aronia (chokeberry) stuck fermentation

[Huba Huba]

I have been trying to make an acceptable wine from aronia, so far without much success. This experiment was
3 liters Aronia juice
4 oz lemon juice and
4 12 oz cans of frozen apple juice concentrate'
the latter two had no sorbate,
water to a little over 5 liters
Starter with 5 gm 71B, 2 Tbs sugar and 6.25 gm Goferm, allowed to grow 14 hours
pitched yeast starter 8/31 at PH 3.7 and SG 1.084, by 9/4 the sg had dropped to1.026, racked to carboy and put under airlock. It had moderate airlock activity. Had to leave town for a couple of days, when I returned there was no airlock activity and I assumed it was finished. I have seen NO airlock activity in about 2 weeks and it has cleared nicely.
Today I was going to rack and add K Meta/K sorbate but when I checked SG it is still 1.014. The taste is different but pretty good (best aronia so far) and this sweetness would be OK but ABV is only about 9.2%.
Should I just leave it alone for another month or so?
Or pitch a starter made with EC1118?
Fortify it?
Just drink it within the next couple of months?

 

[winemaker81]

Patience, Grasshopper. Mother Nature and Dionysus are testing you -- stand firm!

71B has a 14% ABV tolerance, so that's not it. Have you added more nutrient? The general recommendation is 2/3 of the dosage initially and the remaining 1/3 at 1/3 depletion (in your case roughly SG 1.050). A bit more nutrient may spur it, say 1/4 tsp since it's a 5 liter batch.

How much sediment? If there's much, I'd rack off the sediment and put it back under airlock. The activity may stir the yeast.

Ignore it for another 2 to 3 months, then check. If there's no change by then, I'd consider fortifying to 11% ABV with EverClear, unless you want a dessert wine, in which case bump it higher.

With an ABV of 9.2%, the wine should have a shelf life of at least a year, so I would not worry too much about that.

 

[Huba Huba]

Patience, Grasshopper. Mother Nature and Dionysus are testing you -- stand firm!

71B has a 14% ABV tolerance, so that's not it. Have you added more nutrient? The general recommendation is 2/3 of the dosage initially and the remaining 1/3 at 1/3 depletion (in your case roughly SG 1.050). A bit more nutrient may spur it, say 1/4 tsp since it's a 5 liter batch.

How much sediment? If there's much, I'd rack off the sediment and put it back under airlock. The activity may stir the yeast.

Ignore it for another 2 to 3 months, then check. If there's no change by then, I'd consider fortifying to 11% ABV with EverClear, unless you want a dessert wine, in which case bump it higher.

With an ABV of 9.2%, the wine should have a shelf life of at least a year, so I would not worry too much about that.

I can do this! Will add nutrient, rack and leave it alone for the next 2-3 months.
Do you always add nutrient? Other than Goferm I have only added it if the yeast has high nutrient requirements, or it was included in a kit.

 

[Rice_Guy]

* French hard cider with 5% alcohol and high tannin levels has five year shelf life. Aronia has nice tannins. You may have made a good long shelf life hard cider.
* Apple is high on malic acid. There are bacteria related to MLF (wild lactic bacteria) which can eat the malic acid and raise the pH and cause off flavors. As a preventative I either drop the pH below 3.2 or treat with Bactiless or treat with Lysozyme.
* pH is a preservative. 3.7 is high enough to risk bacterial infection. Beer folks above pH 4 refrigerate which prevents growth or pasteurize to prevent infection or sterilize filter.
* Wine is a continum, there is no magic with 12% alcohol. 10% alcohol with no residual sugar is extremely stable. Again sugar based organisms could cause infection with off flavor. Low pH as 3.3 combined with no oxygen (low ullage) will prevent growth of most sugar eating microbes.

 

[BPL]

FYI, all yeast nutrients are not created equal if you can believe what is in documentation found on the Scott Labs website. https://scottlab.com and https://scottlab.com/content/files/documents/handbooks/scott labs 2024 winemaking handbook.pdf

 

[winemaker81]

Do you always add nutrient?

Yes. Having experienced H2S a few times, I'm a firm believer that ensuring the yeast is happy is good. In addition to preventing H2S, having sufficient nutrients helps the ferment progress more steadily.