First time wine making a questions on blueberry wine

[Scooter68]

Best results would be with 5-7 lbs of blueberries per gallon. 6 is going to give you a very thin taste. While some might suggest adding pure blueberry juice or concentrated Blueberry juice that brings in the potential for the fermentation to restart. Chalk this up to experience and start another batch. (When you get to drink this batch you can say that this wine is "Light on the palate." I had a peach wine like that first time around.) You might look into something like Skeeter Pee or Dragons Blood for a fast drinker - something ready in a month or two.
When looking at recipes for fruit wines be very careful about those that call for less than 5 pounds of almost any fruit. Other than Elderberry and maybe a wild Black Raspberry 5 Plus pounds per gallon is a starting point. The less water you have to add to get up to your target volume the better. You will find some that will say something like 3 or 4 pounds of a fruit and the also include something like Apple Juice or Apple Juice concentrate, Grape Juice or even raisins. That will certainly work, however, (And this is just my personal prejudice kicking in) when I make a fruit wine like Blueberry or Peach or whatever variety I normally go for a Single fruit wine, no mixing with other fruits unless I am truly looking to make a multi-flavor wine like Pineapple-Mango or Peach-Vanilla. By staying with a single fruit you learn the flavor characteristics of THAT fruit without 'additives' or distractions. You can even blend wines (By the glass) after they are finished and aged to try combinations. That saves you the time and effort of a combination that turns out less that as desired.
Wine making has taught me something that I didn't learn in the first 66 year of life - real patience. The more you have the better the results. If you read enough on here you will find stories about folks who made a batch of wine and hated it, almost pitched it out but instead just shelved it. Two or Three years later the decided to see just how bad it really was and were blown away but the change (for the better) in that 'bad batch' after 2-4 years of aging.

And in case no body else said it "Welcome to the Hobby of Home Wine Making."

 

[hounddawg]

bottom right is yeast Energizer. So i don’t have the potassium metabisulfate? Sorry very very new to all of this.
View attachment 65129

the bag of brown is potassium sorbate correct? that's for just before you back sweeten, after back sweeten time most wait a few days after back sweetening to make sure your wine does not start fermenting again. campden tablets are fine, but i like the powder form called potassium metabisulfite/K-meta and get a set of stainless measuring spoons from 1/4 tsp to 1 tablespoon set,
Dawg

 

[sour_grapes]

Thank you for your input. I will take a picture of it with the hydrometer in it on Thursday. If I’m doing it wrong I’m down to learn.

Here ya go: How To Read Hydrometer

 

[hounddawg]

my oops,,, potassium sorbate, you'll need it before you backsweeten, it will not stop a ferment, but after 3 days of your ferment reading the same then you put your wine into a clean carboy, i let most of mine bulk age till all lees(sediment) fall to bottom. then after racking into a clean carboy, and letting it sit to make sure all you lees are gone and you as well will need either a degassing whip, or let bulk age till it degasses and clears on its own, but just before you backsweeten you will need potassium sorbate to keep your wine from restarting a ferment, because you could have a wine bomb, which will blow wine everywhere, now i could be wrong but the only chemical i know that has a shelf life is potassium sorbate, i throw out sorbate after a year, and like i said a cheap measuring spoon set is very helpful, i use a set of stainless steel spoon that go from 1/4 tsp to 1tbs, 1/4 teaspoon to 1 tablespoon, it all sounds way worse than it is, i make way more than i drink, i find peace of mind in the crafting of wines, i'll give you a couple sites that will help once your addicted to being a winemaker,
#1 homewinery.come #2 homebrewohio.com #3 labelpeelers.com ,,,, #4 packagingoptionsdirect.com #1 is good concentrates, but they say each for 5 gallons, 4.5 gal much better 4 gal even better, #2 great deals on wine bottles free shipping if over $50 #3 is good for different things and #4 best 3 gal thru 6.5 gal super heavy italian carboys, free shipping on carboys if over $149
now these are just to check out and on down the line are great sites to have bookmarked, and last but not least is a member @vacuumpumpman he sells a vacuum pump that racks, bottles, and since it's done under vacuum it degasses as you rack, as well he sells filter housings so you can filter and degas an/or bottle and filter at the same time, i buy my spun polypropylene filters on ebay in cases of 16 to fifty and saves tons of money on bulk over single filters, 1 micron for whites and 5 microns for reds, i'm disabled so i saved and built up for quite a while before i bought most of these things, now my wine room has grown very small, lol, but i'm as happy as a pig in the mud, lol
Dawg

 

[KCCam]

the bag of brown is potassium sorbate correct? that's for just before you back sweeten, after back sweeten time most wait a few days after back sweetening to make sure your wine does not start fermenting again. campden tablets are fine, but i like the powder form called potassium metabisulfite/K-meta and get a set of stainless measuring spoons from 1/4 tsp to 1 tablespoon set,
Dawg

No, the bag of brown he said is yeast energizer. There is no Potassium Sorbate (Sorbate for short) in the picture. @Alexey, you will need Potassium Sorbate if you want to have anything other than dry wine. At least a small amount of backsweetening (sugar after fermentation is complete) is highly recommended for fruit wines, and k-meta in combination with sorbate prevent any stray yeast from starting a new colony with the fresh food you just added.

 

[RichardC]

The problem with backsweetening (adding sweetness at end of fermentation,) is that even with months of aging / settling and numerous rackings, there may be dormant yeast in the wine that slowly restarts fermentation. This will 1) greatly extend your wait time for the wine to clear, or give you cloudy wine if you're set on drinking it a year from now. It can also scare the out of you when bottles explode, or corks pop out of bottles.

Potassium sorbate prevents yeast from reproducing but does not kill living yeast so adding that alone isn't ideal, so we add potassium metabisulphite (Campden) as well, to help kill the living yeast.

@Scooter68 what in particular do you disagree with in the blueberryvideo posted? Thanks

 

[Alexey]

everybody has to learn, i see where @Scooter68 and @sour_grapes have given advice, they are both top shelf advice, do you have a PH meter and some 4.1 buffer solution to dial your PH meter in , a cheap one around $10 to $20, you'll find you'll want your wines at around 3.6 a little above or below is cool, and to repeat @Scooter68, patience is your best ingredient period , you say you have then in gallon jugs right, then you'd need a couple drilled 6.5 bungs (stoppers with a hole in them) and airlock them with k-meta solution or at least water, vodka, something to keep air out, i can't say because i do not know what you reading is right now, i do know it ain't .082, and on country wines, that's most any wine that is not grape, after your wine has degassed and let sit till your lees(sediment) fall to bottom, once you have let your wine clear fruit or berry wines need back sweetened in order to bring out your fruits flavor, but come back sweeten time you'll need a 1/4 k-meta at most and potassium sorbate to label directions in order to keep your wine from starting fermentation again, but don't worry about that for now, airlock for safety, then post pictures with your hydrometer readings, and when making wines you need to sanitize everything, you make a solution to package instructions using potassium metabisulfite, and called K-meta, that solution you must use to sanitize all your equipment, wine is easy to contaminate,
i hope this helped some, you are on the right forum to learn the art of winemaking, oh and welcome to WMT,,, don't sweat it they'll have you making good wines in no time, welcome to the winemaking addiction ,,, @Rice_Guy is another very good for advice,
Dawg

Thank you. Ive seen the same guys that are replying to thread have replied to others and you're definitely on there too. Lol
Also thank you for the welcoming

 

[Alexey]

Best results would be with 5-7 lbs of blueberries per gallon. 6 is going to give you a very thin taste. While some might suggest adding pure blueberry juice or concentrated Blueberry juice that brings in the potential for the fermentation to restart. Chalk this up to experience and start another batch. (When you get to drink this batch you can say that this wine is "Light on the palate." I had a peach wine like that first time around.) You might look into something like Skeeter Pee or Dragons Blood for a fast drinker - something ready in a month or two.
When looking at recipes for fruit wines be very careful about those that call for less than 5 pounds of almost any fruit. Other than Elderberry and maybe a wild Black Raspberry 5 Plus pounds per gallon is a starting point. The less water you have to add to get up to your target volume the better. You will find some that will say something like 3 or 4 pounds of a fruit and the also include something like Apple Juice or Apple Juice concentrate, Grape Juice or even raisins. That will certainly work, however, (And this is just my personal prejudice kicking in) when I make a fruit wine like Blueberry or Peach or whatever variety I normally go for a Single fruit wine, no mixing with other fruits unless I am truly looking to make a multi-flavor wine like Pineapple-Mango or Peach-Vanilla. By staying with a single fruit you learn the flavor characteristics of THAT fruit without 'additives' or distractions. You can even blend wines (By the glass) after they are finished and aged to try combinations. That saves you the time and effort of a combination that turns out less that as desired.
Wine making has taught me something that I didn't learn in the first 66 year of life - real patience. The more you have the better the results. If you read enough on here you will find stories about folks who made a batch of wine and hated it, almost pitched it out but instead just shelved it. Two or Three years later the decided to see just how bad it really was and were blown away but the change (for the better) in that 'bad batch' after 2-4 years of aging.

And in case no body else said it "Welcome to the Hobby of Home Wine Making."

Wow you sure sent me some reading material. Lol. I love the fact that y’all are sharing your wine knowledge. This is great.
questions:
1. Do I have to lee buying more carboys since mine will be taken up for the next 9 months? Or is there something else I can store wine that is racked?
2. Wheres the best place to buy carboys (don’t have any on offer up, letgo or market place close by.

 

[Scooter68]

I assume you are talking about 3, 5, 6.5 gallon carboys? There's a variety of sources for them can't tell you one is better than another. I recommendation. Measure and mark the carboys actual volume. I've found variations in capacity of as much as 12 oz in mine. Racking can get "interesting" you rack from a larger to smaller carboy and the volume is that much less. After the intial rackings the volume loss you experience might only be 3-4 oz but if the carboy you rack into is 12 oz smaller.... OR if it's larger you suddenly have a very significant amount of headspace soo. Remember you really only need 1 extra carboy so that let say you have 4 batches going and they all are due to be racked. Obviously you rack, wash, sanitize and re-use the carboy you empty for the next racking. Or...... you buy/scrouge up more so that you can keep making MORE WINE ARRR ARRR ARRRR !

As to 1 gallon carboys. (I have 4 and then I have about 8 others that are actually 4 liter carboys and I prefer those. Those were picked up at our recycling center for free. (Carlo Rossi Wine comes in that size so...) Also I would recommend collecting at least a couple of each of the other sizes of glass containers you can find from time to time at a recycling center 1.5 liter, 1/2 gallon, 20 oz, 16 oz and 12 oz*. Those make great places to keep extra wine. The reason I end up with extra wine is that if I want to make a 3 gallon batch of say Apple wine - I start with at least 3 3/4 to 4 gallons because the extensive amount of lees I get from home-made apple juice. When I end up with extra I put that under airlock and set it along side the 3 gallon carboy and use it for topping off.

By the way a lot of this is repeat info. I really should be saving these responses in a file to cut and paste because over a years time we get the same questions at least 2-3 times.

One more thing and this IS a repeat of something I've posted before. This is my just personal reading from my experience with wine making in only the past 5 years.
The taste of wine with aging:

1) Wine immediately after fermentation is finished - It's "Wine" but I wouldn't drink or share it with anyone.
2) Wine cleared and aged about 2-4 months - Sharp wine that has rough edges and tastes rather harsh on the tongue but drinkable
3) Wine aged 9-12 months - Definitely wine and something you can share with friend as you tell them "This is a rather immature wine, but it has potential."
4) Wine aged 18 months - Very enjoyable and reaching it's taste potential, happy to share, give away to good friends or people interested in making their own
5) Wine aged 24-36 months - A treasure - shared sparingly unless you are trying to impress someone. (Many of us rarely have any wine that old because it's consumed before it gets past 18 months.

( I think I only have 1 bottle about 4 years old and it got hidden away when I shuffled my wine bottle around. It's one of my "Light on the palate Peach wines." Pale straw colored and someday I'll open it.)

* Make sure that those extra bottle fit you airlock caps/bungs. Also if you can find them with their original screw on caps clean those and keep then for using when you refrigerate some of that extra wine. (I save the cleanest portion of the lees and put them in the fridge when I don't have much extra wine from a batch. - After about 24-48 hours in the fridge the majority of the lees drop out from that and you now have some extra wine. Just get that wine off of the lees asap)

 

[hounddawg]

No, the bag of brown he said is yeast energizer. There is no Potassium Sorbate (Sorbate for short) in the picture. @Alexey, you will need Potassium Sorbate if you want to have anything other than dry wine. At least a small amount of backsweetening (sugar after fermentation is complete) is highly recommended for fruit wines, and k-meta in combination with sorbate prevent any stray yeast from starting a new colony with the fresh food you just added.

yep that exactly what i correct in the post just above this one
Dawg

 

[Alexey]

I assume you are talking about 3, 5, 6.5 gallon carboys? There's a variety of sources for them can't tell you one is better than another. I recommendation. Measure and mark the carboys actual volume. I've found variations in capacity of as much as 12 oz in mine. Racking can get "interesting" you rack from a larger to smaller carboy and the volume is that much less. After the intial rackings the volume loss you experience might only be 3-4 oz but if the carboy you rack into is 12 oz smaller.... OR if it's larger you suddenly have a very significant amount of headspace soo. Remember you really only need 1 extra carboy so that let say you have 4 batches going and they all are due to be racked. Obviously you rack, wash, sanitize and re-use the carboy you empty for the next racking. Or...... you buy/scrouge up more so that you can keep making MORE WINE ARRR ARRR ARRRR !

As to 1 gallon carboys. (I have 4 and then I have about 8 others that are actually 4 liter carboys and I prefer those. Those were picked up at our recycling center for free. (Carlo Rossi Wine comes in that size so...) Also I would recommend collecting at least a couple of each of the other sizes of glass containers you can find from time to time at a recycling center 1.5 liter, 1/2 gallon, 20 oz, 16 oz and 12 oz*. Those make great places to keep extra wine. The reason I end up with extra wine is that if I want to make a 3 gallon batch of say Apple wine - I start with at least 3 3/4 to 4 gallons because the extensive amount of lees I get from home-made apple juice. When I end up with extra I put that under airlock and set it along side the 3 gallon carboy and use it for topping off.

By the way a lot of this is repeat info. I really should be saving these responses in a file to cut and paste because over a years time we get the same questions at least 2-3 times.

One more thing and this IS a repeat of something I've posted before. This is my just personal reading from my experience with wine making in only the past 5 years.
The taste of wine with aging:

1) Wine immediately after fermentation is finished - It's "Wine" but I wouldn't drink or share it with anyone.
2) Wine cleared and aged about 2-4 months - Sharp wine that has rough edges and tastes rather harsh on the tongue but drinkable
3) Wine aged 9-12 months - Definitely wine and something you can share with friend as you tell them "This is a rather immature wine, but it has potential."
4) Wine aged 18 months - Very enjoyable and reaching it's taste potential, happy to share, give away to good friends or people interested in making their own
5) Wine aged 24-36 months - A treasure - shared sparingly unless you are trying to impress someone. (Many of us rarely have any wine that old because it's consumed before it gets past 18 months.

( I think I only have 1 bottle about 4 years old and it got hidden away when I shuffled my wine bottle around. It's one of my "Light on the palate Peach wines." Pale straw colored and someday I'll open it.)

* Make sure that those extra bottle fit you airlock caps/bungs. Also if you can find them with their original screw on caps clean those and keep then for using when you refrigerate some of that extra wine. (I save the cleanest portion of the lees and put them in the fridge when I don't have much extra wine from a batch. - After about 24-48 hours in the fridge the majority of the lees drop out from that and you now have some extra wine. Just get that wine off of the lees asap)

Im in Florida. People don’t really recycle here.

 

[KCCam]

yep that exactly what i correct in the post just above this one
Dawg

Oops, I didn’t realize that’s what your oops was referring to. Sorry.

 

[KCCam]

Wow you sure sent me some reading material. Lol. I love the fact that y’all are sharing your wine knowledge. This is great.
questions:
1. Do I have to lee buying more carboys since mine will be taken up for the next 9 months? Or is there something else I can store wine that is racked?
2. Wheres the best place to buy carboys (don’t have any on offer up, letgo or market place close by.

1. Once your wine is perfectly clear you can let it age in the bottle too, but you can’t learn as much that way. In the carboy you can taste it now and then to see how it’s progressing, and adjust if necessary.

And you may have picked up on this, but you can also make a bunch of quick drinkers that don’t need to age much first. Once you have a good supply of something you can enjoy bottled, it’s much easier to let a carboy or two (or 20) of the good stuff age. 4-6 week wine kits can be drinkable fairly quickly, or check out DangerDave's Dragon Blood Wine and Skeeter Pee.

 

[hounddawg]

my oops,,, potassium sorbate, you'll need it before you backsweeten, it will not stop a ferment, but after 3 days of your ferment reading the same then you put your wine into a clean carboy, i let most of mine bulk age till all lees(sediment) fall to bottom. then after racking into a clean carboy, and letting it sit to make sure all you lees are gone and you as well will need either a degassing whip, or let bulk age till it degasses and clears on its own, but just before you backsweeten you will need potassium sorbate to keep your wine from restarting a ferment, because you could have a wine bomb, which will blow wine everywhere, now i could be wrong but the only chemical i know that has a shelf life is potassium sorbate, i throw out sorbate after a year, and like i said a cheap measuring spoon set is very helpful, i use a set of stainless steel spoon that go from 1/4 tsp to 1tbs, 1/4 teaspoon to 1 tablespoon, it all sounds way worse than it is, i make way more than i drink, i find peace of mind in the crafting of wines, i'll give you a couple sites that will help once your addicted to being a winemaker,
#1 homewinery.come #2 homebrewohio.com #3 labelpeelers.com ,,,, #4 packagingoptionsdirect.com #1 is good concentrates, but they say each for 5 gallons, 4.5 gal much better 4 gal even better, #2 great deals on wine bottles free shipping if over $50 #3 is good for different things and #4 best 3 gal thru 6.5 gal super heavy italian carboys, free shipping on carboys if over $149
now these are just to check out and on down the line are great sites to have bookmarked, and last but not least is a member @vacuumpumpman he sells a vacuum pump that racks, bottles, and since it's done under vacuum it degasses as you rack, as well he sells filter housings so you can filter and degas an/or bottle and filter at the same time, i buy my spun polypropylene filters on ebay in cases of 16 to fifty and saves tons of money on bulk over single filters, 1 micron for whites and 5 microns for reds, i'm disabled so i saved and built up for quite a while before i bought most of these things, now my wine room has grown very small, lol, but i'm as happy as a pig in the mud, lol
Dawg

i have listed 4 sites, below them the where to buy forms are numbered, #4 packagingoptionsdirect.com has premium italian carboys, as long as your order is over $149 than shipping is free i bought #11-6 gallon carboys for 34.49 each, if you read my above long winded post above i listed 4 sites then below them the corresponding numbers tell you what to buy at each site, like #2 homebrewohio.com as long as the order is over $50 then wine bottles are free shipping, i bought 15 cases or better green cork finish for $14.49 a case,
Dawg

 

[Scooter68]

Im in Florida. People don’t really recycle here.

Ouch.... Well that makes things more challenging. You might just check with the city/county and see if there is a glass recycling center. That sort of recycling is still a strong thing. What is funny about your comment is that our kids have lived in some places where you would think that recycling would be highly supported but nope.

Well there is one more thing you can look into. If there is a local restaurant that serves a lot of wine, they might be willing to set aside wine bottles for you if you catch the right person and you can stay on top of picking them up in a timely manner. THAT would really make it a lot less expensive than buying bottles. The other thing is that they are likely to serve a couple of brands and therefore the bottle they get rid of would be pretty much the same.

 

[Alexey]

1. Once your wine is perfectly clear you can let it age in the bottle too, but you can’t learn as much that way. In the carboy you can taste it now and then to see how it’s progressing, and adjust if necessary.

And you may have picked up on this, but you can also make a bunch of quick drinkers that don’t need to age much first. Once you have a good supply of something you can enjoy bottled, it’s much easier to let a carboy or two (or 20) of the good stuff age. 4-6 week wine kits can be drinkable fairly quickly, or check out DangerDave's Dragon Blood Wine and Skeeter Pee.

i actually have it printed and ready to make but I need 6 gallon bucket and a 5 gallon carboy or two. I saw that he only uses 6 lbs of fruit total. Im told to use 6 lbs fruit per gallon. I don’t understand the math behind that

 

[KCCam]

i actually have it printed and ready to make but I need 6 gallon bucket and a 5 gallon carboy or two. I saw that he only uses 6 lbs of fruit total. Im told to use 6 lbs fruit per gallon. I don’t understand the math behind that

6 lbs per gallon is for fruit wine (country wine). Very little, or no water is used. I've never tried one.

1-2 lbs per gallon is for Dragon Blood. That is a special "wine." If you read about Skeeter Pee, it is lemon-flavoured beverage fermented like wine, but tastes like uncarbonated hard lemonade (basically). Dragon Blood is a variation of that: lemon-based wine, with small amounts of berries and/or fruit to enhance the flavour of the lemon-only Skeeter Pee. The lemon juice provides acid and flavour. The low amount of fruit is what allows Dragon Blood wine to be enjoyed immediately after fermentation is complete. It improves with age too, of course. And you are totally free to add as much or as little fruit as suits your taste! That's one of the beauties of it. But it's ultimate attraction for many is to have very inexpensive wine ready to drink very quickly (some have done it in as little as 2 weeks, I believe, from pitching yeast to bottling -- don't start one expecting that though).

 

[DizzyIzzy]

Wow you sure sent me some reading material. Lol. I love the fact that y’all are sharing your wine knowledge. This is great.
questions:
1. Do I have to lee buying more carboys since mine will be taken up for the next 9 months? Or is there something else I can store wine that is racked?
2. Wheres the best place to buy carboys (don’t have any on offer up, letgo or market place close by.

I like "Homebrewohio.com". Free shipping on all orders over $50, and their glass carboys are top-notch. Welcome, and good luck............Dizzy

 

[DizzyIzzy]

i actually have it printed and ready to make but I need 6 gallon bucket and a 5 gallon carboy or two. I saw that he only uses 6 lbs of fruit total. Im told to use 6 lbs fruit per gallon. I don’t understand the math behind that

I have made two batches of Dragon's Blood using three, 3 lb. bags of Triple Berry fruit, and the taste of the fruits are very forth-coming. I also add 1 1/2-2 cups of Everclear to boost the alcoholic content and 2 oz. glycerin for "mouthfeel".................................................Dizzy

 

[Alexey]

I have made two batches of Dragon's Blood using three, 3 lb. bags of Triple Berry fruit, and the taste of the fruits are very forth-coming. I also add 1 1/2-2 cups of Everclear to boost the alcoholic content and 2 oz. glycerin for "mouthfeel".................................................Dizzy

I actually got very lucky and found a guy who is willing to sell me a bunch of his stuff for super cheap. He’s getting out of making wine. Right now I only have (2) 1g Carboys (1) 2g primary fermenting bucket and all of my powders. Definitely going to be an upgrade. Picking all of that up after the Labor Day weekend.