General Concentrate Wine

I just started a 2 gallon batch of Welches white grape. Started this past Tuesday. Followed the recipe, except i added some oak to the fermentation bucket.. the batch has not Started foaming yet, so i am thinking it is not fermenting yet. Added the nutrient & energizer for the yeast. Tried adding more sugar yeast enegizer & nutrients this morning. Still no action in the bucket, Any thoughts around this?

If you scaled down the recipe then you added 4# of sugar? What was your OG?

It did start back up again today. Thanks for the quick response.

I have decided to cold crash my rasp concentrate wine. Its been fermenting for about 1 month, second time around. My SG was about 1.02 or 1.03. How long should I keep it in the frig? Never done this before.

I've never cold crashed before so I'm not sure. I've had a damn straight-grape concentrate wine that's been going since July and is still dropping like .001 a every week or two. Down to 1.022 and driving me CRAZY with it's slow slow slow bubbling.

brazedowl said:

I've never cold crashed before so I'm not sure. I've had a damn straight-grape concentrate wine that's been going since July and is still dropping like .001 a every week or two. Down to 1.022 and driving me CRAZY with it's slow slow slow bubbling.

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Aging and fermenting this long in the primary (or secondary if you have racked) it is going to be really damn good...mines been sitting a month or two but I dont even plan on moving it from the primary for another month or two and Im not going to bottle until june or july

Cold crash for 24 hours to stun the yeast and make it fall to the bottom of your carboy, then rack onto your sorbate/campden to prevent fermentation restart.

Oh yeah, one more thing...when you are buying your concentrates be sure to look at the ingredients and make sure it isn't sulfited; if it says that you'll never get it going because it's been stabilized to make sure there isn't fermentation.

Just started a batch last night per recipe using apple kiwi strawberry in a Carlo Rossi 4L jug filled up to the base of the neck. Airlock showed activity within a couple of hours and hasn't let up since. The yeast seem to be having a field day in there. Thanks for the recipe

About three weeks ago I started 2 1-gallon batches of various flavors. Yesterday I decided to do a gravity reading out of curiosity and tasted the sample. Dear lord... I will not even look at these again for a month. Tasted like strawberry flavored rubbing alcohol. I'm sure the flavors will blend better over time but that was something I'd never tasted before.

Glad I could help out!

I'm enjoying a cran-apple from this recipe right now. tomorrow I bottle a straight-grape and a mixed-berry

dgrums said:

About three weeks ago I started 2 1-gallon batches of various flavors. Yesterday I decided to do a gravity reading out of curiosity and tasted the sample. Dear lord... I will not even look at these again for a month. Tasted like strawberry flavored rubbing alcohol. I'm sure the flavors will blend better over time but that was something I'd never tasted before.

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What concentrates did you use by the way? I've never done a strawberry one.

brazedowl said:

What concentrates did you use by the way? I've never done a strawberry one.

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One batch is grape concentrate mixed with cranberry strawberry juice and the other is grape concentrate mixed with raspberry lemonade

Mine tend to end up sweet and thick with flavor but still strong. Seems you may be shy on the concentrate if the alcohol is coming through so strongly. hmm...

brazedowl said:

Mine tend to end up sweet and thick with flavor but still strong. Seems you may be shy on the concentrate if the alcohol is coming through so strongly. hmm...

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That may be the case. This was just a tester and I wouldn't mind tossing it if it doesn't come out right. In the cranberry strawberry batch, I used one concentrate and one 64 oz container of juice. It's only been 2 or 3 weeks so I'm going to let it finish up and see if the flavors blend a bit better

I'm going to try a test batch today of 1 gallon. Has anyone used a different sugar then white, like corn sugar?

I've tried brown sugar with apple concentrate, that's about it.

Was just wondering if there anything u can add to make it not so sweet been siting for almost two moths and its really sweet

Hit it with a little energizer/nutrient and stir up the yeast on the bottom. Should be enough to get it fermenting again for a while.

Thanks will try out I got about 5 g goings so what about tablespoon of each or try one first ?

Yea give. I just use a turkey baster to draw up some liquid to dissolve it in then pour it back in. You can mix it pretty well by just repeatedly squeezing the baster inside the wine without blowing bubbles. this agitates the yeast, mixes the nutrient and does not introduce much oxygen.

Perfect will give it a shot c what happens ... Do I gotta leave the airlock off since starting up fermenting again?

Nope. Lock it back up.

After you move it to secondary, how long should you wait to bottle? You said 1-2 months .what came out better? How long should it sit in bottle before you drink it? The big question is when can you drink it?

haha as soon as it's clear you can drink it. Normally by the time it's clear the fermentation has stopped. I still recommend stabilizing, but it's pretty much good to go. It does mellow over time and the flavors come together, but this isn't a fancy 2-3 year aging wine.

Thank you Brazedowl! I will move into secondary today and let it clear. Being a beer brewer, I have plenty of bottles so I will use this method of bottling when ready. I'll update then.

Has anyone expierienced stuck fermentation because of the high sugar content or a false hydrometer reading???

This question comes up frequently. Here's the standard response

Sometimes the OG is so high that the yeast doesn't get started or can peeter out. Did it start vigorously and then stop? I had to take out about 3L and topped back up with water. It went off like crazy. I siphoned the 3L off into a 4L carlo rosi bottle and topped it with water and it took off too. I'll recombine the two volumes when it comes time to bottle so as not to lose any. That would be my advice.

Thats exactly what happened. It took off like crazy and went for a week. I took a hydrometer reading and it was only half done. I did throw in some yeast nutrient but that has done nothing.

right. Do the slight dilution thing.

When you say dilute it 3L thats about a gallon right? Seems like a lot.

Nevermind. Found my answer

Should I expect this to come out clear? Or should it look like the commercial mikes hard lemonade? I used a passion fruit concentrate.

I used apple/kiwi/strawberry and it was cloudy for a couple of weeks and was crystal clear at around the one month mark

Helly,

I basically copied your recipe today except I used Welch's white grape and raspberry concentrate. Do you have any other tasting notes other than tart? Did it finish dry/sweet?

Thanks!

Pomylka22 said:

Helly,

I basically copied your recipe today except I used Welch's white grape and raspberry concentrate. Do you have any other tasting notes other than tart? Did it finish dry/sweet?

Thanks!

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I have found that the cranberry tartness mellows and it's been a really nice easy wine to drink after a couple months. I tried a batch that was red grape & cranberry mixed (1 can each for a 1 gallon batch) but I didn't like it as much. For me it was too thin and not a real full flavor. Fine for something to drink as table wine or to chill and drink a glass but so far the cranberry only is my favorite version of this. I should note that I haven't tried this with the white grape juice though. Raspberry sounds great, let us know how it turns out.

Pomylka22 said:

Helly,

I basically copied your recipe today except I used Welch's white grape and raspberry concentrate. Do you have any other tasting notes other than tart? Did it finish dry/sweet?

Thanks!

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I've never done any with raspberry, but it sounds nice! so I can't give any tasting notes, but with this recipe I've never had it finish dry. If you want it drier you need to cut the sugar some.

Well I pitched my yeast on 2-1-13 and its still bubbling. Very slow fermentation.

brazedowl said:

haha as soon as it's clear you can drink it. Normally by the time it's clear the fermentation has stopped. I still recommend stabilizing, but it's pretty much good to go. It does mellow over time and the flavors come together, but this isn't a fancy 2-3 year aging wine.

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You recommend stabilizing, what does that mean? Sorry but I'm a noob when it comes to wine being this is my first attempt. At the end of March it will be two months. Do I bottle at that point? How long does it have to sit in bottle before you recommend serving it? Do you have to add anything when you bottle it?

Thanks for recipe it may be my next batch.