any more questions.
British Red
22-09-2009, 06:15
You can indeed make wine with grape juice conentrate. You can also add it to strong tea for a fun wine!
If you have the concentrate, use it - whats to lose?
Same with the nutrient - it won't do any harm
Red
"What's to lose?"
Not much, I don't suppose.
I get the feeling it's one of those things where anything I make will most likely work, making a drink that shouldn't be too sickening and will be enough to make the room move a bit.
Think I might make a couple of batches, one with grapes and one with concentrate. Just to see.
We've got a spot of rain today after a few sunny days. Is that likely to affect the berries? I've always been told fruit was best to pick after a couple of good sunny days.
Worth picking now or wait for some sun and hope there's still good berries about then?
British Red
22-09-2009, 12:39
I've never worried - just pick em :)
Cheers Red.
I've heard so much about harvests when things are just right I think I'm worrying far too much about it!
Haha.
I'll head off to the park tomorrow afternoon I think. There's usually a few metric tons of the things weighing the trees down in there. There's a spot I know surrounding a small mountain of horse manure too - the berries around there always look good.
There's loads around here, Firecrest and her fellah joined me on the local farm the other day poking the dead badger and gathering elderberries. We hardly made a dent in the crop, but I have filled up tubs and out them in the freezer for use later on. I also don't rate the fork trick now after trying it, too any berries were coming off with little bits of twig stuck to them. I developed a new technique whereby I hold the bunch in one hand and roll he berries off the stems with my thumb. A few little bits of stem go in but far less than with the fork. Maybe I am worrying to much about the sticks but I've never done this before and I'm getting a bit compulsive over the whole affair! I am going for zero tolerance on stick inclusions in my berries! :yikes:
littlebiglane
22-09-2009, 17:40
If you de-stalk the berries over a basin of water the unripe berries will float and you can just skim them offf. The ripe ones sink :)
Spamel - think I might have done that when I made some elder and blackberry jam around this time last year.
I remember being kinda unimpressed with the fork method for the same reason.
littlebiglane - I think I saw that mentioned elsewhere too. I'll most certainly be giving that trick a try. Cheers :D
I find a little stalk material makes it a tad drier, which I like.
If freezing, i bung the lot in the freezer, then pull off the berries off quick into the bucket when getting things ready for the first stage. If not I cut the worst of the stalks off letting the plump berries fall into the bucket.
All tastes good, especially with the juice and zest of a lemon and orange.
I've not used grape juice concentrate or raisins for years, I did use grape juice when I started because the book I had said it was needed, turns out the book was published on behalf of Boots the chemist who at the time used to sell grape juce and other wine making stuff.
Providing the livestock (spiders etc) and dust have been washed off the odd piece of stem and leaf wont hurt. at a guess freezing the elderberries to shake them off will still leave stem,
Some reasonable wines can be produced from the grape concentrates. I know wilkinsons sell different types as well as other fruit juce concentrates in their wine and brewing section
Lastly for red wines they should be fermented and stored in dark containers to stop the UV from turning it a funny colour. I have about 12 demijohns none of which are dark so I wrap brown paper around the ones with red wine in My local pub keeps me well supplied with wine bottles both clear and green
Addo - I can't remember whether my recipe calls for lemon and orange, but some in the same book do and I think they'd go really well in the wine.
Colin - I've got 5 clear demijohns and don't anticipate a problem. Have you ever had a wine discolour? I was in a shop called Demijohn up in Edinburgh (http://www.demijohn.co.uk/) where everything is stored in big, round demijohns (5 gallons each maybe?) on open shelves and all of it looked really good. The elderberry wine I got was LOVELY.
That said, I'll be keeping it all out of sight anyway. Once it's into demijohns it'll be kept in a cupboard that has a fairly stable temperature and I reckon it'll go into dark bottles anyway so no problem there I guess.
I didn't know Wilkinson's had a brewing section. I'll have to pop into the one near here and see what's what.
I'll try my local for some bottles though - hadn't actually thought of that.
Cheers for the replies, all - keep 'em coming! :D
What do people think about campden tablets?
Most of the recipes I see call for them to be crushed and dropped in several times, but the guy in the brew-shop suggested I'd be as well without and I've read elsewhere that wine made without them was far less headache-inducing.
Considering my love for all things organic and my recent step into organic allotment gardening I wonder how necessary it is to put it into the wine at all. I'd like to avoid it if possible at least.
Any good resources (websites ideally, I've run out of budget for new books lately) for organic winemaking?
Bigshot, excellent question.
I have been making good, bad, excellent and appalling elderberry wines over the last 15-20 years. I'm actually getting quite good at it now.:)
Stripping the berries - I very cleanly stripped 40-50lb fruit in 2 hours a few weeks ago. The secret is to harvest ripe bunches. Then take about 8 bunches by the stems in one hand and shake them vigorously in a bucket with a bit of plastic (I used a carrier bag) roughly lidding them so only a few fly out. This is about 10 times faster than with a fork and does less damage to the berries, leaves more stalk behind, and leaves under ripe berries and dried old ones back on the stalk.
If you get more than the occasional stalk then you can roll the berries down a table to leave the stalks behind.
I use 4lb fruit to the gallon. I don't add any other fruit or concentrate or acid or juice; just water and sugar.
Campden tablets are probably essential for white wines but I think you could get away without them with red wine.
It is good to use a pectolytic enzyme - some bushes you will get away without, others leave a cloudy haze difficult to clear if you don't use enzyme in the first place.
Steps I go through:-
Pick (taste the berries off each bush and select bushes that have nice tasting berries)
Strip
Crush
Add yeast - a wine yeast from a supplier.
Ferment the crushed fruit (in a covered bucket) - shaking down the fruit cap a couple of times a day. I do this for 1-2 days.
Then squeeze out the juice through a cloth bag,
Meanwhile I have got some cooled boiled water - into some of this I dissolve 1lb 14 oz sugar. (The boiling is all about driving off dissolved oxygen, so boil it for a few minutes to drive it nearly all off)
Into the demijohn then goes:- the juice, the dissolved sugar, and then topped up with more cooled boiled water - halfway up the shoulders, not right to the top.
Then fit a trap and let it ferment. (In the house this time of year)
When slower fermentation top up to the neck with more cooled boiled water.
When it completely stops fermenting place it somewhere cold for a couple of weeks to start clearing before first racking.
If I can I top up after racking with glass marbles - reduces the air without introducing more water or juice or sugar.
A month later I either rack again or if I'm ready and it is clear I bottle it direct.
Cheers, Rich.
Brilliant response!
When you say racking with glass marbles - what exactly do you mean? I understand what racking is, by the way, just not how marbles fit into it - you do mean marbles like those we played with as kids, right?
Also, what do you mean by "shaking down the fruit cap"?
Think I'll try a few methods this year (provided I can harvest enough berries) and see which I prefer. It will mean freezing some berries while my one bucket is used for previous batches but I can live with that.
So have I read it right, you mix yeast in with the crushed fruit and then a few days later add the water? Every other recipe I've seen adds water and yeast at the same time.
Is there any particular reason you do it that way around?
Glass marbles - is what I like to top up with after racking. Sorry for confusing phraseology.
Shaking down the fruit cap - When you crush the fruit you get a soupy liquid with juice, skins and seeds. Once it starts fermenting then the gas bubbles rise, but get trapped in the skins, so they rise to the top, out of the juice. Since you are trying to extract colour and flavour from the skins you need to get them back into the fermenting juice every once in a while.
Why do I add the sugar and water later? - Well firstly because I always have done. It probably doesn't make much difference really. Until recently there was a reason in that I didn't bother to dissolve the sugar, just chucked it into the demijohn to slowly dissolve of its own accord, so that way round it would have been a problem to add it to the crushed fruit and find I left half of it behind.
Also it worked out better timing wise. Picking, stripping and crushing and getting into your bucket with the yeast seemed quite enough to do the first day.
Also I gave you a simplified description of what I do. I don't actually boil most of the water these days. Instead I get the oxygen out by starting a fermentation in the sugar and water mix by adding some yeast and some yeast nutrient crystals from the wine shop. This can take a day or 2 get going so I can be doing that sort of stuff after the harvesting day if I delay the putting together rather than before I harvest.
Also... it will only ferment to 5-7% alcohol before running out of sugar so there is a different/ lighter extraction of flavours and colour. If you instead put all the sugar and waer in at the start and ferment for a week on the fruit then you will extract more stuff. That may be good, or maybe not depending on the flavour you want out of it at the end. As an example of what you might not want:- A couple of years back I tried making "eldeberry gin" like slow gin. I only had the fruit in the gin for a day or 2 but boy did it taste strong of undesirable flavours.
So.. I guess you get a different wine for different methods - try it different ways and see what you like.
I use pectalose in all the wines I make although some fruit, flowers etc have almost no pectin I have found it does help to produce a clear wine.despite making wine for many years I've only recently started using a hydrometer to regulate the sweetness and alcohol content (Wendy dont like it too dry) with reasonable results, I made some elder flower champagne last year using the hydrometer to control the sugar/alcohol ended up with a medium sweet sparkly wine with a kick like a cart horse, all 10 bottles went for my daughters 21st with some lovely printed labels done by my youngest. some people took a lot of comvincing it was home made because of the horror stories of home made wines they didnt believe wine that good could be produced at home
Rich - thanks for the detailed reply. I'll almost certainly give that method a go... though whether it will be this time or next year I can't say!
Back to the marbles... are you saying that when you rack the wine (losing a bit of liquid in the process) you put marbles like this into the demijohn?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marble_(toy)
There's not much to this question so here it is in all it's blunt glory...
Why?
:p
Colin - I think a lot of the horror stories may well be justified! Someone I was talking to about brewing about a year ago told me he makes beer from the kits but puts twice the amount of syrup in to get extra strong booze. It sounded absolutely horrible!
I'm hoping people won't believe my wines are home-brewed either... but I'm getting ahead of myself there.
I've got a hydrometer from the off, not so much for control at first, I'll just be following the recipes, but I'd like to be able to take the necessary readings to see what alcohol content I'm ending up with.
nicodiemus
24-09-2009, 07:39
With double kits, it wouldn't be extra alcoholic, it would be extra bitter, that's all. This is perfectly normal hop-head behaviour, the rest of us brewers tend to smile and nod and let them get on with it. :D
In that case I've got no idea what he was on about.
Still sounds pretty awful to me - I'm all for a hoppy ale when the time's right but something about doubling up doesn't sound right to me.
Think I'll join you in the smile and nod way.
Rich - thanks for the detailed reply. I'll almost certainly give that method a go... though whether it will be this time or next year I can't say!
Back to the marbles... are you saying that when you rack the wine (losing a bit of liquid in the process) you put marbles like this into the demijohn?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marble_(toy)
There's not much to this question so here it is in all it's blunt glory...
Why?
:pGlass marbles like kids used to play with. The reason is that they are just glass. They are not water that dilutes the alcohol content risking restarting the fermentation if there is a bit of sugar about. They are not sugar that might give a little boost to the yeast and start the fermentation again. They are not fruit juice that risks both of the above. They replace lost volume with the racking off the gunge at the bottom so keeping the amount of air at the top to a minimum. Before you racked it was almost pure carbon dioxide. With racking you end up with some air at the top of the demijohn that will contribute to spoiling the finished wine.
All so clear now!
That makes perfect sense.
Cheers.
I guess I'll have to buy some marbles... for some reason I don't think I'd feel right raiding the bag of marbles I've had since I was a nipper.
WhichDoctor
27-09-2009, 13:14
Very interesting thread.
I would just like to add that my Mum makes the most amazing elderberry and runner-bean wine. If i remember rightly the beans help neutralize some of the tannins in the elderberry or something. Anyway it makes a very smooth rounded wine, eminently drinkable :beerchug:
I'll be sure to grow some extra runner beans on my allotment this year so I can try that. It'll be interesting to see how it compares to straight elderberry.
Well it's all go now.
Last night I crushed the berries and grapes as best I could, poured on 4.5 litres of boiling water, gave it a good stir, mixed in the sugar well and left it to cool overnight. About an hour or so ago I checked and the temperature was at 21°C so I added the citric acid (as per the recipe, I'm not deviating from that this first time - I'll mess about when I feel a bit more confident) and took a hydrometer reading. The trial was at 20°C when I took the reading, as the hydrometer's instructions stated.
I'm a tad confused.
I've used a Stevenson Reeves hydrometer (the S1011 Triple Scale jobbie) http://www.stevenson-reeves.co.uk/hydrometers/HBWB.htm
According to the Hydrometer
1.084 specific gravity
roughly 225g suger per litre
13.5% potential ABV
According to the Specific Gravity table in the book I'm using
1.080 specific gravity
is 205g sugar per litre
10.6% potential ABV
and
1.085 specific gravity
is 222g sugar per litre
11.3% potential ABV
For reference, the recipe calls for 1.5kg elderberries, 225g raisins, 4.5l water, 1.1kg sugar, 2tsp citric acid, 1 tsp yeast nutrient and a sachet of yeast.
I'm using Gervin Wine Yeast No2, if that makes a difference.
Any input?
I'm also toying with not using campden tablets in the must... Good idea? Bad idea?
Oh hang on... I think something just half clicked...
When I was talking to someone local about brewing I mentioned a hydrometer and a thermometer in the same breath and was told, in no uncertain terms, that temperature had absolutely no bearing when using a hydrometer.
I was certain they were wrong, but being inexperienced in matters of brewing I couldn't articulate it too well without sounding like the annoying sort of know-it-all who still needs to ask for advice.
I looked it up (still sure I was right) and saw, as one would expect, that temperature AND atmospheric pressure are relevant factors in relative density!
It's nice to be proven right when you were made to feel like a bit of a dolt.
...The hydrometer chart in the book is assuming a reading taken at 15.5°C and having looked it up when I got home I now know temperature is relevant.
Quite how that would make the scales disagree isn't clear to me though. Surely each should be calibrated to the temperature it's meant to be read at and should give the same results.
Anyone?
gregorach
05-10-2009, 14:30
A properly calibrated Excise grade hydrometer costs about 80 quid...
The difference between the expected alcohol percentage between your two sources is probably down to assuming different final gravities. My advise would be to not worry about it too much - you're in the right ballpark.
Yea, I can't say I thought I was buying weapons-grade accuracy for £2.59. :)
I hadn't thought about how much a properly calibrated one would cost though.
The one I've got actually had a blue shaded area with "Start Wine" written on it. In fact, for a beginner it seems really useful. It makes the ballparks quite explicit. I'm definitely at the upper end of that area.
(It also has similar areas shaded for starting beer and for bottling both beer and wine - the latter of which is split for sewwt and dry wines too... most of it unnecessary I'm sure but it does help when you've never done it before)
The confusion was whether I should be expecting 10.6% (quite normal for a wine) or 13.5% - though thinking about it the elderberry wine I bought from DemiJohn in Edinburgh was about 14.5% so I don't suppose it matters to have something so strong.
You know, I really am enjoying this. It's like so many of the things I enjoy rolled into one. The fun of chemistry lessons and cooking, drink, outdoorsy stuff and the whole DIY thing I like so much. :D
I can't WAIT to get started on these sloes... in fact, I'm half tempted to go and buy another fermentation bucket just so I can get the next lot going a bit quicker!
EDIT
I just checked and the Hydrometer and book both suggest bottling between 1.000 and 1.010 - I'm not sure if that's what you were referring to with final gravities, though I suspect so.
I've just realised (again) that it's going to be AGES before I get to drink this stuff! It's not fair! Haha.
Wow!
Second full day of fermenting (so the second daily stir since adding the yeast) and the must is really fizzing away when I disturb it. Apparently the yeast is fermenting for all it is worth!
What a smell though!
I can't describe it (though it doesn't smell like rotten fruit or wine that's turned to vinegar - thought either of them could be a possibility I suppose) other than it's strong and reminds me somewhat of a cross between a brewery (without the hops smell, obviously) and a pub's slops bucket.
Is that normal?
Whilst I can't solve your contradictions on different charts entirely I would encourage you to perhaps get 2-3 more charts/ scales and see if there is an error somewhere. I would have thought that:-
According to the Hydrometer
1.084 specific gravity
roughly 225g suger per litre
13.5% potential ABV
sounds very fishy as charts I refer to put 1.080 as round about 10%.
The point of the campden tablets/ sulphite was at the very start of the ferment when there is oxygen present in the unfermented stuff. If you put some in at the start it is useful then. It only becomes useful again at the end when oxygen may have a chance of causing you problems again. If you had put some in early it would then blow off with all the bubbling and you would need to consider putting some more in at the end.
Ah! the smells. I remember a 5 gallon batch of peach! - Banished for about 2 years due to the bad smells. Came across it later and it was delicious.
If you want to be drinking it quickly then you need to be fermenting it at about 25 degrees C. I had some test batches ferment out in a week and be pretty clear by 2 weeks this summer.
So... the smell is normal then? (Well, I know you can't smell it, but it's normal for a bit of a honk while it's fizzing away in the bucket is it?)
I wonder, there's still a few days left to go in the bucket, would it be worth putting campden in now or not bother? Maybe I'm just losing my nerve about doing it non-chemically!
It's my intention to leave this going for quite a while and then bottle and leave it for at least a few months. The recipe suggests leaving it for 18 months before drinking. From what I've heard it'll be a much nicer wine that way. I'm a bit impatient to try some but I'm willing to wait a while if it means a nicer wine.
On the hydrometer front, the scale I quoted from that bit is on the hydrometer itself. Maybe it isn't to be trusted if it's as far off the mark as it seems from what you've said. That said, anything between 10ish (normal for most shop bought wines I think) and about 15 (same as the Elderberry wine I got recently) I'll be happy enough.
I'll probably take a reading of normal water at standard temp and pressure and see if it reads somewhere close to 1.000... at least then I'll know if the density scale on the hydrometer is to be trusted at all. The rest doesn't really matter so much once I know the answer to that, I suppose.
I'm sort of planning to take a trial when it's stopped fermenting entirely and then add a bit more sugar and keep doing so until it won't start up again meaning dead yeast, then sweeten it to somewhere around medium (or slightly sweeter if the girlfriend gets her way) - is that a good idea or not?
gregorach
07-10-2009, 09:47
I definitely wouldn't be putting a camden tab in now.
There's basically two ways to produce a sweeter wine - either keep adding sugar until it stops fermenting, or "cut" it by using a camden tablet and some fermentation stopper (potassium sorbate) when it reaches your desired gravity. Or I suppose you could combine the two, by letting it ferment right out, then adding the camden / pot. sorbate, and then adding more sugar.
Don't worry about differences in the estimated alcohol content from different tables - the alcohol content depends on difference between starting and finishing gravity, so you can't estimate it accurately from only the starting gravity. I suspect that one source is giving the alcohol content if the finishing gravity is 1.0, and another is based on it finishing at about 0.99, which equates to a difference of about 2%. 13.5% seems a too high either way...
Right...
...you know, it is ratehr a lot of fun to feel so hopelessly lost with something. It's that sure feeling you get when doing something completely and utterly new without a single concept you've used before... (well, I've used yeast in bread, but that's stretching things a bit) ...not a feeling I have enough, must do more things for the first time!
The book I quoted abv predictions from actually details how to calculate it from start and end gravities so shouldn't have a problem there. Just to confirm though, it is:
ABV = ((ρ1 x 1000) - (ρ2 x 1000)) / 7.35
I don't know if there's more than one way of calculating it - but that's the one I have.
gregorach
07-10-2009, 16:28
That's it, but I've encountered various values for the constant, from 7.35 to 7.46... I split the difference and use 7.4.
Haha - I might have known there'd be some sort of uncertainty about it!
Any idea which one is the official constant used for the booze that goes to retail?
gregorach
07-10-2009, 17:16
Not off the top of my head. I suspect that the proper calculation may be somewhat more complex...
When I make wines I try to keep a detailed diary of what I did and what I measured/ noticed. That way I can learn from my experience and perhaps do it better another time.
If you wanted to do a simple hydrometer test you might make up a sugar solution with water and see if the reading is as expected.
I don't bother to attempt to get the stronger wines. 11% is plenty enough for me and I don't even like commercial 14% wines these days - they taste too powerful on the throat and unbalance the taste. If you aim for the higher amounts then you might get a continuing slow ferment when you want to be racking it off the lees. I don't like the risk of getting a sweet wine either as I don't particularly like them either.
If it goes to full dryness by the way then the gravity will be about 0.992 which used to surprise me!
I'm keeping a detailed record of what happens including the smells I notice, fizzing and so on. I've even written the met office's predicted air pressure for the area with the hydrometer reading just in case! I don't expect I'll be needing it, but it's there if I do.
I was going to aim for around 11% but have no idea how to plan things to get there. I've just done a bit of searching and have found that Gervin No-2 is "Montrachet strain, Davis 522" which can tolerate up to 15%.
Personally I tend not to go for anything too sweet either - but since my girlfriend has asked I'll probably make something a bit sweeter than I'd intended to.
So, if I was going to stop somewhere around 11%, how is best to stop it so I can get the right level of sweetness without the fermentation starting again? I don't suppose there's any way if not using campden is there?
I'm starting to realise just how far out of my depth I am now... and I'm still loving it! Haha.
I've just found a rather technical website, most of which I don't understand, but it seems to explain the difference in predicted alcohol based on the hydrometer reading...
It could be that the book made a correction of some sort for non-sugar solids suspended in the liquid and the hydrometer didn't. Of course, any such correction would be inaccurate as the amount of such solids would vary from fruit to fruit, but it could explain things.
British Red
08-10-2009, 06:48
Have you recorded the pantone shifts in colour as well?
You may also like to titrate the solution to observe the relavent shifts in acidity.
(or just wait until you get less than one "blurp" in 30 seconds and you know its fermented out :D)
Seriously though, I get the fascination and have done similar myself, but in all reality "it will be what it will be". Whilst you can stop fermentation at a point, or make a wine sweeter after fermentation etc., I have found that its rarely a good idea (fermentation restarting or continuing in the bottle is plain old messy for example).
What is really useful is knowing exactly what you did - the precise recipe etc. so that when you get a really great batch, you can re-create it. I've never gone quite as far as Rich has with his elderberry varieties but things like apple varieties for making apple wine really vary the taste -imagine the difference in falvour between a Granny Smith and a russet and you can see why you get a different wine.
Its all good, cheap interesting fun though!
Red
Panatone?
SOD IT!.... I knew I'd forgotten something!!!
If I was going to sweeten after fermenting, I'd intend to do it in a demijohn and leave it a while to be sure it wasn't going to fire up again in the bottle... I don't fancy the idea of one exploding, especially not after the exploding mead story I heard about a family friend a couple of weeks ago.
If going for a "it will be what it will be" approach does that mean you've either got to start off with a recipe that will either give you a dry wine of the right strength (say, 11%) or a strong one that's a bit sweeter (that'd be 16% in the case of the yeast I'm using)?
I'm not sure I see how I could get, say, an 11% medium wine without messing around somehow unless I get a yeast that wouldn't survive above 11%.
Cheap and interesting is dead right though. I'm having a great time - and with my 5 demijohns being free I just paid for the bucket and some assorted tat. Money well spent already and all I have so far is a bucket full of fizzy juice that's currently smelling uncannily like blackthorn cider that's been left overnight in a glass wash room at the first bar I worked in!
British Red
08-10-2009, 12:31
Panatone?
SOD IT!.... I knew I'd forgotten something!!!
If I was going to sweeten after fermenting, I'd intend to do it in a demijohn and leave it a while to be sure it wasn't going to fire up again in the bottle... I don't fancy the idea of one exploding, especially not after the exploding mead story I heard about a family friend a couple of weeks ago.
If going for a "it will be what it will be" approach does that mean you've either got to start off with a recipe that will either give you a dry wine of the right strength (say, 11%) or a strong one that's a bit sweeter (that'd be 16% in the case of the yeast I'm using)?
I'm not sure I see how I could get, say, an 11% medium wine without messing around somehow unless I get a yeast that wouldn't survive above 11%.
Cheap and interesting is dead right though. I'm having a great time - and with my 5 demijohns being free I just paid for the bucket and some assorted tat. Money well spent already and all I have so far is a bucket full of fizzy juice that's currently smelling uncannily like blackthorn cider that's been left overnight in a glass wash room at the first bar I worked in!
Spot on with the yeast - if you add more sugar than the yeast can consume before they die off, you get "sweetness". Different yeasts will die off at different points and convert different amounts in the process. To achieve I highly alcohlic sweet wine I would start with a champagne yeast and a boat load of sugar.
You can of course kill the yeast in the must using various additives but I dislike adding "gunk" to my wine
Red
bit late for this one but - if you use apple juice instead of grpae juice yiu get a nice fruity wine. Can be a bit potent though.
If I need to add more sugar to a wine at the begining I tend to use apple juice rather than sugar and water.
EdS - yep, definitely a bit late there. :p The thing's going into a demijohn tomorrow!
I'll have a shot at that next time though.
Red - I'm inclined to agree on the "gunk" front too.
Maybe this batch will just be strong and then sweetened up a bit, I'll look for a slightly less alcohol tolerant yeast for the next lot.
Can anyone suggest a good yeast for things like elderberry wine that will go up to the 10% or 11% ABV?
I used Gervin #2 because I was told it was good for fruit wines, I might have looked for something else if I'd known it was a 16%er.
Also, recommendations for similar criteria but for floral wines like Elderflower would be handy too. Cheers.