Going for a dry apple wine with honey, looking for advice

[Gemadrken]

My 2c is head over to the cider sub forum and have a look at the stickied thread about pasteurising, dead easy to do.

I can dig it- i'll check it out


On the bright side the cyser is fermenting like a charm; the 10 gallons of apple wine havent started yet. Different yeast strain for those two tho

 

[Gemadrken]

Still no fermentation for the apple wines

Cyser going great

I just re pitched its yeast and I used EC-1118 (the one I used on the cyser). They were pitched 1122 first

Any ideas on why fermentation hasnt started?

 

[Rooster]

I may be too late, but if you are using fresh apples, add pectic enzyme at the rate of 3/4 tsp per gallon to extract more juice out of your pulp, and 1 Campden tablet per gallon to prevent oxidation and the turning brown of your apple juice. Also to get rid of any bacteria, wild yeast and mold, 1/4 tsp per gallon of potassium metabisulfite. But if you are using store bought cider or juice ( which is filtered cider ), make sure that it does not contain any sorbate additions. The sorbate will inhibit your yeast growth and putter out your fermentation cycle. Your malic acid should be around 0.65% to 0.85%, I wouldn't stress too much about it. Your yeast, while the lalvin71b is good, for apples though I use K1L-1116, it keeps the apple taste better i think.PH though should be 3.5 +/- .3. This can be adjusted with acid blend if necessary. When I make wine and need to make a gravity adjustment, I use corn sugar, it raises the gravity without impacting flavor. For your honey aroma/taste, I would recommend back sweetening.
Cheers!

 

[Gemadrken]

Yep I got that all figured out!

I'm making 6 gallons cyser- started at 1.053, added honey to 1.085, i'll be adding sorbate and k-meta and then back sweetening with more honey once fermentation is done

I'm making 5 gallons of apple/raspberry wine. Also 1.085, i'll be sweetening with raspberry puree after fermentation and racking it off the fruit 5-7 days after adding it

I'm making 5 gallons of apple/peach wine, which is also 1.085. I'll be back sweetening with peach puree after fermentation and racking off the fruit pulp 5-7 days after adding.

So lots of wine going on! I think its going to go pretty well; all 3 are bubbling away very well

 

[Gemadrken]

Hey does anybody have any good info on back sweetening with fruit puree? My 2 apple wines are close to having fermented dry and I just got 20lbs of raspberries; i'm planning on sweetening one of them with fresh raspberry puree and one with fresh peach puree then racking them off the lees 7 days after adding the puree's. I'm looking towards for each

I have K-meta and sorbate




Also i'm making a raspberry mead but the mead forum is slow so i'll ask this here:

I have 15lbs of raw honey and 14-15lbs of raspberries that i'm planning on using. Is 15 lbs too much? I'm planning on fermenting it dry and i'll be targeting 14 abv

 

[Jericurl]

Also i'm making a raspberry mead but the mead forum is slow so i'll ask this here:

I have 15lbs of raw honey and 14-15lbs of raspberries that i'm planning on using. Is 15 lbs too much? I'm planning on fermenting it dry and i'll be targeting 14 abv

Are you looking at a 5 gallon batch of mead?
14-15 lbs of raspberries should give you a decent raspberry flavor.
Hold back 2 or 3 lbs to add to your secondary after you rack from primary.
Fermenting the fruit in primary gives it the nice base fermented fruit flavor. Adding a bit of fruit to secondary gives your mead fantastic fruit aroma as well as some of that fresh, truer to fruit taste.

eta: consider doing this one off dry. Raspberry needs just a little bit of sweet to bring forward the full rounded raspberry flavor. 1.01 finish gives a nice flavor if you don't want to go full on sweet.

 

[Gemadrken]

Sounds good I appreciate the advice; i'm looking for a 5 gallon batch, but ultimately the yield will be whatever my gravity/flavor targets give me based off my quantity of ingredients (aka 5 gallons +/- a little to hit ~14abv)

By secondary do you mean add that 2-3lbs of honey and some extra fruit with sorbate and sulfites so they dont ferment? Or do you suggest I let it ferment dry and add more honey/raspberry and let that ferment.


I'm planning on putting the raspberries in a straining bag and smashing them while collecting the juice- then I will add the juice and the pulp in a bag to my primary fermentation bucket and remove the pulp bag at ~day 7

The honey and raspberries are both very high quality directly from local producers; I don't necessarially want either to overshadow the other. I'll likely back sweeten a little- I like my wines dry but I make my stuff to share and I bet a little sweetness will make it more of a crowd pleaser

 

[Jericurl]

By secondary do you mean add that 2-3lbs of honey and some extra fruit with sorbate and sulfites so they dont ferment? Or do you suggest I let it ferment dry and add more honey/raspberry and let that ferment.

I would just let it go completely dry, then rack onto the extra fruit. Leave it for a week or three (depending on the temperature), then rack again.
If you are going to sorbate/sulfite, do it at some point after this.

 

[Gemadrken]

I would just let it go completely dry, then rack onto the extra fruit. Leave it for a week or three (depending on the temperature), then rack again.
If you are going to sorbate/sulfite, do it at some point after this.

Awesome thank you