Preservatives

[jules]

Getting ready to make our first batch of wine. We have chosen to make jalapeno. It calls for golden raisins. We were told at our wine supply store to not purchase store bought raisins with a preservative as it would kill our wine making yeast. How true is this? We are going to use raisins made from green grapes with no preservatives understanding this could affect our results.

 

[Rocky]

Jules, I am not telling you what to do. Let me just say I have used Sun Maid golden raisins in many wines and never had an issue. Just FYI.

 

[jules]

Thank you for the information. We didn't want to run all over town looking for special raisins if we didn't need to. Our first batch is in the fermentation bucket already.

 

[djrockinsteve]

If the raisins contain sulfites soak them in water awhile before adding. I've used a variety of raisin brands, never a problem.

I have made 2 dif. versions of jalapeño wine, hot and a mild. both were great.

 

[wvbrewer]

I have not had any trrouble either. I just used a cup and a half in a beer and all I did was simmer them for a few minutes and pitched them in. The beer fermented just fine...

 

[Runningwolf]

First off welcome to the forum. I also made jalapeno wine with the golden raisins with no issue. I have rinsed them off first and I have thrown them straight into the primary. No Issues either way.

 

[Brew and Wine Supply]

Even if the raisnins did have a preservative on them, I can't see them having enough to effect fermentation. Look at the size of a campden tablet and you use one per gallon. If the raisins had that much I don't think I would want to be eating them.

 

[corntassel]

I make a lot of jalapeno wine and either use welches white grape juice or concentrate. I also make some with apple juice as the base. Both are very good.

 

[jules]

We just did our second racking over this past weekend. We snuck a little taste and wowee! Good and spicey! We have decided to call our wine
"Hot Lips Jalapeno". Thank you everyone for your raisen advise. It will be very helpful for any future wines.

 

[Wade E]

Most golden raisins do have sulfite on them. If you use campden tablets the reduce the amount used. 1 per gallon pre fermentation is too much anyway! You really only need like 1 per 3 gallon and maybe 3 per 6 tops. Afterwards is a little different but even then 1 per gallon is too much. 4 per 6 gallons is more about what you should be using, 4.5 max.

 

[Runningwolf]

I agree with Wade about 1 tablet prefermentation being too much. Actually I really don't even believe in using meta prefermentation. The idea is to kill off any wild yeast. Wild yeast is not that powerful and if you make a good yeast starter you'll be fine.