# Cranberry wine from pure cranberry juice, any tips?



## joeyfmx

Hey all, I bought 2 32 oz bottles of lakewood 100 percent cranberry juice , it containes no additives or presevatives, and is not from concentrate. It is low on sugar (8 gm per serving) so I know I will need to add sugar. Im figuring one 32 oz bottle plus one gallon of water will do, plus sugar to get the 1.085 ish range. I am wondering if anyone has used this type of pure cran juice and the ph, adding tannis or pectic enzyme measurements you have gone by. I see some recipes call for raisins, but some dont. Plus this is pure cran juice and no water added. It states on the bottle over 3 or more lbs of cranberrys used per bottle. Any recipes or suggestions are highly appreciated, thanks!!!


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## Tom

Do NOT add water. 
Make a starter.
Can be hard to start.
Do a TA test
Gravity no higher than 1.085
I would NOT make 2 quarts of wine
Get 3-5 gallons of 100% juice from Costco.


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## JasonH

I agree with above. The only time I add water to a batch is if I'm using fresh or frozen fruit.


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## joeyfmx

*re*

wont it be too tart or acidic? I have a gallon of pure apple juice as well I thought about mixing with the cran juice before fermenting. Any thoughts? Ratios? I was thinking 32 oz cranberry plus a gallon of pure apple juice, maybe some white raisins and cinnamon stick.


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## joeyfmx

Tom said:


> Do NOT add water.
> Make a starter.
> Can be hard to start.
> Do a TA test
> Gravity no higher than 1.085
> I would NOT make 2 quarts of wine
> Get 3-5 gallons of 100% juice from Costco.



Thanks for the tips, I guess the ta test would tell me a bit. I planned on a gallon with the 2 32 oz bottles, just an experiment really. Ive heard good things about apple cran wine but not sure if people ferment them together.


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## JasonH

joeyfmx said:


> wont it be too tart or acidic? I have a gallon of pure apple juice as well I thought about mixing with the cran juice before fermenting. Any thoughts? Ratios? I was thinking 32 oz cranberry plus a gallon of pure apple juice, maybe some white raisins and cinnamon stick.



You will probably still need to add acid to get a good TA. The only fruit wine I've made that didn't require atleast a little acid addition was grapefruit. 

Personally, I would make separate batches of apple and cranberry and then blend the wines to taste after they were finished. In this case, I would think that the apple flavor would be lost if you fermented them together. Still, if you want to ferment them together, I'm sure it wouldn't be bad.


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## Zwetschgen

It can be very hard to get started! Mine ended very similar as it began and was still very tart. All sound advice.


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## joeyfmx

Zwetschgen said:


> It can be very hard to get started! Mine ended very similar as it began and was still very tart. All sound advice.



24 hours later no bubbles, still waiting. Did a yeast starter today as well too by warm water and sugar till yeast bubbled. Pure cranberry juice is high in acid. Repeated tests and dilutions brought it from 14 ml of hydroxide solution down to 9 ish, the 90's! Good enough I suppose! May buy some 1118 in case its not fizzing in a few days.


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## Tom

Patience. Cranberry is a slow starter.


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## olsoncal

*How did it turn out?*

I'm looking to do the same thing but mix Lakewood cranberry with apple. How did your batch turn out? Did you add water?


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## cintipam

I did a 50/50 mix of apple juice concentrate and cranberry juice concentrate. I think it is important to use 71B yeast to make a dent in the malic acid or else it takes a long time to be drinkable. I did wind up backsweetening with pure apple juice concentrate because the apples did get overwhelmed by the cranberries. I used 4 cans of concentrate plus needed water to make each gallon. If using ready to drink juice I still add more concentrate as straight juice makes a very thin wine. Usually a gallon of juice plus 2 1/2 cans concentrate works well.

I did not add any acid, which might be why I had no trouble getting the yeast going.

One straight cranberry batch I used RC212 and it took almost 18 months for the tart to be tamed. It was excellent then, but I will always use 71B in the future.

Pam in cinti


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## wpt-me

I made a small batch of cranberry using Ocean Spray 100% juice cocktail.
It came out pretty good in Imho. 

Bill


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## Dmaley

Tom said:


> Do NOT add water.
> Make a starter.
> Can be hard to start.
> Do a TA test
> Gravity no higher than 1.085
> I would NOT make 2 quarts of wine
> Get 3-5 gallons of 100% juice from Costco.


Greetings, Tom. Noob question... Why no higher than 1.085 OG?


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## Bladedancer

I have done a cranberry wine from dried cranberries, ocean spray cranberry juice 1lt and what cranberry jelly that was left from Xmas and appears to be doing well at the moment. Added some red Grape concentrate to give some extra body. will let you know how it goes.


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## mikewatkins727

A number of years ago I made a gallon of cranberry wine from Ocean Spray. Good enough that I am doing it again except I am using 12 quarts of R.W. Knudsen cranberry juice. It is past the initial fermentation and in clarification stage. This was started Feb 8, 2021.


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## Dmaley

mikewatkins727 said:


> A number of years ago I made a gallon of cranberry wine from Ocean Spray. Good enough that I am doing it again except I am using 12 quarts of R.W. Knudsen cranberry juice. It is past the initial fermentation and in clarification stage. This was started Feb 8, 2021.


I am just finishing up a primary fermentation on a cranberry wine, from 100% juice, and it went poorly. It took 2 months to go from 1.118 to 1.050, as of last week. It stopped once and I bumped up the pH and added a starter to get it going again. It may be near 1.0 at this point. I get a bubble about every minute or two. I assume this is not typical. Would you mind sharing your experience with your cranberry fermentation? Thanks!


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## mikewatkins727

Dmaley said:


> I am just finishing up a primary fermentation on a cranberry wine, from 100% juice, and it went poorly. It took 2 months to go from 1.118 to 1.050, as of last week. It stopped once and I bumped up the pH and added a starter to get it going again. It may be near 1.0 at this point. I get a bubble about every minute or two. I assume this is not typical. Would you mind sharing your experience with your cranberry fermentation? Thanks!


In winemaking, the larger the yeast cell population, the better. With that in mind I use this technique to rehydrate yeast: Add the entire 5 gm packet of yeast to 1 cup of warm water (100° F) with a pinch of Yeast Nutrient (YN). Four hours later add *¼* cup of water. Four hours later add* ¼* cup of wine must. Four hours later add* ½* cup of wine must. Four hours later add another *½* cup of wine must. Yeast is ready for pitching. I started with a 5 gallon fermenter to which I added all ingredients. Two days after pitching yeast the must was foamy. I didn't rack off the must for 22 days. Today (4-1-2021) it is in a 3 gallon carboy collecting dead yeast cells waiting for me to rack.


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## Bladedancer

Bladedancer said:


> I have done a cranberry wine from dried cranberries, ocean spray cranberry juice 1lt and what cranberry jelly that was left from Xmas and appears to be doing well at the moment. Added some red Grape concentrate to give some extra body. will let you know how it goes.


.
Finished ready for Xmas!


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## Dmaley

mikewatkins727 said:


> In winemaking, the larger the yeast cell population, the better. With that in mind I use this technique to rehydrate yeast: Add the entire 5 gm packet of yeast to 1 cup of warm water (100° F) with a pinch of Yeast Nutrient (YN). Four hours later add *¼* cup of water. Four hours later add* ¼* cup of wine must. Four hours later add* ½* cup of wine must. Four hours later add another *½* cup of wine must. Yeast is ready for pitching. I started with a 5 gallon fermenter to which I added all ingredients. Two days after pitching yeast the must was foamy. I didn't rack off the must for 22 days. Today (4-1-2021) it is in a 3 gallon carboy collecting dead yeast cells waiting for me to rack.


Thanks for the tips!


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## winemaker81

Dmaley said:


> I am just finishing up a primary fermentation on a cranberry wine, from 100% juice, and it went poorly. It took 2 months to go from 1.118 to 1.050, as of last week. It stopped once and I bumped up the pH and added a starter to get it going again. It may be near 1.0 at this point. I get a bubble about every minute or two. I assume this is not typical. Would you mind sharing your experience with your cranberry fermentation? Thanks!


An OG above 1.100 is more likely to cause problems. It doesn't matter what the fruit is, even with a yeast such as EC-1118. 

What is the temperature?


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## HillPeople

1.118 - .992(dry) x 131 = 16.5% ABV. That's pretty hot for a fruit wine which IMHO should end at 12.5% to have a good flavor profile.


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## Dmaley

winemaker81 said:


> An OG above 1.100 is more likely to cause problems. It doesn't matter what the fruit is, even with a yeast such as EC-1118.
> 
> What is the temperature?


I see, thanks for the tip. That may have been part of my problem. I started at 1.118. It's finally down to about 1.015 now but I have to restart it twice. Temp is about 75 F.


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## Dmaley

HillPeople said:


> 1.118 - .992(dry) x 131 = 16.5% ABV. That's pretty hot for a fruit wine which IMHO should end at 12.5% to have a good flavor profile.


OK, thanks for the info. I'll keep this in mind next time.


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## winemaker81

Dmaley said:


> I see, thanks for the tip. That may have been part of my problem. I started at 1.118. It's finally down to about 1.015 now but I have to restart it twice. Temp is about 75 F.


Most who aim for high ABV start with a moderate OG, then step feed the must, small amounts of sugar at a time, to avoid overwhelming the yeast. I've done that -- overwhelming the yeast, and in one instance _could not_ get the fermentation restarted -- I bottled the wine and decided it was a dessert wine. [Make the best of what you got!] It's actually a pretty good dessert wine so I accept it as a win.

In this situation my last feed was 30 points, from 1.002 to 1.032. Doing it again, I'd have used 10 point increments.

Another possibility is nutrients. The yeast eats sugar, but needs various nutrients to be healthy. This is one reason why mead can be hard to make -- honey is sugar and has no nutrients. If you haven't been adding nutrient, doing so may help.

What does the wine taste like at SG 1.015? It's green, but should have a decent taste which will improve with age. If the SG won't drop, you may need to call it done. My guess is that it's tasty and cranberry needs a fair amount of backsweetening anyway, 1.015 equates to about 3.8 brix, which is a reasonable level. 

IMO this is a successful result (if the wine tastes good). You get a palatable wine while learning valuable lessons that will shape your future winemaking endeavors!


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## Dmaley

winemaker81 said:


> Most who aim for high ABV start with a moderate OG, then step feed the must, small amounts of sugar at a time, to avoid overwhelming the yeast. I've done that -- overwhelming the yeast, and in one instance _could not_ get the fermentation restarted -- I bottled the wine and decided it was a dessert wine. [Make the best of what you got!] It's actually a pretty good dessert wine so I accept it as a win.
> 
> In this situation my last feed was 30 points, from 1.002 to 1.032. Doing it again, I'd have used 10 point increments.
> 
> Another possibility is nutrients. The yeast eats sugar, but needs various nutrients to be healthy. This is one reason why mead can be hard to make -- honey is sugar and has no nutrients. If you haven't been adding nutrient, doing so may help.
> 
> What does the wine taste like at SG 1.015? It's green, but should have a decent taste which will improve with age. If the SG won't drop, you may need to call it done. My guess is that it's tasty and cranberry needs a fair amount of backsweetening anyway, 1.015 equates to about 3.8 brix, which is a reasonable level.
> 
> IMO this is a successful result (if the wine tastes good). You get a palatable wine while learning valuable lessons that will shape your future winemaking endeavors!


It's not got a bad flavor. Still very yeasty and still just a tad sweet for my liking but not too bad. I know the tartness will need some sugar to tame it down a bit anyway, if fermented till dry. My last starter I added, which was about 10 days ago, I rehydrate the yeast with go ferm then added 3 tsp nutrient (in a 6 gallon batch), 3 days later. Days 2-6 it fermented at a good rate (a light foam on it). I started with a gallon starter and added the must over a 4 day period.It slowed down after day 6 or 7 but I can still see it is churning and it's still giving off aroma. If I can get the SG down just a bit more I will call it and stop fermentation. And BTW, thanks for all of the tips! This is definetly a learning process and there is still a lot learn, I'm sure. Your help is very much appreciated.


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