Sweet Wine

Kitty1989 · Apr 21, 2011

Hey all! I am looking for a sweet wine, like Moscato sweet. My fiance has been trying his hand at beer brews and I just cant stand beer, so we wanted to try our luck with a wine, and it would be really pointless if I couldnt enjoy it as well.

Anyways any recipes you could send our way would be appreciated, I have tried many different Moscatos and i have found that I like any italian or australian imports and i also like barefoot moscato.

Thanks,
Kitty

ACbrewer · Apr 21, 2011

I'd suggest you try doing a receipe search through the database.

OR if you'd like, go simpler and just by a kit. I will admit to being primarily a kit wine person. A box of juice, some included yeast, nutrients, clarifiers(clay and finings) make my wines just great... A kit wine won't make the best possible, but it will be fairly consistant. I've not tried doing any of the Moscato style wines. I will say I've seen several listed on Amazon as well as being available from the major mailorder suppliers (austin and midwest should both have a kit to chooose from).

Why start with a kit? Well it should produce a good finished product and have basic instructions. THEN you can concentrate on the other bits of wine making, like sanatation of your fermentor and other equipment, taking measurements, and sanitation, and bottling and sanitation and degassing and did I mention sanitation? It is kinda required to get a good product.

Your fiance should be able to help with that as he should have some experience from beer making. The sanitation process is very similar, but not identical.

KevinM · Apr 21, 2011

As a complete wine making beginner, agreed on the kit. Without a kit, there won't really be too much in the way of recipes. Wine is different in beer in that for beer, there are recipes, but for wine there tends to be a single grape, in this case the muscat grape. (Yes, there are things about grape blends and wine blending.)
So your recipe winds up being muscat grapes (lots), and yeast.

Then you get down to the grape source and season, is it grape season, which locality, which farm, what's the ripeness and sugar content. Each Moscato is different due to yeast and processes, but largely it will be the grape and the soil it was grown in, as well as the weather. So there will be good years, and not so good years, for each region. I think you're already well aware of this since you said you've tried many moscatos and found that you preferred two particular areas of the world.

Kits will be better since it takes those out of the process and gives you something slightly more consistent, but definately straight forward. Especially for us beginners. (Add bag A and X amount of water. Stir, Add included yeast, wait, rack, wait, add D, E and F and wait, then wait more, then bottle, then wait, with wait time dependant on the kit type.) Experienced people use kits too, and I know there's some price comparison threads and how often they use kits as well as press.

I think AC forgot to mention the importance of sanitation!

Kitty1989 · Apr 22, 2011

Sanitation is important??? LOL. Thank you both for your input on this and I will see what I can find out there in kits.

Kitty

ACbrewer · Apr 22, 2011

I think every wine maker or brewer of a long time has screwed up sanitation at some point, producing a final product that is undrinkable, and maybe even unusable even for cooking or watering the lawn.

In terms of making a quality product, it is the easiest to screw up and easiest to fix, and something that if poor will show up consistantly regardless of your ingredients or other methods.

As for boxed kits. The fruit wines are nice a sweet (assuming you like fruit wines) - my wife particuarly like the green apple resiling by island mist available online or your lhbs. It tastes like green apple candy. The Island Mist Pomogrante Zinfandel was pretty good too - if you like sweet and fruit.

Good luck!

Brdetty · Apr 25, 2011

Yeah, just go with somthing you can do easily. The hardest part of wine making Is the wait ,aging don't get anxious let the wine sit for at least 4months or so before drinking. Be sure to take samples though

Kitty1989 · May 25, 2011

Thank you all again, we ended up getting a Moscato off of Amazon, just entered the second step, doing good so far!

ACbrewer · May 26, 2011

Good for you. Let us know how it turns out.

KevinM · May 26, 2011

Sounds great. That was the only place I found the Moscato listed as well, surprisingly. Let us know how it goes and how both of you enjoy the process.

crazydog · May 26, 2011

Hi Kitty, Try something different and is as ancient as the classics of Homer. A mead style wine is very tasty and produces great alcohol contents of 14 to 18 %. Just an idea.