Choke cherries--2014

[brendathebrewer]

by cooler, what does that mean, i always understand that between 70 and 75 its perfect. so what temperature is cooler and how much does it slow it down. i also read that the berries need to be removed at 5 or 7 days or so..what effect does this have opposed to 70 - 75 until it ferments down?

actually what is the prime SG for one to strain/squeeze the fruit and transfer to secondary?

 

[Arne]

I generally don't remove the fruit til I rack to secondary. Usually do this about 1.010 or so. I have a basement that gets pretty cool in the winter. Ferments will stall out or really slow down, but they eventually seem to ferment out. I tend to not b e in a hurry about ferments, tho. Kinda did a tapdance around your questions but we all do our ferments our own way. Good luck with yours, Arne.

 

[jensmith]

Colder is below 65, all the way down to 50 degrees. Not all yeast chills out at the same temp. Instead of fermenting dry in a week it will take a month or two. If it does not stop alltogether that is.


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[ozzie]

1) Is this a reasonable project for someone who has never made wine before?

4) One thing that has puzzled me a lot is do you have to wait for the full aging time to tell if you're on the right track? Most of the recipes for cc wine say it needs to age in the bottle for 9-12 months. If I'm going to get a failure a year from now, what am I going to do with next year's crop in my freezer?

Hey wyogal -

I'm from the same neck of the woods. I picked a ton of chokecherries over at Palisades/Alpine area last fall. Didn't know what to do with them all, and started out with a 3 gallon batch of wine. I went through all the steps from picking to fermenting it out really dry. I didn't have much equipment so I set it up to age it in bottles rather than bulk. (so I could start another batch in my equipment.) I bottled up 15 bottles, and had some left over. My wife and I tasted it, and it was totally drinkable. The recipe says to sit it for 9 months minimum, so that puts me a year out from when I picked them and started the batch. So you can totally do it, very likely it will taste great. And you'll now at about 90 days if it is going to be good. I'm trusting that a 9 month nap will only mellow it out and make it better. But even if it stays the same, it was plenty good to drink.

 

[wyogal]

Update on chokecherry wine, oaking

Well I did plunge right in and made 2 batches, one 3 gal and one 5. All has gone very well I think. I was not in a hurry with it, and made sure the fermentation was complete.

The 5 gal batch was ready first, and my brother talked me into putting it into a new charred oak cask that he will fill up with un-aged whiskey. It's been sitting there for about 6 weeks now, and I've been topping off from the 3 gal batch.

Arne (thank you!) pointed me to some people on the board who know about oaking, and it seems the rough rule of thumb for this sort of treatment is 1 week per gallon of cask. (So I'm a bit on the long side, but it hasn't hurt it at all.)

I have to say that while the wine was drinkable before going into the cask, there is no comparison now, and even after only 2 weeks. It mellowed significantly very quickly, and has a much better body now. I honestly don't taste much oaky flavor, just much smoother and a great cherry flavor. Very dry.

Like Ozzie, I intend to bottle it soon and age until next August or so. I'm toying with the idea of submitting some in the Teton County Fair (last week of July) just to see what people think.

I did some things differently in the two batches. Some lessons I learned from this first effort that I will always remember:
1) Fruit that has been frozen is much much easier to deal with in the must. I got better color and flavor, and better slip of the skins & pits.
2) I squeezed the must almost dry before decanting to second fermentation, and I really like the enhanced color, but there were more solids, meaning more decanting and longer clearing time.
3) Since I don't have a utility/laundry sink, the big bathtub in the master bathroom is a wonderful alternative.

I still have chokecherries in the freezer, but I've been giving away the jelly I made so quickly that I might have to use them for that!

 

[Arne]

You are quite welcome and glad it all worked out for you. Reminds me, probably should think about bottling mine. Arne.

 

[fabrictodyefor]

Hi, wyogal, glad it has worked out for you. My life got a little crazy last fall and I never did get back to you. I have 2 batches of choke cherry going, one with apple juice and one with grape. They are both coming along, but I got a late start and am not near ready to bottle. Maybe we can meet up sometime and exchange a bottle or two of our choke cherry wine! Would love to taste one put on oak. I haven't gotten into the oak barrels yet....mmmm....knew there was something else I should have put on my Christmas list.

 

[wyogal]

Going on a year now...

Time flies--it's the end of june already, the chokecherries have set, but it looks like the harvest will be quite a bit lower than last year here due to a hail storm right during bloom. We'll probably have to range a lot farther to pick as much this year.

The batches were split in 2; as you might recall I was filling an oak cask w/5 gal, the rest I bottled without any flavoring. We filled the cask (and bottled) in mid to late Nov, and let it sit for 6 weeks, then bottled the oaked wine in January. We tasted the oaked wine right out of the cask in January, and I have to say the oak cask took the "alcohol edge" off beautifully, and very fast compared with no oak.

I'm waiting until July to give both another sample. I'll let you know, but I'm thinking that either one will be a good table red.

 

[fabrictodyefor]

Hi, wyogal, good to hear from you again. Sometimes the time drags on when you are wanting a wine to age enough and sometimes "poof" a year has slipped by. This is so interesting about the oak. Last year I had made 2 batches, one with apple juice and the other with grape juice. The choke cherry/apple is ready to bottle, but the choke cherry/grape is still....just not ready! I may get an oak spiral to put in there and see if it helps!

 

[wyogal]

Want to pick your brain re Not bottled cc/g?

Hi Fabric--so I'm confused again (not unusual for me)! How long has your chokecherry/grape been sitting since reaching the point of stability from the fermentation phase? I'm assuming you are "bulk aging" this before bottling? Why, and does it make a difference in the end quality do you think? When you say it's "not ready" is that because it doesn't taste right to you, or is there some test measurement you are doing?

PS-are you coming out this way this summer? I'll take you on a float on the Snake

 

[fabrictodyefor]

I think we are going to go through the mountains of CO this summer, but you never know! We always talk about going to Yellowstone, we love it up there. I've been bulk aging my 2 choke cherry wines since last fall. I rack to clean car boys every 2 months or so. The choke cherry/apple tastes great and taste is what I go by. The choke cherry/grape just doesn't taste very good yet. Not "bad", but....you know if you eat a choke cherry it sucks all the moisture out of your mouth...well it doesn't quite do that, but it almost has that feel to the wine. So I figure to just leave it and hope it mellows out after time! Can't imagine anyone actually coming to Wright, but if you find you are coming through just let me know!!

 

[Elkdog]

Bottled my 2014 choke cherry wine last week. It came out light and fresh tasting. Sweetened to about 1.002SG. I bulk aged it for almost a year and it was pretty smooth. Hope it continues to improve.

 

[fabrictodyefor]

Bottled my 2014 choke cherry wine last week. It came out light and fresh tasting. Sweetened to about 1.002SG. I bulk aged it for almost a year and it was pretty smooth. Hope it continues to improve.

Cool, I bottled my choke cherry/apple last month, and my choke cherry/grape is ready to go. Both bulk aged for almost a year. Now I have to make it last as there were no choke cherries this year!

 

[jensmith]

Bottled mine a few days ago as well. What little I had not already drunk that is! Very tasty, very dry, no need to sweeten this batch. I picked enough chockcherries for a big batch and left way more on the bushes. Just not enough time to pick or freezer space, or carboy space! Darn!!


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[fabrictodyefor]

Bottled mine a few days ago as well. What little I had not already drunk that is! Very tasty, very dry, no need to sweeten this batch. I picked enough chockcherries for a big batch and left way more on the bushes. Just not enough time to pick or freezer space, or carboy space! Darn!!


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time to buy another freezer! My first batch of cc I didn't back sweeten at all. Just depends on the cherries!