My first peach wine

[thinman56]

Nope, the blackberry will be a separate red wine batch. I made it a couple years ago and made the same initial mistake you did - added too much water before I added the berries. I was going for a 3-gal batch and it ended up a 4+ gal batch of rose, not my favorite but we didn't throw it out. I wish I had this awesome long post to read two years ago, I could've salvaged something more interesting from it.

So, I guess I should be either looking for more peaches or making a smaller batch than 6 gallons from the peaches I have.

I do have a procedural question - I saw your must with the peaches all in smaller bags, can I do the first 4 days of K-meta and pectin treatment in one 8 gallon fermenter with peaches just mashed in the bucket and then pour the must into my strainer bag placed inside my other fermenter? I just have the one big 8-gallon bag.

Awesome post, Seth (and everyone else), really informative, my peach wine will be so much better for it!

 

[seth8530]

I am glad you have found this thread useful not only from the stuff that I did but also from the other posters who really input top notch advice into this thread.

If I am following you correctly you want to mash and ferment your peaches in one fermenter and then strain that into another? And then put the bag with all the collected peach material in with the other fermenter?

If so, I would avoid that, it sounds messy and perhaps a good way to introduce more oxygen than you might want at that stage... I would recommend that you first freeze the peaches to break them down really well, put the frozen peaches into small bags and then let the pectic enzyme and unfreezing proccess break the fruit down for you.

Those bags I used were simply pantyhose, cheap and surprisingly durable. Did I follow you correctly?

 

[vernsgal]

This has been a great learning post. Thanks everyone who contributed to it and thanks Seth for following through the year with it.

 

[thinman56]

Seth - yes, that is what I had in mind, freeze, thaw, mash and treat the first four days without bags in one bucket and then put it all in my big bag in the second bucket, but I see your point about the air. I'll do it your way, thanks again. Will post progress....

 

[seth8530]

Excellent, just go with pantyhose, works like a charm. The yeast, thawing, and pectic enzyme will do all the work for you.

 

[thinman56]

Seth - you still there? Finally got my peach wine going, one thing in all this that's not clear is when you pressed your bags and when you took them out of the mix. Did you squeeze 'em hard before fermentation, and leave the squeezed bags in the must through fermentation, then press 'em again? Right now the pectic enzyme is doing its thing...

 

[seth8530]

Of course I am still here, I left my bags inside during fermentation. It is normal to notice that they are getting turned to goop. Yeah, I would press them after the primary is done to get any juice that might be remaining in them.