APV Question

[Berry Juice]

OK, Been making kits for the past 8 months, learned a lot & having fun,
now I have just starting to try a batch I made 6 months ago, Fontana Merlot. Taste is great but after 2 bottles, I'm not feeling the buzz. From my calculation, my SG is always 1.100 range and finish at .998/.996 range.
That should put it in the 14% APV range. A store bought 13% has more kick than mine.
I'm a little confused about this...

 

[BernardSmith]

Hmm... I wonder... sometimes the body builds up tolerance to alcohol so that the more wine you drink the less the effect the same volume has on your body... That is not a good thing, by the way... But just sayin'.. Just sayin'
But to be serious, it may be that you are drinking your wines under sufficiently different conditions than store bought wines for the effects on your body to be accountably noticeable.

 

[salcoco]

a balanced wine does not have any taste of alcohol.

 

[BernardSmith]

a balanced wine does not have any taste of alcohol.

Yeah.. but "a buzz" from drinking alcohol does not speak to anything about flavors. To me , it just suggests that the OP is sorta kinda disappointed that after after gargling down store bought wine he feels a bit tipsy but can still walk too straight a line after slugging down his own. But I guess I am not sure why that is a problem... do people typically make the wine they drink to get some kind of "buzz" or do they make wine to derive pleasure from the taste, the aroma, the conviviality of the experience. It's a pleasure very different and much larger than from a "buzz".. I think.

 

[meadmaker1]

Yeah.. but "a buzz" from drinking alcohol does not speak to anything about flavors. To me , it just suggests that the OP is sorta kinda disappointed that after after gargling down store bought wine he feels a bit tipsy but can still walk too straight a line after slugging down his own. But I guess I am not sure why that is a problem... do people typically make the wine they drink to get some kind of "buzz" or do they make wine to derive pleasure from the taste, the aroma, the conviviality of the experience. It's a pleasure very different and much larger than from a "buzz".. I think.

I dont disagree with anything you just said
However
I picked 75 lbs of my favorite red grapes sunday they are in a brute crushed and waiting and the juice is delicious. Just like it is it could be bottled and enjoyed by everyone i know ..
Yet i am determined to turn it into something that can give me a buzz??? Hopefully also delicious.
I have clean water and refrigeration so im not preserving it

 

[meadmaker1]

My favorite grapes are called free
These are purple.

 

[Berry Juice]

I think Flavor and Buzz go hand in hand. If I wanted to drink grape juice, I'd just buy Welch's and not waste 8 months of waiting for a wine thats suppose to be 14% and feels like 7%..
So I have progressed and upgraded to a RJS, Crand Cru, WE, & Mivino..From the smell they were outstanding, but if these dont bring the buzz, I will be saddly dissipointed.

 

[LouisCKpasteur]

I dedicate one bottle per batch to drinking by myself after a long day at work. I try to be absolutely certain that I'm not going to have to leave the house except maybe wobble out to the mail box. This is my confirmation of alchohol content. Recently, I drank a bottle of WE New Zealand Hawkes Bay Merlot. My first. The first two glasses and I was suspicious, but not too much so, since everything tasted great and seemed to be balanced. Yet I was just not buzzing. By the time I finished the bottle I felt confident I could not pass a sobriety test until the next day. Don't know what this proves other than there are all kinds of things that can influence our perception of getting an alcholic buzz. The important one to keep in mind is the legal one. Whether I aimed for a 13 percent and got 12.5 or 14, in the end, I know if I drink a whole bottle in a couple of hours I'm not going anywhere for awhile.

 

[Berry Juice]

Exactly, I start to wine down after 11:00 ish and the medicinal effects help me sleep.

 

[pillswoj]

Could it be that the higher sulphite levels and or tannins cause the store bought wine to hit you harder?

 

[Berry Juice]

No way to tell or measure that. How would one know how much store bought has in it?