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Update: it is water-soluble.

@cmason1957 I don't soak the corks, I just dip them in water right before corking to make it easier. @Rice_Guy I'll check the solubility of the substance later today. My theory was maybe the pressure didn't equalize after corking before I laid the bottles on their side. Thus, there would be...

Non-kit fermentation can be a bit longer since everything is not so strictly controlled. I had a mead recently where primary took a whole month to get to 1.010. One culprit could be temperature. Yeast usually like 65-72F in the must, so maybe check that. But if your SG is dropping then I...

I would throw in some tart apples to your must. Gala are delicious but fairly low on acid so your wine may turn out a bit bland. You don't need raisins, those are usually used to add nutrients for the yeast but since you're using fresh juice the yeast should be fine. Personally, I would core the...

I have some bottles of mead aging in my cellar since May, and yesterday I noticed a few bottles have an amber-colored sap-like substance on the exterior of the cork (see photo). The substance is highly viscous (like the sap of a pine tree) and lacks any distinguishable smell or taste. The corks...

If you're not going to backsweeten, then you probably don't need the sorbate. It has a limited life in the wine and can add weird geranium-esque characters if it starts breaking down. It's up to you but I would say most people on this forum don't sorbate fully dry wines. I only use it on sweet...

So kmeta won't actually stop fermentation, we use it during aging and bottling to make sure no bacteria or other microorganisms don't start growing. Potassium sorbate (ksorbate) will stop the yeast from reproducing but won't halt an in-progress fermentation. I'm not an expert on winemaking, but...

@BernardSmith I have made a traditional mead already, albeit with raw clover honey. Still got great reviews from friends/family recently which is why I want to step it up to something spectacular. I've also done lime, orange, and orange-chocolate-chai in addition to a good deal of wine, so I...

Once I free up some carboys, I want to make a 2 gallon batch of traditional mead as best as I can. I realize this will be subjective, but I'm looking for interesting suggestions. I like my meads semi-sweet to sweet, so I need suggestions for the fermentation honey as well as the backsweetening...

But again, don't worry too much. Odds are everything is fine. Just get back on track with the instructions, add the sulfite, and keep an eye on it.

The only real way to tell is by taste and smell (how poetic haha). Look for smells or tastes of oxidation (like raisin-esque), rotten eggs, or other non-natural smells or tastes. The wine has a lot of CO2 in it so it will be sharp and acidic and won't taste good, but it certainly should not...

Are you using a plastic fermenter at some point? If so, check for scratches. Sometimes when plastic buckets or carboys get scratched, it provides a protective place for bacteria to hide. Even if you soak them in sanitizer, it may not get all of them. I would check all your equipment to male sure...

If your SG is already 1.000 you really should NOT exchange the airlock for a towel. During the start of fermentation when the yeast are multiplying like crazy, they need oxygen. But as they start making alcohol, you do not want to add air to the must anymore. Especially with an open fermenter...

I did a cab last August that was in primary with skins for 6 weeks, and nothing bad happened! So your wine is almost certainly fine as long as there was an airlock on it. I would add a dose of sulfites (1/4tsp per 5 gallons) to make sure nothing is festering in there and push any oxygen out...

People were making wine for centuries before they even knew what yeast was, so I'm glad your mom found a method that works for her without worrying about all the science-y stuff. I will say that if you want to make a higher quality or dry wine that can be aged for a while, you would need to be...

A separate thought: the best way to avoid any yeasty or otherwise unpleasant odors/tastes is to not leave the wine on the yeast for too long. I generally do my first racking when the specific gravity drops below 1.020. This gets the wine off all the dead yeast that can start to break down and...

Hi Ryan, welcome to the forum! Bread yeast can certainly be used for fermentation, many meadmakers use it all the time. Fleischman's is the most popular. But it has an alcohol tolerance of only 12% iirc, so I would only use it on white and fruit wines, not reds. Otherwise, Lalvin EC1118 is the...

My two cents is that glycerin can do wonders for your wine's body. I had a thin merlot where adding a tiny bit (i.e. 1tbsp in a gallon) gave it such an improvement without any noticeable increase in sweetness. Try a drop in a small sample glass and see if you like it, but to me it can make a big...

So for my orange chocolate batch, I decided to make a tincture using brandy and Lindt dark truffles. Basically 1 cup of brandy and 7 truffles of 50%-70% cacao, put in a jar and let sit for a few days, shaking twice a day. Once done, strain through a coffee filter and then freeze to get the fat...

Funnily enough, my dissertation involved simulating laser absorption spectroscopy (using the BLL) in reacting flows using adaptive finite elements haha so good to know my engineering degree helps with winemaking, I should add that to my resume haha