The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Food & crafts => Home brewing => Topic started by: Dans on May 23, 2015, 02:58:46 pm
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Well I've been brewing coming on 10 years now. I was always taught 3lbs of sugar to 3lbs of fruit roughly, allanson's bread yeast, one week in a pot stirring daily, 6 weeks in a fermenter, taste and go from there. Generally that worked really well for us, though we had quite a few wines that needed longer, but really nice tasting wines, some a little sweet for other's liking.
Last year I got myself a hydrometer and thought maybe I should be getting a bit more technical with this. Had a year of not doing much brewing (damn phd) but ended up with a freezer full of fruit. Housebound and pregnant and looking to move I thought I'd get my brew on again.
Ended up adding on average 2lbs of sugar to 3lbs of fruit to get a decent reading on the hydrometer to start wines off (between 1.070 and 1.100) and used an actual wine yeast for half of them. Cleared out my freezer of fruit and started tasting last week. They are awful. Every single one of them. Watery and thin, barely any fruit or alcohol taste to any of them and hydrometer says the sugar is completely fermented out. I even tasted a wine that had only been in the fermenter a week (So 2 weeks since the yeast went in) and it was the same. No sugar left and watery as anything. I just don't quite understand what happened? ???
Anyone know where I went wrong? I'm guessing not enough sugar but it seems such a drastic change considering it was only 1lb less.
Think I shall be going back to my 3lbs to 3lbs again after this, and will try adding sugar to the wines we have done and see if they are salvageable, but it seems like such a waste. Starting to think some things are more of an art than a science. Either that or pregnant women are cursed for brewing. Never had such a bad brewing year.
Dans
1 gallon of white currant
1 gallon black currant
1 gallon of alpine strawberry
1 gallon or raspberry
1 gallon gooseberry
1 gallon of bean wine (yeah I wasn't expecting much from that)
5 gallons of elderflower
:'(
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Dans, I'm not very good with wine (making it that is but if you need a taster ;D ) I don't even understand my hydrometer. Have you made wine with frozen fruit before? I am just wondering if that is the problem.
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There will be more water in frozen fruit so did you cut down on the liquid added?
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We tend to always make from frozen fruit so it's the same amount of water as it has always been. About 3L of water to 3lba of frozen soft fruit gives a gallon once it goes into the demijohn. We always get a good wine from these fruits (not the bean as that was an utter experiment), but it does vary between years so we wanted consistency so thought we'd try being more exact measuring the sugar, but it seems our consistent product is pants lol.
We pick the fruit as it becomes available over the summer then brew in the autumn/winter/spring when we have more time. My hubby's Mum does the same most years from her garden and brings up to us frozen at the end of the season.
Only differences I can tell are:
1) less sugar
2) new yeast but only for some of the wines
Everything else has been done the same as we have done for years. We sterilise everything as we go as well so that shouldn't be an issue.
Only other thing I can think is we have some wild yeast that has gotten in and is affecting the wines when they are in the pot for a week. I've got one more on the go now, still with the reduced sugar and I have tried adding a campden tablet before adding my yeast just in case that is what has happened. I've got some red and white currants left in the freezer and think the wine I start with them as a mixed wine will be going back to the 3lbs of sugar unless I can work out what is wrong. :(
Dans
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I don't even understand my hydrometer.
I could help you out with the hydrometer. We've used it before to calculate wine strength, just seems when I add the amount of sugar it tells me to for a good wine I get water *sigh*
You need to take a hydrometer reading at the start of the wine making and at the end. It basically looks at how much sugar is there at the start and how much is there at the end. From that you can do a quick calculation (there are calculators on the net) that tells you how much sugar your yeast has turned to alcohol and thus how alcoholic your wine is.
Dans
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Have used these fruit varieties before and got good results? Insipid country wine is usually caused by a lack of tannin, some of them will require more tannin than others I use strong tea, this is what gives wine its bite, you should also be adding some acid (lemon or orange)
Generally for 1 gallon of wine I would use 1kg of sugar
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I;ve read around the subject at times but never got as far as brewing.
My logic suggests that the starting point should be to try and assess the sugar level in the fruit juice before embarking on dilution and then work out roughly your added water/sugar depending on how alcohoholic you want the wine and that also depends on the yeast variety.
Back in my schooldays it was considered that yeasts died off at 12% alcohol but I understad that yeast strains now can survive to 18-20% (so called super yeasts) with some beer yeasts apparently able to push towards 25% - heck that's nearly spirits levels
The fruit sugar level will obviously vary with seasons weather and may also require additions of yeast nutrients.
Throw is some more fruit and sugar and ferment it again
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Not trying to teach me granny to suck eggs .. What temperature did you take the hydrometer readings at? Is it a wine hydrometer .........isn't it ???
Have you checked your weighing scales with a packet of butter to see if they generally agree on the weight especially if you have digital electronic scales ... guess why I've asked that question ?
Look up the Pearson square for calculating the alcohol levels .
If you add a sugar syrup that is warm a quarter to half a pint at a time to a fermented out wine you can often take the alcohol levels up to 14 to 16 %.
I found that frozen fruits never gave such a food result as quality fresh especially if the fruit is over 6 months old as it tends to berak down due to the high acid contents.
Adding a bottle of cheap brandy to five gallons of poor wine and a couple of table spoons of glycerine can give some amazing smoothness and depth that will really warm your tummy if it is finally racked off and left to mature for several months.
Adding a mashed up ripe banana is also good for adding to the initial gallon of must.
You used to be able to buy a sort of glass tulip on a glass stem that has a microbore running through it, so that when you run filtered alcohol through it the weight of liquid drops down to the alcohol reading found present at a specific temperature .
I found that this tulip alcohol tester and my maths using the Pearson square & wine hydrometer were very close to each other all the time .
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Yep used the fruit varieties before (from our garden and my MILs), never added any citric acid or tannin, the guy who taught me to brew used a very simplified method, hence my trying to be a bit more 'sciency' with it now!
Pgkevet yep that's pretty much the line I was going down. Check how much sugar there was in fruit to start, add more sugar to the desired point then let it brew.
Cloddopper you may be onto something with the length of time the fruit was stored, and also possible defrosts/refrosts affecting quality. We have always used frozen fruit but it tended to be that I would brew in the autumn after we had all the fruits harvested, these sat until spring in the freezer and were moved between freezers and reweighed sometime Dec/Jan.
I did actually inherit one of those tulip style testers from a homebrewer, unfortunately it rolled off of a kitchen worktop during a move :-(
Hydrometer readings were taken between 20 and 24C with my wine hydrometer being marked as needing 20C. I've been using this online calculator which does have an option to adjust for differences in temperature:
http://winemakersacademy.com/wine-alcohol-content-calculator/ (http://winemakersacademy.com/wine-alcohol-content-calculator/)
I'll look up the method you give. The batteries were going on the scale so that could have also affected the amount of sugar, but it shouldn't have been by too much as it's roughly 1lb of sugar that my bowls hold and I used 2 of them for each wine. I'll make sure and calibrate next time, new batteries in now.
The wines are stopped (potassium sorbate), although I'm starting to think that my hydrometer is broken as the white currant and black currant said they had no sugar left but noticed yesterday that they are still popping despite the potassium sorbate! Going to have a go at the oldest one tomorrow (gooseberry and we've never had a bad batch of it before) adding some sugar to see if that helps the taste. If not I may go down your brandy route (although the bean one may get used as slug bait!). Gonna be hubby doing the repeated tastings though as I've got 10 days left before I'm due to pop this baby out!
Thanks for the help and the ideas guys. I feel a bit despairing each time I walk into the kitchen and see the demi-johns at the moment. Was half tempted just to pour them all down the drain the other day, but that may be the hormones.
Dans
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Maybe the ancients with their old wives tales are correct and pregnant ladies shouldn't make beer - or in this case wine :D :D It won't be long til you can try again once your wee girl arrives.
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Maybe the ancients with their old wives tales are correct and pregnant ladies shouldn't make beer - or in this case wine :D :D It won't be long til you can try again once your wee girl arrives.
I hadn't heard about it being an old wives tale, but I'm actually inclined to believe. Starting to think that some kind of pregnancy pheromone ruins wine. I have a lemon wine that went on months ago, using my normal 3lb sugar to 3lb fruit ratio, no tannins or anything extra added and that is still popping away and tasting good. These new wines are running out of sugar in 2 weeks. Think I am cursed...
Dans
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Could you use the freezer to concentrate it up a bit, as you would with applejack (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Applejack_%28beverage%29)?
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Woohoo, had a play with the gooseberry. Ended up adding a pound of sugar in post fermentation and it is good. It's not as good as the gooseberry normally is but I would have drunk the rest of the last taster glass if I wasn't carrying this baby! Better than I thought it would ever get. The gooseberry taste is back (my hubby couldn't work out what fruit it was made from at the first taste). :thumbsup:
The raspberry that I put on last, and used a campden tablet before adding the yeast, has had 2 weeks now and was also tasted. It's started to go the way of the others so hopefully caught it early enough that if we stop it and add some sugar it will still be up to the normal quality.
Also tasted the lemon that I started in my first trimester and it is pretty much perfect. Feeling much better about the brewing now and hubby is feeling quite tipsey as he was doing pretty much all the tasting. :excited:
Will add sugar to the others and once this baby is out I'll try my mixed white and red currant wine, see if I am free of the curse!
Dans - looking forward to a glass of lemon wine this summer.
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Could you use the freezer to concentrate it up a bit, as you would with applejack (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Applejack_%28beverage%29)?
What is applejack?
Dans
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Followed the link David put up - "Applejack was historically made by concentrating cider, either by the traditional method of freeze distillation or by true evaporative distillation. The term "applejack" derives from "jacking", a term for freeze distillation."
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Dans,
I made some wine last year and although we drank it it would probably have been good on chips :)
Whatever you were doing previously sounds easy. When you get the time could you explain a bit more. I get the 3lb fruit to 3lb sugar. Is that for 1 gallon? And how much yeast? And is there anything else you can tell me.
Thanks
Sally
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But Sally, its obviously not working
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The very basic method I was taught was:
3lbs of fruit
3lbs of sugar
Yeast (We were using Allanson's bread yeast - yellow tub)
Water to make a gallon once fruit is added (bit of a judge by eye but better to go too little than too much)
Bring your water to the boil
Add your sugar and stir until dissolved
Add your fruit to the water and then immediately turn off the heat (don't let it boil).
Stick the lid on your pan and leave to cool overnight/several hours
When it gets to room temperature add your yeast and cover with a tea towel
Stir wine daily for a week - recovering with towel each day.
After a week strain off the fruit (I use a sieve and funnel) and pour wine into a demijohn
If you don't have much liquid after straining off the fruit then boil some more, allow it cool and add until you're at the shoulders of the demijohn
Bung an airlock on and leave for 6 weeks
Taste, if good go to next step if not leave a bit longer
Once happy with it stop it with campden tablet (We now use potassium sorbate).
If you like filter the wine
Bottle it
Drink it
We now rack wines when we are happy with them to get them out of the sediment and make it easier on the filter. For a pot I use a 7L stock pot. Also with fruit I often use a cheese cloth along with the sieve to mean less fruit gunk gets in the demi-john.
We also learnt that if a wine tastes good drink it down, we try to avoid lots of chemicals (Although now we use the potassium sorbate) so the flavours can change over time. I still mourn a batch of plum wine that was sooo good that we saved the last bottle for a year. When we drank it it was awful. On the other side if it's not quite right leave it for a few months if you have the bottles/space, it may well improve and surprise you!
It's an utterly basic method, and if you read the brewing books there's loads on getting the right mix of tannins and citric acid, pectolase, nutrients for the yeast. A lot of recipes using raisins and grape concentrate. If you're worried your fruit isn't very acidic you can add some lemon juice, you can add a tea bag if you like at the fruit stage for tannins. But we got good wines 9 times out of 10 with this way so stuck to it for years until I tried to deviate just recently. Only wine we couldn't get to work was rhubarb - old socks every single time. I struggle to get a cherry wine I like as well but I have two friends who would tackle me to the ground for a bottle of our cherry so different strokes for different folks!
I've passed this method of brewing on to 4 lots of people teaching them face to face, generally with a couple of demijohns and boots wine filter to get them started. All now still brew and have gotten along quite well with it. Let me know if you need any other information. Always happy to spread the brewing love. So grateful to the guy who offered me a bottle of dandelion wine at a camp, and in response to my surprise that you could make wine from dandelions decided to teach me and get me set up to brew.
Dans
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But Sally, its obviously not working
But it WAS working before
thanks for the info Dans. I am going to give it a go
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D'oh didn't even see the link for applejack, my eyes must be going!
Interesting, though I must admit a fair amount went over my head!
But Sally, its obviously not working
The method I was using before was working well for 10 years oldwolf. It's when I have moved away from that method that I have run into trouble.
Dans
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Well, my water has been boiled, sugar disolved and the cut plums have gone in :fc:
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Good luck! :fc:
Dans
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Interesting, though I must admit a fair amount went over my head!
How about this then:
1) Take wine (small amount to start with, in case this is a total waste of time and alcohol!)
2) Pour into plastic lemonade bottle
3) Put in freezer until a decent amount of ice has formed (not until the whole lot is frozen)
4) Pour wine out using a sieve to catch the ice. Throw ice away
5) Warm wine up to drinking temperature
6) Taste and tell us if it made any difference! ;D
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With the yeast we made it up just the way it says on the tin. 150ml warmish water, tsp sugar, tbsp yeast, leave to activate then pour it in and give a stir.
You'll know if the yeast has taken or not as when you stir the next day you'll hear fizzing at the very least; you may even have a lot of foam. The fruit will have risen to the top as well. Make sure the pan isn't full to the brim at this point or it may overflow. If it is full then split between two pans or sit it in a roasting tray that'll contain any overflow.
Dans
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Now that my pregnant brain can handle Womble! Will give it a go and report back.
Dans
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My wine has been in the demijohn for 4 weeks now and it seems to have stopped completely. It was going like the clappers but I haven't seen any signs of life for a few days now. Do I still leave it for another couple of weeks (leave for 6 weeks and then taste) or do I taste now?
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I'd taste it and check the density. If it has stopped fermenting, what's the point of leaving it longer to not ferment further! :D
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I'd taste it and check the density. If it has stopped fermenting, what's the point of leaving it longer to not ferment further! :D
Tasting it sounds like a good idea? How much do I taste? a pint? ;D
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You'll probably find it will taste better after several large samples. To be truly representative you should really taste the whole demijohn.
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New or " Green " wine often has a yeasty insipid taste even if it has a high alcohol content .
"Rack the wine off " the sediment into a clean sterile container similar to the one you are currently using. Leaving the last inch that holds the sediment in the bottle undisturbed ..... by using a sterilized transparent plastic syphon tube . Do your hydrometer test if you feel like it and record the level of alcohol .
Refit the air lock once you have sterilized it along with the bung and refilled it with clean cold boiled water and then agitate the bottle a bit to get it swirling round .. this should ensure that any suspended yeast is allowed a final attempt at making alcohol .
Then in four or so weeks time repeat the operation , again leaving the sediment undisturbed.
Now do your alcohol reading , this racking should see a slight increase in alcohol & a dramatic reduction of sediment in the bottom of the demijohn .
If the alcohol reading is to your choosing you'll need to " Stop the wine " by adding the advised number of " Camden tablets " crushed and dissolved in a little of your wine to kill the yeast cells.
If you like your wine a lot drier ( not so sweet ) then you can let the wine carry on fermenting itself out after re-racking it yet again , till you get a higher alcohol reading or a set specific gravity reading. Then store the wine in an airlocked container for a couple more months .not only will the wine be almost fully fermented out it will have developed some wonderful scents and flavours . Bottle the wine in cleaned sterile bottles and cork with new sterile corks
Don't do what I did ...
I had five gallons of a delightful sparkling ruby red ( elderberry & black berry fortified with two litres of five star brandy to give it a bit of smoothness& body ) that I'd fermented out for over a year in bulk . Comne the middle of October I sampled and sampled it . Hic ) then bottled it . My own caligraphically made labels " Vin De Pays Gordon ". Now where on earth do your store 35 bottles of newly bottled wine when you don't have a cellar or out building .
I know ...... I'll put it on top of the wardrobe as it's always cool up there . Come the middle of FEB 1982 it got so cold we had to put the central heating on that night 21 of the bottles either exploded or popped their corks as the sudden warmth had caused the wines to start fermenting again.
Our bedroom was a hell of a mess , I had to use a wall & ceiling sealer to lock the wine stains in the wall and ceiling to stop them bleedog through .
From then on I always used Camden tablets to stop my wines. Do take care with some of the more delicate favoured wines, for too many Camden tablets can leave the sulphourous after taste that a lot of the cheaper German Pearl wines have.
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Right, I have sampled and its quite dry already. I wouldn't like it any drier so I guess its campden tablet time.
Need to get another demijohn out and sterlise it first.
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Just bottled it and it isn't half bad.
Thanks Dans :thumbsup:
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So glad it worked for you Sally.
Had an utter baby brain moment after moving and being confronted with liafs of windfall fruit. I made 3 batches of wine with the lower sugar. 15 gallons of wine (plum, apple and pear) that all taste watery! Hopefully will sweeten up snd hopefully it will stick in my mind now. 8 gallons of spiced apple on the go the old way.
Dans
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So glad it worked for you Sally.
Had an utter baby brain moment after moving and being confronted with liafs of windfall fruit. I made 3 batches of wine with the lower sugar. 15 gallons of wine (plum, apple and pear) that all taste watery! Hopefully will sweeten up snd hopefully it will stick in my mind now. 8 gallons of spiced apple on the go the old way.
Dans
Sweet plum or strawberry wine tends to start to develop a sulphurous taste if it is over 30 months old .. so don't go laying it down as a long term vintage .
Most other sweet wine also go the same way ..if you fully ferment them out to as dry as possible , they can often be OK five or so years later if you can leave them alone that long .
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I don't think it will last longer than christmas clodhopper ;)
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Most of our wines we drink within a year. Only one that has aged well for us is the elderberry. When we first started brewing we would try keeping a bottle to age but never worked. Now our philosophy is: If it's good drink it up, if it's not then we leave it for a few months and test, do that a few times and if still no good then it's slug bait!
Dans