First Ever Passionfruit Wine--and Fermentation Questions

[AnnArrogance]

Hello, all! So, I'm totally new to winemaking (but loving it so far) and have my first batch underway! I'm using a variation on the "Canny Apple Wine" recipe from "The Joy of Home Wine Making" by Terry Garey, but substituting passionfruit juice for the apple juice (hey, she does encourage you to experiment!). Basically, here's what I've got going on:

48 fl. oz. passionfruit juice
juice of 2 lemons
1 lb. 10 oz. sugar
water to 1 gallon
1 tsp. pectic enzyme

I'm using Montrachet yeast, since the recipe recommends it and it came with my starter kit setup rom my LHBS.

I bought Ceres 100% juice passionfruit juice, which contains only pear and passionfruit juices, and no preservatives or anything. After putting everything together I tested the PA/SG, and added 10 oz. of sugar (the recipe originally called for only 1 lb.) to bring the PA up to 12%. Also added 1.5 tsp. of acid blend to bring the acidity up to 0.60 per my acid test kit. I let it sit undisturbed for 24 hours before adding the yeast, which I just sprinkled on top per the recipe.

Here's a pic right after adding the yeast:



Now, here's where the questions come in. From everything I've read other than this one recipe (which is a beginner's recipe in the book, so I know she's trying to keep it simple), you should start your fermentation in a primary fermenter. This recipe says to put it all in a gallon carboy with a good amount of headspace and cover the top with plastic wrap and a rubber band, then rack and top up in a couple of weeks. I put in a bung and airlock instead, since I had one (the recipe presupposes you don't and tries to use minimal equipment), and figured that would let gas escape a bit better than plastic wrap.

Well, about 6 or 8 hours after adding my yeast, it looked like it was really starting up well. It was good and fizzy looking, and the airlock was bubbling like mad. 24 hours after adding the yeast, though, the bubbling had noticeably slowed down. I figured it wasn't getting enough air, so I removed the bung and airlock and put a piece of cheesecloth over the top of the carboy with a rubber band and gave everything a few good swirls. It fizzed like mad when I aerated it like that, but then settled back down. I also added 3/4 tsp. of SuperFerment yeast nutrient/energizer to be safe. I gave it a couple more good swirls throughout the day for good measure. I also wrapped the whole thing in a towel (leaving the top sticking out to breathe) for good measure thinking it might be a bit cold, although the stick-on thermometer on the bottle says it's between 70-73 degrees.

That was yesterday. Today (48 hours after adding the yeast), the must looks somewhat cloudier and there is some visible and audible fizzing, especially when I give it a swirl, but nothing like the foam or head I've seen online with most fermentations. Is that because I'm using just juice and not fermenting on the fruit or something, or do I have a slow/stuck fermentation? If so, should I transfer it to a primary fermenter or leave it be in the carboy? And again, if so, is there anything else I can do to perk it up?

Here's a pic of it today for comparison:



Sorry for the lengthy post and the newbie questions. Very excited about winemaking and hoping I haven't killed my passionfruit wine before it even had a chance! Also, feel free to tell me to chill out and be patient--I'm hoping winemaking will teach me patience eventually! Also, please forgive me and scold me harshly if I've posted this in the wrong place.

 

[Pargettk]

I replied with a long detailed response but this site lost it. Sorry. Basically you are fine except the starting volume looks low - 2/3 gallon? Add passion fruit to keep it from being too dilute. Next time, start with 1+ gallons in a bucket to allow air and allow bubbling volume. Rack from it to the 1 gallon carboy! Love your spirit!

 

[BernardSmith]

Hi Ann, Welcome Pilgrim. The only good way to tell whether your wine has stalled is to measure the density of the liquid - otherwise known as specific gravity. You do that by drawing a sample and putting it into a narrow glass or plastic cylinder into which you carefully (because quite fragile) your hydrometer. Given the fact that you mention that you measured the density before pitching the yeast you have an hydrometer and you know how to use it. Simply take a reading. If the reading is close to 1.000 then it has not stalled. What has happened is that your yeast has done its job (more or less). If the reading is say 1.050 or 1.020 and it does not move if you take another reading after 24 hours then it may have stalled. But my guess is that the yeast has done what you asked it to do and stopped doing it when it ran out of sugar to ferment.

I will let others offer their thoughts if it turns out that your wine has stalled.

But one other thought from me. I am sure Garey's book is a good first text on the art and science of wine making but IMO, it is not always a good idea to dilute fruit juice with water unless that juice is a concentrate. If you tasted the juice you wanted to make into a wine would you want to dilute it with water or drink it "straight"? If you would drink the juice without dilution then you are simply going to water down your wine. IMO, you really want to buy enough juice to make the volume of wine you want to make. There are exceptions: mead, for example - you really do need to dilute honey - honey simply will not ferment unless it is diluted with water. Flower wine are another example: I don't think you can press enough juice out of hibiscus or elderflowers to make a must (the juice before you pitch the yeast), so you make a kind of tea from the flowers and ferment that tea.

Last point, if the wine has indeed fermented out all the sugar that was in the liquor you could leave it in this container. But the idea of racking is that you remove the wine from the dead yeast and fruit particles. This for three reasons at least. The first is that some yeasts when they die disintegrate and become food for the living cells but their disintegration releases chemicals that can produce off flavors and odors in your wine after a few months. The second reason is that racking your wine off the sediment means that you in fact help to clear the wine so that it finishes bright and absolutely transparent. The third reason is one that you touched on in your questions. And it is this: when you pitch (add) your yeast you want to leave several inches of head room to allow for froth and foam that the yeast can produce (some yeasts produce less , some more, some fruits encourage more , some inhibit this), BUT after the active fermentation is over you really want to have as little headroom as possible between the surface of the wine and the container itself. You want the wine to be an inch or so INSIDE the mouth of the jug because air and wine are not a great combo. Air will oxidize the wine and oxidation spoils the color and can change the taste (most people view that change as undesirable). So, you may want to find a smaller container to continue aging this wine - or you may want to add more juice (and this will begin the fermentation again) to better fill the carboy or jug.
Good luck.

 

[AnnArrogance]

I replied with a long detailed response but this site lost it. Sorry. Basically you are fine except the starting volume looks low - 2/3 gallon? Add passion fruit to keep it from being too dilute. Next time, start with 1+ gallons in a bucket to allow air and allow bubbling volume. Rack from it to the 1 gallon carboy! Love your spirit!

Thanks! Yeah, she calls for a low starting volume since you start in a carboy instead of a primary fermenter in this recipe, then has you top it off with water when you rack it the first time (which I think I'm going to do with juice instead). I really waffled over following her instructions or going with a primary bucket and doing it the way you're "supposed to." I decided to go with her instructions (for the most part), but I don't think I will again! I'm going to stick with the primary bucket/rack to carboy method from now on.

Hi Ann, Welcome Pilgrim. The only good way to tell whether your wine has stalled is to measure the density of the liquid - otherwise known as specific gravity.

Oh, sorry! I forgot to mention that I did check the SG when I pulled it out yesterday. No change in 24 hours--1.090. My bad. I knew I forgot to include something important! I will probably take another reading in the morning just to see how it's going and update here.

But one other thought from me. I am sure Garey's book is a good first text on the art and science of wine making but IMO, it is not always a good idea to dilute fruit juice with water unless that juice is a concentrate. If you tasted the juice you wanted to make into a wine would you want to dilute it with water or drink it "straight"? If you would drink the juice without dilution then you are simply going to water down your wine. IMO, you really want to buy enough juice to make the volume of wine you want to make.

That's really good advice! Thank you! I'm thinking I might top off the gallon with juice when I rack it rather than water, to try to punch it up a bit. Will that mess with my alcohol content too much? But for sure next time I'm not going to do that. I hadn't even thought about watering it down so much! Unfortunately my husband drank all the leftover juice and the store we get it from (it's imported from South Africa) is out now, and I don't know of another passionfruit brand that's 100% juice. Otherwise I think I would just dump it and start over. I have some canned passionfruit I can use to make enough juice to top up, but not enough for a whole new batch.

So, you may want to find a smaller container to continue aging this wine - or you may want to add more juice (and this will begin the fermentation again) to better fill the carboy or jug.
Good luck.

Now, one more question (sorry)--when you say adding more juice will restart fermentation, does that mean primary? Would I be better off just topping it off now and switching it into a primary fermenter or just leaving it and topping it off when I rack it it a new carboy and letting it run its course in there?

Thanks!

 

[BernardSmith]

The primary is simply the first container you start with- the one into which you pitch the yeast. Many folk on this forum use a bucket (you can get 2-gallon buckets from your local home brew store if you intend to start with gallon batches but they also will have 6 or 7 gallon buckets too. The idea is that you have plenty of room for the batch size and you have no fear that the foam and froth generated by the yeast is going to create a volcano that runs out the primary and over your floor or carpet. The other thing about using a bucket is that it is easy during active fermentation to take a sanitized spoon or rod and stir air into the wine a couple of times a day.
I would wait before adding more juice ... if this has stalled you don't want to add more good after bad, as it were. You want to restart the stalled fermentation before adding more sugar. But I cannot see why this would have stalled at 1.090.
What I might do is whip air into the juice and wait another 24 hours to see if the yeast is simply sluggish. You did not heat the water and so damage or kill the yeast?
If the fermentation does not appear to be working in another 24 hours (the gravity is still at 1.090) then this is what I would do:
I would take some other juice (say apple juice) - about a cupful and add another package of the same yeast. That should take off within a few hours. When that is going gangbusters I would take a cup from your passion-fruit must and add that to your starter. Check to see if that is fermenting actively and after a few hours I would take TWO cups of the passion-fruit must and add those to the two cups that are actively fermenting. If that still ferments, take FOUR cups from your wine and add that. What you are doing is not adding the yeast to the problem wine but adding small doses of the problem wine to your starter. You are continually doubling the volume of the starter until all your wine is now actively fermenting. BUT the yeast in your must may simply be in a lengthy lag period... Give it another 24 hours...

 

[AnnArrogance]

LOL I got impatient and went ahead and took another SG reading. I definitely do have fermentation going on! SG was 1.060. I also managed to find another carton of juice that my husband somehow missed (yay!), which is a small miracle for as much as we both love passionfruit juice. I was getting a bit paranoid about the dilution of the juice and all with already adding water and then topping it off later, so I went ahead and added the juice and transferred the whole thing into my (sanitized) 2-gallon bucket so it has more room to breathe. Checked the SG again after adding the extra juice and it didn't change it at all. I also added another 1/4 tsp. of the SuperFerment, since I only added 3/4 tsp. before and it says you can add up to 1 tsp. per gallon.

I wish I had waited 'til tomorrow so I would have seen your reply, Bernard! Sorry—still working on this patience thing! But at least I know the yeast is doing its job.

Plan now (unless y'all recommend otherwise) is to check the SG again tomorrow or Saturday and rack it back to a gallon carboy with an airlock when SG reaches 1.040 or below? That seems to be what most recipes I've read recommend. Man, I hope this works! Who knew winemaking could be so stressful? I know once I've got a couple of successful gallons under my belt I'll relax and trust the process, but for now I'm in full stress-bunny mode about this batch!

Thanks again for all the help! It is much appreciated!

 

[BernardSmith]

Looks like you are far better than you think... I would wait a wee while longer before racking your wine back into the secondary. A gravity of 1.040 is too early and you might leave behind too much of the active yeast colony and you might still have too much activity to fill the secondary as high as it really ought to be filled. I would wait until the gravity drops to about 1.005 and then rack.
The reason why you may not have seen a rise in the gravity after you added the juice is because the juice itself may have been pretty close to the gravity of your wine. If the juice was at around (say 1.050) and your wine was at 1.060 then given the quantity of juice you could have added the change in gravity may have been 1 or 2 points and you may not have read that for all kinds of reasons - including , eg the CO2 that would be in the sample you took (added buoyancy) or the juice you added may not have been perfectly mixed in the carboy /bucket so your sample would not have been one that perfectly random sample .

 

[AnnArrogance]

Oooh, good to know! Thank you! I'll make sure to wait until it gets down to that range. I'll post an update once I get to that point.

Thanks again for all the help!

 

[AnnArrogance]

You know, I have to say, too, that'sa much as I think the book I'm using is overall a good starting book for newbies, I think this first recipe in it kind of sets people up for, well, not failure exactly, but certainly not a great first wine. At least from everything I've read on the forums and in this thread in particular, especially with her recommending diluting the juice so much and using such a low starting volume, and not the proper equipment and not using a hydrometer and all. I understand that she's trying to simplify the process and reduce the startup cost for someone just getting into it, and to be fair her later recipes are much more in line with the standard methods and techniques I've read about everywhere else, but I wish I'd just gone ahead and followed that process instead of following the simpler one!

 

[mennyg19]

Hi, im new to the forum and the winemaking in general. I would like to try passionfruit as i have a ton of frozen passionfruit in my freezer (my wife didnt end up liking it in her fruit smoothies)
One question I have, what does the pectic enzyme do and is it a make it or break it ingredient? I live overseas and doubt I would be able to find it anywhere.
Also, can I substitute honey for the sugar?

 

[BernardSmith]

Hi mennyg19 - and welcome. Pectic enzyme is an organic chemical that breaks up the pectins in fruit. If you heat fruit that contains pectins the pectins form (I believe ) long chains and those chains are what transforms the fruit into jams and jellies. In wine these pectins result in cloudy wines even if you don't add heat. The addition of the enzyme helps ensure that the wine can finish absolutely clear and bright. If you cannot find a source for pectic enzyme - I think - but am not certain - that papaya skins may provide you with the same enzyme that is otherwise made in a lab.
Honey is a perfectly good , often better, substitute for table sugar in the context of wine making. The fermentability of honey is equivalent to that of sugar although you may need to add a little more honey (by weight) to produce the same amount of alcohol (since honey does contain some liquid). The wine , however, will develop the flavor of the honey which may or may not be neutral and which may or may not enhance the flavor of the fruit. Wines made from fruits fermented with honey are called melomels and folk often ferment, for example, apple juice with honey (that melomel is called a cyser) so there is a great deal written about meads (wines from honey) and melomels. Passion fruit wine sounds like a winner - but I would always try to use as little (or no) water as I possibly could even if that meant making a gallon of wine rather than five gallons. Most fruit has a more delicate flavor than you might imagine when all the sugar has fermented to alcohol. Good luck

 

[mennyg19]

Thanks for all that info. Just a question: Would it ruin the taste if i dont have pectic enzyme or is it just for looks and how clear it will be? Im having a hard time finding pectic enzyme or papayas around me.

 

[BernardSmith]

No no. The use of the enzyme is really for aesthetic purposes. Most people prefer their wine to be bright clear and without the pectic enzyme your wine is likely to be cloudy. I don't know that the cloudiness affects the taste.

 

[Masbustelo]

You can use the skins from Papaya instead of the pectic enzyme. It's not that big of a deal to use neither. Especially with the passion fruit. Definitely you can use honey instead of sugar. Here is a link to a program that will help you decide how much honey to use.http://mcarterbrown.com/mead/mead2.html With the tartness of the passionfruit and the honey you could have some problems with a slow or stalled ferment. Then you would need to use some form of calcium carbonate to get it going again.