Best sugar for back sweetening?

[user 32114]

5 lb. per gallon of water is pretty strong, that is how i do mine, if you make blackberry it makes a great blend, but you'd need to figure your juice from berry conversion then ad that amount to your blackberry wine at bottling time,,,, or using a conversion of elderberry from berries to juice figure your 5 lb. to gallon of water, then dilute and bottle back right off the bat, if you're young i guess you could try 20 years or better ,,,as for me this is the first full strength elderberry I've ever heard of, whew, one thing for sure it would be great for your heart, arthritis or diabetes, do you know your ABV, all my wine last much longer in oxygen then others, and with out the alcohol taste,
you have several or just a bottle or two. even a bottle would flavor a fair amount of blackberry,
Dawg

 

[blumentopferde]

Yes. That’s my experience. i found that I don’t get the full sweetness profile in the beginning. Hence when I first started using Erythritol a few years back I added far too much. I now use those early still and sparkling pear wines for blending in with other fruit wines and only pop a bottle for direct drinking when a couple of sweet wine drinking friends turn up. So in summary my 0.035 to 0.04 % is basically half what I used to do when I shifted to it. And I would recommend you aim for that level. Erythritol is only 80% of the general sweetness of sugar. Your price is similar to what I pay in New Zealand. It’s not cheap. But it is worth it. Cheers

Now I understand what you were trying to point out: I just opened a wine from 2015, sweetened with Sorbitol. The label says : sugar: 5g/l -this is 0.5%. I always factored in that Sorbitol has only 50% sweetening power, so that means that I added 10g/l of Sorbitol. Well, the wine tastes VERY sweet now. If I would guess, I would say 15-20g regular sugar per liter. I opened another wine from 2013, which says 9g/l sugar (=18g/l Sorbitol) and it is undrinkably sweet now. It seems like the sweetness of Sorbitol multiplies over time, exceeding the sweetness of regular sugar by far.
Do you have similar experiences with Erythritol?

I use xylitol to back sweeten sparkling ciders and it tastes ok and has worked fine. Most recently tried Erythritol to backsweeten a sparkling concord wine which I have yet to taste, letting it bottle carb now. Xylitol is a little different taste than sugar but I don't use a lot as we prefer and off-dry cider.

Thank you to share that experience! How is your experience with Xylitol? Did you experience any big developments in sweetening power?

5 lb. per gallon of water is pretty strong, that is how i do mine, if you make blackberry it makes a great blend, but you'd need to figure your juice from berry conversion then ad that amount to your blackberry wine at bottling time,,,, or using a conversion of elderberry from berries to juice figure your 5 lb. to gallon of water, then dilute and bottle back right off the bat, if you're young i guess you could try 20 years or better ,,,as for me this is the first full strength elderberry I've ever heard of, whew, one thing for sure it would be great for your heart, arthritis or diabetes, do you know your ABV, all my wine last much longer in oxygen then others, and with out the alcohol taste,
you have several or just a bottle or two. even a bottle would flavor a fair amount of blackberry,
Dawg

I just have one bottle (=1 liter) of the pure elderberry wine. The ABV should be around 11%. That was calculated from assumed sugar content plus added sugar, so it is far from exact. I don't have access to blackberries, so mixing is not an option. I guess I will wait a few more years, maybe 5 or so, and try it then...

 

[sour_grapes]

The label says : sugar: 5g/l -this is 0.005%.

I believe that is 0.005 (no percent), or 0.5%.

(Good to see you back on WMT. I still get a chuckle out of my misreading your "potting soil" name as "blumento - horse." )

 

[blumentopferde]

I believe that is 0.005 (no percent), or 0.5%.

You are right, of course! I corrected the text now!

(Good to see you back on WMT. I still get a chuckle out of my misreading your "potting soil" name as "blumento - horse." )

Thank you! And nice to hear that this little joke still works from time to time!

 

[E-man]

Thank you to share that experience! How is your experience with Xylitol? Did you experience any big developments in sweetening power?

Honestly, I haven’t let any of the ciders age that long as we usually drink them within 6 months so I’m not sure. Hasn’t seemed to get any sweeter over that short period of time though.

 

[Bmd2k1]

I use Erythritol to back sweeten both still and sparkling styles... as I have a sugar intolerance issue. Erythritol works beautifully.

Does erythritol affect the SG in a similar way to sugar?

 

[Hazelemere]

Hello there!

Which sugar would you recommend to back sweeten a wine? Is there any significant difference in taste?
And are there any non-fermentable sweeteners that you could recommend? At the moment I am using sorbitol syrop but I have the impression that it leaves a weird aftertaste...

Thanks for any recommendations!

dextrose

 

[Venatorscribe]

Does erythritol affect the SG in a similar way to sugar?

Yes it does.

 

[Venatorscribe]

We may need to keep abreast of this recent finding on Erythritol.

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/02/27/...tener-heart-attack-stroke-wellness/index.html

 

[ulalah.reedy]

I use Erythritol to back sweeten both still and sparkling styles... as I have a sugar intolerance issue. Erythritol works beautifully.

How do you keep the erythritol from crystallizing?

 

[Rice_Guy]

How do you keep the erythritol from crystallizing?

In an aqueous solution you shouldn’t have it crystallize, ,,, What kind of solution were you thinking of 0.5% 5.0%?

 

[Hazelemere]

Hello there!

Which sugar would you recommend to back sweeten a wine? Is there any significant difference in taste?
And are there any non-fermentable sweeteners that you could recommend? At the moment I am using sorbitol syrop but I have the impression that it leaves a weird aftertaste...

Thanks for any recommendations!

corn sugar aka dextrose

 

[JBP]

Expanding on the options - any thoughts on monk fruit as a sweetener? While it is quite pricey, finding it quite good with no off-tastes typical of calorie free sweeteners.

 

[Rice_Guy]

Expanding on the options - any thoughts on monk fruit as a sweetener? While it is quite pricey, finding it quite good with no off-tastes typical of calorie free sweeteners.

? Do you pick up off flavors? yes, me too. Then you like the early sweet me too, ,,, and longer lasting flavor notes that dominate after the sweet washes out of your mouth, ,,, at about 45 seconds? just OK ,,,

The last no calorie I used was xylitol, the sweet is about 2/3 as intense as sugar but it it has normal early and late flavor notes. I will use it again. ,,, erythritol also scores well and aspartame which in 2023 is called a potential carcinogen.

 

[winemanden]

Well, the wine tastes VERY sweet now. If I would guess, I would say 15-20g regular sugar per liter. I opened another wine from 2013, which says 9g/l sugar (=18g/l Sorbitol) and it is undrinkably sweet now. It seems like the sweetness of Sorbitol multiplies over time, exceeding the sweetness of regular sugar by far.

I don't think the sweetness of Sorbitol increases. It's more likely that the wine's acid and tannins smooth out as it ages, so that you're tasing the sweetness more easily.
You may have to add Sorbitol based on how long you intend to age your wine.

Don't add too much, Sorbitol is also a Laxative.

 

[Navid Saf]

Thanks for your replies! So i will just stick to regular sugar for back sweetening.
But for sparkling wine I would still like to use a non-fermentable sweetener... What do you think about birch sugar (Xylit)? Any experience with that?

Boil the part of your grape juce
It will loose water and become more sweet
Dont use suger
Just use fruit suger for wine

 

[Hazelemere]

Boil the part of your grape juce
It will loose water and become more sweet
Dont use suger
Just use fruit suger for wine

you'll get a better flavour with corn sugar (dextrose) than cane sugar

 

[Guasto-IS]

I had pretty good success using Winexpert Red Grape Concentrate when I back sweetned a red beaudoux style wine. (Note there is also a white concentrate available too). It readily dissolves and also adds a deeper inky purple color, depending on how much you add. Adding ~1mL to a bottle roughly increases the residual sugar to a bit above 1 gram/L. I purchased it from Amazon.