Already juiced plums, maple syrup instead of sugar?

[David Goldsmith]

Hi, newbie here (to the list and to wine making). I have about 6 liters of plum juice I'd like to make plum wine out of; all the recipes I've found online assume you haven't already juiced the plums, i.e., they give the volume of chopped plums to use: can anyone point me to/provide a recipe in terms of the amount of plum juice (or should I just estimate that juice was about 85% of the whole plum volume, so that my 6L juice corresponds to about 7L whole plums)? Also: I'd like to try to use maple syrup as the carb source for the yeast--any advice (incl. "definitely don't even try")?

 

[Blacksmith1]

Just work off the juice volume. Take an Sg, and then adjust using sugar or a simple syrup for the ABV you want.
Or,You have about a gallon and a half of juice. If tou take a gallon recipe and multiply it by .50 you will have a workable recipe.

 

[Seamonkey84]

I’d recommend using sugar/honey for the majority of the fermentation, aiming a bit lower than you want, and then finish/back sweeten with maple syrup. From what I’ve read, dry maple syrup tastes like wood. But it’s kind way to add wood aged flavor.

 

[JimRausch]

I’d recommend using sugar/honey for the majority of the fermentation, aiming a bit lower than you want, and then finish/back sweeten with maple syrup. From what I’ve read, dry maple syrup tastes like wood. But it’s kind way to add wood aged flavor.

I tap my own trees and so have an abundance of maple syrup to experiment with. Here's what I've found- fermentation takes all the sugars, leaving almost nothing in the way of maple flavor. And definitely not any wood flavor. A member of my homebrew club did a maple porter using maple wood spirals. Wonderful maple character. I did one using maple sap during the mash, and added maple syrup late fermentation. No maple character. So, if you have a cheap source of maple syrup, then go ahead and use it. But, it's impossible to find it cheaper than using table sugar, and it's still more expensive than honey. Whatever sweetner/source of sugar you use, add it to the juice until you have the OG you're looking for.

 

[Seamonkey84]

I was going to try an acerglyn at some point. From what I’ve read, it’s best to use grade B/dark syrup for fermenting as it would have more flavor in the end. I might just try this soon with the small batches of dry mead from feeding my yeast farm.

 

[JimRausch]

From what I’ve read, it’s best to use grade B/dark syrup

This is true. The darker and thicker the better.