Finer Wine Kit Finer Wine Kits

[Brant]

Great idea! I have several Rhône style wines of 11.5-12.5% ABV. They would all be suitable to bring down the alcohol in the

You want to drop 14% down to what exactly? 13%? Sorry, but your not going to do that by topping up with your lower ABV wine. Unless you plan to top up over 50% of the volume. At that point, your blending, not topping up.
Maybe it would be a good blend though. Worth a try.

 

[winemaker81]

You want to drop 14% down to what exactly? 13%? Sorry, but your not going to do that by topping up with your lower ABV wine. Unless you plan to top up over 50% of the volume. At that point, your blending, not topping up.
Maybe it would be a good blend though. Worth a try.

The best choice is to not consider the final ABV, focus on the aroma and taste. The ABV doesn't have to drop much to have an impact.

 

[jgmann67]

What starting SG did you have? Looking at my notes as I get ready to label and it’s higher than expected. Their site says 12-13. I’m wondering if I misread it.

I think it was in around 1.090 +/-. I'll look the next time I'm in the cellar. I hit the two-week mark on Sunday and racked the wine to a clean carboy. It was gray from the suspended carbon in the wine. A couple hours after hitting it with the clarifiers, it looked like it should (and there was a nice pile of carbon at the bottom that i'll rack off in another couple weeks.

 

[ratflinger]

pfft ... unless you just have to have that pale golden color forget the carbon.

 

[Mcjeff]

I think it was in around 1.090 +/-. I'll look the next time I'm in the cellar. I hit the two-week mark on Sunday and racked the wine to a clean carboy. It was gray from the suspended carbon in the wine. A couple hours after hitting it with the clarifiers, it looked like it should (and there was a nice pile of carbon at the bottom that i'll rack off in another couple weeks.

Thanks for the reply. Here is mine in the bottle.

 

[QuiQuog]

Thanks for the reply. Here is mine in the bottle. View attachment 95000

Okay, I love that bottle.

 

[Mcjeff]

Okay, I love that bottle.

Bottle is from Sofia Rose’ that I used to top off.

 

[Shurt1073]

Bottle is from Sofia Rose’ that I used to top off.

Oh my .... I would love to have 1-2 cases of those bottles! Very cool.

 

[winemaker81]

Oh my .... I would love to have 1-2 cases of those bottles! Very cool.

The problem with "interesting" bottles is storage. I use Bordeaux bottles as they stack neatly in less space. When you bottle 30 gallons of wine, you learn to appreciate space.

 

[Bmd2k1]

I was tending wines this afternoon after a fun day of meetings/work sessions, and decided, "Dang! I need a glass of wine!"

While debating, I saw a bottle of Chardonnay all by its lonesome on a shelf. The batch produced 5 bottles of sparkling and 25 bottles of still wine, and I print labels in sheets of 6 ... meaning this bottle has no label. I wrote a "C" on the top of the cork with a Sharpie. The idea is I'll open it first, in a month or three.

But the bottle looked soooo lonesome sitting there by itself. So different personalities conducted a debate: "It's not ready to drink." "Says who?" "It's your wine, drink it if you want!"

The first personality lost out. The wine looks good in the glass, and the taste is MUCH better than when I bottled. 2+ weeks ago the wine was muted on the tongue -- that is far from true today. This one is a winner!

What's ur protocol for creating a sparkling version? (2023 will be my 1st stab at it....)

Cheers!

 

[winemaker81]

What's ur protocol for creating a sparkling version? (2023 will be my 1st stab at it....)

The sparkle was not successful. Funny -- never had a problem carbonating beer, but wine fights me.

The wine was 4 months old, yeast should have been in good shape. I bottled in a mixture of champagne and beer bottles, using carbonation drops. Each is good for 12 oz, so 1 in beer bottles and 2 in champagne bottles. Let the wine rest in a warm place for 4 weeks, chilled a beer bottle, and popped it.

Nada. No zip.

I figured the yeast was dead, so I made a starter with EC-1118, unbottled all the wine, and mixed in the starter, and rebottled it. Crown caps. Since it didn't carbonate, I figured the sugar from the carbonation drops would still be there.

Again, nada.

I'm disappointed, but not giving up. Next time I try it, I'll make up a starter first, blend it well, then do the carb drop thing again.

My son used them to carbonate cider and that worked great, so I figure the problem was the yeast.

 

[Brant]

The sparkle was not successful. Funny -- never had a problem carbonating beer, but wine fights me.

The wine was 4 months old, yeast should have been in good shape. I bottled in a mixture of champagne and beer bottles, using carbonation drops. Each is good for 12 oz, so 1 in beer bottles and 2 in champagne bottles. Let the wine rest in a warm place for 4 weeks, chilled a beer bottle, and popped it.

Nada. No zip.

I figured the yeast was dead, so I made a starter with EC-1118, unbottled all the wine, and mixed in the starter, and rebottled it. Crown caps. Since it didn't carbonate, I figured the sugar from the carbonation drops would still be there.

Again, nada.

I'm disappointed, but not giving up. Next time I try it, I'll make up a starter first, blend it well, then do the carb drop thing again.

My son used them to carbonate cider and that worked great, so I figure the problem was the yeast.

Can you use a soda stream?

 

[winemaker81]

Can you use a soda stream?

Yes, you can.

My parents purchased the original SodaStream in the late 70's, and the instructions said to carbonate only water, else the mechanism would be gummed up and destroyed. My wife & I purchased one ~18 years ago, and I recall the instructions said the same thing.

If carbonating anything other than water, I'd rinse the mechanism really well, then I'd rinse it again.

 

[sremick]

Yes, you can.

My parents purchased the original SodaStream in the late 70's, and the instructions said to carbonate only water, else the mechanism would be gummed up and destroyed. My wife & I purchased one ~18 years ago, and I recall the instructions said the same thing.

If carbonating anything other than water, I'd rinse the mechanism really well, then I'd rinse it again.

Instead of wasting money on an overpriced SodaStream, I just use a standard CO2 tank, regulator, and quick-release bottle adapter. Connect a plastic soda bottle with whatever I want to (re)carbonate, open up the valve, shake it around a bit, and voila.... carbonated. Refilling the CO2 is a whopping $20 but it lasts an insane amount of time.

I've made my own soda, re-carbonated flat soda, Club Soda, ginger beer, hard cider... list goes on and on.

 

[kilendra]

The sparkle was not successful. Funny -- never had a problem carbonating beer, but wine fights me.

The wine was 4 months old, yeast should have been in good shape. I bottled in a mixture of champagne and beer bottles, using carbonation drops. Each is good for 12 oz, so 1 in beer bottles and 2 in champagne bottles. Let the wine rest in a warm place for 4 weeks, chilled a beer bottle, and popped it.

I think it might take more carbonation drops. Beer has residual CO2 in it from primary but wine is degassed to remove that CO2, so wine is starting from a much lower carbonation point than beer is.

Beer is typically carbonated to 2-3 volumes CO2 depending on style, so carb drops are made to add an additional ~1-1.5 vols CO2 to beer that already has ~1-1.5 vols residual CO2 from primary (depending on max temperature reached during fermentation). For sparkling wine, any residual CO2 plus the added CO2 from the yeast consuming carbonation drops needs to get up to ~4 vols CO2 for champagne levels of carbonation: if that residual CO2 is ~0 vols from degassing, everything has to come from the carb drops.

 

[winemaker81]

@kilendra, what you're saying makes sense, but I don't think it applies here. My son successfully carbonated cider with drops (1 per 12 oz), which was fully degassed. In my situation, the resulting wine was fully still. Not light carbonation -- no carbonation.

 

[bakervinyard]

I‘ve tried making “sparkling“ blueberry and peach wine. I took 3 gallons of blueberry, didn’t add the sorbate and added 3 ounces of sugar, stirred, bottled in beer bottles. Put in a dark closet, waited 6 weeks. Wasn’t bad at all. It was better as it aged. Same process for the peach. When I-first tried it at 6 weeks it wasn’t that good. At 14 weeks it was pretty tasty. I used the Island Mist kits.
Bakervinyard

 

[Bmd2k1]

Instead of wasting money on an overpriced SodaStream, I just use a standard CO2 tank, regulator, and quick-release bottle adapter. Connect a plastic soda bottle with whatever I want to (re)carbonate, open up the valve, shake it around a bit, and voila.... carbonated. Refilling the CO2 is a whopping $20 but it lasts an insane amount of time.

I've made my own soda, re-carbonated flat soda, Club Soda, ginger beer, hard cider... list goes on and on.

Hmmm....can ya post a pic?

 

[She’sgonnakillme]

AWS just posted this years competition results.

Three out of the four FWK's submitted received medals.

Tavola Riesling - Silver
Forte Cab Sauv - Bronze
Oh So Strawberry- Bronze

Only one that didn't medal was my Forte Super Tuscan.

https://americanwinesociety.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/2022-AWC-Results.pdf

 

[Bmd2k1]

AWS just posted this years competition results.

Three out of the four FWK's submitted received medals.

Tavola Riesling - Silver
Forte Cab Sauv - Bronze
Oh So Strawberry- Bronze

Only one that didn't medal was my Forte Super Tuscan.

https://americanwinesociety.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/2022-AWC-Results.pdf

Congrats! ✌