Cherry wine

[Tnuscan]

You aren't recommending running ALL of the must through a blender right? I did that once with peaches and the air entrapment became a serious issue. It took several days for all the air to leave the must and permit an accurate reading with the Hydrometer.

No just a small sample to take the pH.

And to taste.

 

[Tnuscan]

I'd also like to add,... when I'm reading these numbers, I'm tasting, to train myself, to realize the differences the changes are making. I know it can be done without meters, and by taste alone. I'm just using visual along with taste as a training method.

 

[geek]

Just came back from Costco, got 2 3lbs bags of sweet organic frozen cherries, these are much bigger/darker cherries compared to the first ones given to my wife (red color).
So in total I am using:
-10lbs of tart pitted cherries
-6lbs of sweet pitted cherries
-6lbs of sweet cherry puree
-1 can of 16oz red tart pitted cherries that I found in the house (meh)

I know that pH of 3.5x won't hold as soon as I add water to the mix later, we'll see.

Hoping to pitch Montrachet yeast later tonight.

 

[geek]

After completing to a bit less than 6gal (with about 3 and 1/4 gal of spring water); used what I had left of tartaric acid, about 3tsp and pH came down to about ~3.63.

However the SG is only 1.030

Oh well, white plain sugar it is..

 

[Hoxviii]

I've made a few batches using costco frozen cherries, and it's to rave reviews. everyone loves the stuff.

3lb/gallon, juice, correct for acid to .65, sugar to 12% potential, use 1tsp red star premier blanc/gallon activated before pitching, primary on the solids. backsweetening is my secret - won't share that.

fantastic tasting and repeatable if you're good at taking notes.

 

[geek]

This is now in the ~1.010, so tonight I'm racking and squeezing the fruit bag.

 

[dcbrown73]

This is now in the ~1.010, so tonight I'm racking and squeezing the fruit bag.

We will need to trade bottles once they are fit to drink.

 

[geek]

We will need to trade bottles once they are fit to drink.

Sure thing, let's see how this develops in a few months.
My daughter is buying me a couple cocoa chocolate bars today, so I'll throw them in there tonight. Very curious to know what kind of flavor this will impart to the final product.

My wife also brought a 2.5lbs bag of tart pitted cherries last night, will use them to back sweeten a bit.

 

[Hoxviii]

This is now in the ~1.010, so tonight I'm racking and squeezing the fruit bag.

Are you reading your hydrometer correctly? 1.010 is only a 1% potential. do you mean 1.110 (14.5%)?

 

[Johnd]

Are you reading your hydrometer correctly? 1.010 is only a 1% potential. do you mean 1.110 (14.5%)?

I think you may not be reading the Forum correctly. See post 64, after adjusting acid, he had a sg of 1.030, and boosted it up with white sugar, it's been fermenting for days and is ready to be racked. My $ are on Varis's hydrometer reading ability........

 

[geek]

Lol, you're correct John.
I did boost it to about 1.080

I am currently racking it again as there's LOTS of slush at the bottom.

Taking another reading briefly...

 

[geek]

It's sitting right in the ~1.000 and maybe slightly a bit higher, so I'm calling it 1.000

Man, does Cherry like other fruit wines create a lot of sediment or what..!!
I lost probably 3/4 of a gallon.

I'm letting this sit again for an extra week or more before I add some sulfite to bulk age, for some reason I'm not trusting this will ferment much lower, will see...

 

[geek]

BTW - pH seems to be ~3.56 with a must temp of 68.5F

 

[dcbrown73]

During primary fermentation, was the actively over the top compared to most wines? Mine was. I kept the primary fermenter in a clear plastic bag and it was a good thing!

 

[geek]

Yes, pretty much, I had to move it to a bigger vessel I have (10gal bucket) as it was making a big mess with this red star Montrachet yeast, plus mine went much higher than the 6gal mark since I added simple syrup to boost it up.

BTW - I just ended with a bit less than 5gal, so I racked to a 5gal carboy to rest for some time.

I have 2.5lbs of frozen pitted cherries in the freezer, I will decide on when and how to use them to back sweeten, although these cherries seem to be very low in sugar.

 

[Hoxviii]

Lol, you're correct John.
I did boost it to about 1.080

I am currently racking it again as there's LOTS of slush at the bottom.

Taking another reading briefly...

View attachment 34584

Yep, racked a batch of cherry this morning and there was about 5/8" of goop in the bottom of a 5 gallon batch, and this was coming out of secondary.

coming out of primary I had good and proper chunks left behind, obviously, but the amount of fines and dead yeast that came out in secondary is absolutely nuts. Plus the fact that the wine isn't anywhere near clear yet, there's going to be another layer of goop when I go to rack for sweetening.

I only lost a little since I'm patient and know this wine is going to sit for clearing for probably a month, so no sense in leaving too much behind.

I'll typically only lose a real amount of wine at racking for sweetening, but that doesn't get "lost", the tails from that racking gets used to figure out what and how much sweetener to use so it gets consumed in the process

 

[geek]

What's the pH of that batch?

 

[Hoxviii]

What's the pH of that batch?

Couldn't tell you.

At the start it was 3.9pH, I corrected to 3.5pH, then titrated and corrected to .65TA.

I don't take pH readings at every racking, just at the beginning, before going to bulk aging, and before sweetening. I'm not due for a reading on this batch until my next racking.

 

[geek]

I racked this wine again and it seems like fermentation got stuck and won't go below 1.000 (never happened to me with any other yeast as I can remember); it's been sitting there for many days. I did degas really well.
So decided to stabilize with k-meta and sorbate, then added the juice from 2.5lbs of tart pitted cherries, the SG went to a merely 1.002.

Racked into 5gal carboy and added chunks of dark chocolate (around 1lb).

I'm gonna let this ride for a couple months to see what kind of profile it develops, cherry smell or flavor is nowhere to be found, so hopefully the back sweeten would do its job in a couple months.

SG ~3.59

.

 

[Scooter68]

Well getting my First Cherry Wine must ready today.
Going for a 3 gallon batch (Plus a little more for lees lost)
3 x 16 oz bottles of Tart Cherry Concentrate
1 x 15 oz bottle of Black Cherry Concentrate
(Each of the above says that one bottle makes 1 gallon of Cherry Juice. According to the maker - 1 oz of concentrated 'contains the juice of 2 cups of Cherries' According to some sources that mean a bottle equals 5 1/3 lbs of cherries. So I should have 20 pounds worth of cherries in there.

Still working on the pH - it started at 3.86 and I'm looking at adding primarily Acid
Blend to lower that.
SG is 1.088 with a dry ferment that should be a 12.86% ABV.
Based on what I've seen I don't need to add any tannin but I think I'll go ahead with about 1 tsp because I do want it to have the dry and pucker factor.
Going with the EC 1118 yeast when it's ready sometime tomorrow.