What is Wine Conditioner

[ByCandleLightWinery]

I am most familiar with ciders, though I am making a few fruit wines. Today I was in a brew supply store near the in-laws and saw some Wine Conditioner. It isn't the first time I have seen it, but the cider people I mosty talk to wouldn't dream of adding anything to their craft ciders, so I have no clue what it is, how it is used, and if it might be useful to me. Comments?

 

[jcobbs]

It is a non-fermentable sugar, such as lactose, and usually potassium sorbate, in a clear syrup form. I make fruit wines, ciders, and apfelwein myself and started using it recently. It is handy for taking the dry edge off of a wine that is just a bit too dry or tart. I don't believe I'd use it for full-out backsweetening--for one thing that could get expensive, plus I think that might be too much sorbate. The recommended dosage for the bottle I got was about 2oz per gallon, and that seemed to hit it about right for my blueberry-citrus and key lime wines. They ended up right about where I liked them, not really sweet but kind of off-dry. It's a perfectly acceptable additive used by lots of winemakers, and I don't see why it wouldn't be just fine in a cider, although I can appreciate the ideal of trying to avoid adding anything extra to a craft cider.

Simple step-by-step for using wine conditioner

 

[fatbloke]

It is a non-fermentable sugar, such as lactose, and usually potassium sorbate, in a clear syrup form. I make fruit wines, ciders, and apfelwein myself and started using it recently. It is handy for taking the dry edge off of a wine that is just a bit too dry or tart. I don't believe I'd use it for full-out backsweetening--for one thing that could get expensive, plus I think that might be too much sorbate. The recommended dosage for the bottle I got was about 2oz per gallon, and that seemed to hit it about right for my blueberry-citrus and key lime wines. They ended up right about where I liked them, not really sweet but kind of off-dry. It's a perfectly acceptable additive used by lots of winemakers, and I don't see why it wouldn't be just fine in a cider, although I can appreciate the ideal of trying to avoid adding anything extra to a craft cider.

Simple step-by-step for using wine conditioner

I've also seen that term used on bottles of glycerine. Which can be used to add a little sweetness as well as body to a wine. The difference being, that you still wouldn't use much as the sweetness part of glycerine is quite "metalic" in taste, hence it's usually used to add "body" or mouthfeel, rather than sweetness

 

[jcobbs]

I've heard of adding glycerine to wine, but I agree I don't think you'd want to add much. My experience with cider is that it probably will need more sweetness than you'd want to attempt with glycerine. What I liked about using the lactose/sorbate conditioner was that it was a clear syrup, so it was easy to add to my already clarified wine with only a minimum of stirring. It didn't cloud the wine and I didn't have to worry about getting too much oxygen in there. I added some powdered lactose to a batch once and it took a lot of mixing to dissolve and a while to get clear again. The wine conditioner was much easier to use, although at $7 for 16oz it could easily get expensive to backsweeten a large batch.