Maple Wine Yeast Nutrient Help

[brill]

I have 8 gallons of maple wine (mead made with maple syrup instead of honey) that I pitched months ago and have had in the basement and just reracked today. three gallons of it had a bunch of blueberries added to it, and five gallons was pretty much plain. I used yeast nutrient in both: "Crosby and Baker Fermax Yeast Nutrient." I put 6 tsp in the plain maple wine and 4 tsp in the blueberry maple wine.

Here's the issue: the blueberry maple wine tastes good, seems to be fermenting well, but the plain is still much too sweet. THis is odd since the blueberry wine actually had more sugar than the plain. What I'm guessing is that the blueberries helped the yeast to grow, thus causing a more efficient fermentation. Does this mean I should add more nutrient to the plain right nowbefore I put it back in the basement? Will that help give zeal to the secondary fermentation?

For yeast I used redstar champagne yeast (17 percent max) and aimed for an alcohol content several notches lower than that. (I forget now exactly, but when I figured it out, it was somewhere around 14% I i think. I still have my exact recipe, but never actually bothered to write down my goal alcohol content... that was dumb)


Thanks so much,

- Brill

 

[buzzerj]

Adding nutrient now after months isn't going to help you. The yeast are done especially in basement temperatures. It could be that the blueberry addition sparked another round of fermentation in the three gallon batch. As for the five gallons it's quite late to rouse the yeast with more nutrient. Based on the current specific gravity what is the current %ABV of the 5 gallon batch? I hesitate to tell you to add sugar and nutrient now unless you also add a strong champagne yeast like Lalvin KIV-1116 to try a restart. Even then I'm skeptical it will reliably restart. I have not used maple syrup as a sugar source but it's likely that long chain sugars remain that your Pasteur Champagne yeast couldn't metabolize yet maybe some yeast on the blueberries could. That's why I suggest using and extra strong champagne yeast to try to restart. However the best course of action is to stagger addition of nutrients and add them with monitoring of th gravity over the first week. I usually ensure my meads are completely dry after the first week and fermentation is pretty much done by then. If you have further fermentation (bubbling) after a month, your fermentation is labored.

 

[fatbloke]

buzzerj, just as a pointer/tip, K1-V1116 isn't a champagne yeast. It's the Montpellier strain. Very robust and has the "killer" factor, plus it has a mega wide temperature range and will do 18%......

Lalvin don't recommend it for restarting stickies.

EC-1118 is their usual champagne yeast and they do suggest it as suitable for restarting.

Uvaferm 43 is (apparently) better but not so easily sourced and something in my head says it (maybe, can't remember) a bit of a nutrient hog........

Not gonna suggest any remedy for the OP, as I've not done any acerglyns or maple wines.......