Potassium sorbate/camden??

[brewman551]

I'm really new at making wine and have a couple of questions. I have two one-gallon batches. Both are Yooper's Apple Juice Wine recipe. The first batch was put into a secondary glass jug and held there for two months, racked into a different glass jug at two months old, and is coming up on another two-month anniversary in a few days. So, total of about 4 months old. It's clear enough to read through, but there is a tiny bit of sediment in the bottom. I mean a tiny bit. For this third racking, should i rack on top of a crushed camden tablet, wait two more months and then bottle, or should I just bottle now? I read that Yooper likes to use camden on every other racking and at bottling. I also want to sweeten this a bit, as my wife likes more of a dessert wine. I have some powdered potassium sorbate, but I don't know the amounts to use with sugar for a one-gallon batch. Does anyone know the amount of K-sorbate/sugar for a one-gallon batch? Also, I am probably going to bottle in 22 oz beer bottles.

As for the second batch, it's the same, just about a month younger, so any advice I get for the first, I can just follow for the second.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Yooper]

Make sure there are no lees at all when you add the sorbate- so racking off of them into a new vessel is important.

The sorbate is 1/2 teaspoon per gallon, and you can dissolve that in the boiling 1/4 cup of water with the crushed campden tablet. That's the easy way to do it- still some water in the microwave, and when it boils take it out and add the campden tablet and smoosh it up, then stir in the sorbate, sti until completely dissolved, and add that to the new sanitized vessel and rack the wine into it.

As far as how much sugar to add, it really is about "to taste". I drink mostly dry wines, so "sweet" to me is probably not sweet to someone with a sweet tooth or who likes dessert wines. I would find even 1.010 cloyingly sweet, but others might not find it sweet at all. You can sweeten to taste, by using simple syrup and a tiny sample of the wine and see how much is right for your goal.

 

[brewman551]

Thanks Yooper!


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