concord wine

Someone recently gave me 12 lbs of concord grapes. I decided to experiment, never having made grape wine before from raw fruit. I wanted to make a white, but decided squeezing the fruit out of the skins was too much work (note: after pre-processing, I think this is NOT the case!), so I just mashed all the fruit and got exactly 1 gallon of juice.

I'm not following a recipe--just winging it based on about 30 gallons of other fruit wine I've made in the past.

My 1-gallon must fermented (Montrachet) rather vigorously and quickly (in about 5 - 7 days my gravity went from 1.064 to 0.999), so I've already racked it and added some sugar syrup to fill the volume of the void taken up by the sediment that settled out.

Anyway, my real questions are (1) have I done anything wrong
so far and (2) I've noticed (and read) that eastern grapes are very acidic. I have some acid-reducing crystals. Should I wait until I'm ready to bottle--after sweetening to taste--to add any such acid reducing products?

If you added more sugar you will have another fermantation unless you killed the yeast with campden or something similar. There will still be yeast in the wine and adding sugar means adding food.

I didn't think campden killed the yeast? Most recepies include a crushed tablet before the yeast is pitched or is that to kill yeasts that may be present before pitching?

nissed as a pewt said:

I didn't think campden killed the yeast? Most recepies include a crushed tablet before the yeast is pitched or is that to kill yeasts that may be present before pitching?

Click to expand...

The killing effects of campden wear off after a day or so. So, the recipes you have seen add campden immediately to kill wild yeast in the juice, just as you suspected. Then, when the campden's effects have worn off, you pitch the yeast you WANT to do the fermenting.

-walker

Ah that makes sense then.

I made an apple recipe and overdid the sugar so as the fermentation was nearing its end I added some more apple juice unsweetened to dilout the alcohol so the sugar would ferment out I also added in proportion to the original recipe nutrient, acid and.... campden!

I guess thats why its slowed down so much? Although slow it is still going though (its 24 hrs on) is it likely to pick up in a day or 2 or become stuck?