Raspberry Iced Tea Wine Cooler

[Jovimaple]

I made the Twisted Mist Raspberry Iced Tea Wine Cooler kit last year, and got rave reviews from some family members. I would like to make it again and of course it's not available. I'm not sure if it was seasonal or if it's been discontinued, but anyway, I decided to see about making my own raspberry iced tea wine.

Proposed recipe for 1 gallon test batch:
2 qts brewed tea (6 tea bags)
White grape juice concentrate
Water to 1 gallon (note: I have no idea what the SG will be so the water amount may have to be adjusted)
2-3 lbs frozen raspberries

I would like to end up at about 7% ABV but I haven't used frozen grape concentrate before so I'm winging it with that. I can add sugar if I need to raise the starting SG, or I can add water if necessary to lower it. Or I can live with it being full wine strength, if it's good!

I also am considering fermenting the tea and grape juice first, then adding the raspberries as a flavorpack, but I'm leaning more toward fermenting it all together. I am sure I will backsweeten it some. I'll check the flavor first and figure out if it makes sense to backsweeten with a raspberry fpack and/or sugar - in the planning stages I want a lighter, wine cooler effect, but if it turns out more heavily flavorful and I like it that way, I'm okay with that.

Obviously I will be using kmeta/campden and potassium sorbate before backsweetening.

Am I on track with this recipe?

P.S. I'm also going to crack open one of the Twisted Mist bottles I have left, to get a better idea of the strength of the tea vs raspberry flavor. That might cause me to tweak the amounts in the recipe.

Thanks!

 

[Rice_Guy]

7%; you should be using beer or cider rules. On my part the idea of adding a raspberry flavor pack makes sense. A ferment targeting 13 or 14% ABV would give you room to dilute yet have working alcohol (FYI a lot of cider products ferment a high alcohol and add non fermented juice to make the finished product.)
I like to know what the answer is before I do a test batch. I would play around with tea and a raspberry concentrate to get an idea about ratios. My guess is that you would not taste normal strength tea tannins. This opens up building the tannin flavor after the fact with a finishing tannin or adding chestnut tannin to the primary. ,,,,, Do you have numbers on what the twisted mist finished wine was? The US market likes sweet which pushes us into K sorbate. ,,, Sounds like fun, (I play with my food / lab bench all developmental recipes)

 

[Jovimaple]

7%; you should be using beer or cider rules. On my part the idea of adding a raspberry flavor pack makes sense. A ferment targeting 13 or 14% ABV would give you room to dilute yet have working alcohol (FYI a lot of cider products ferment a high alcohol and add non fermented juice to make the finished product.)
I like to know what the answer is before I do a test batch. I would play around with tea and a raspberry concentrate to get an idea about ratios. My guess is that you would not taste normal strength tea tannins. This opens up building the tannin flavor after the fact with a finishing tannin or adding chestnut tannin to the primary. ,,,,, Do you have numbers on what the twisted mist finished wine was? The US market likes sweet which pushes us into K sorbate. ,,, Sounds like fun, (I play with my food / lab bench all developmental recipes)

I don't keep track of TA. My notes indicate the SSG was 1.051 and the FSG was .996, before the flavor pack.

I like the idea of testing the ratio, but I am working with frozen raspberries rather than concentrate so I will probably just juice some to add and figure out ratios from that.

Thank you!

 

[Rice_Guy]

A TA on finished wine typically is between 0.5 to 0.75%. I use TA to estimate a dilution rate. A black tea component should test like water with pH close to your tap water and TA close to zero. To maximize flavor I might titrate 100 ml of tea drop by drop with raspberry juice. When you get to pH 3.4 you could stop and use this as the weakest (? at least one end point) raspberry ratio. ,, ,, Working from TA numbers a skinny wine might be 1 part raspberry with 3.6 parts tea. A high solids wine might be 1 part raspberry with 2 parts tea. Any raspberry level above that ratio would need significant back sweetening. Knowing that the US likes sugar, I would expect the flavor pac to push the TA close to 0.75 which could balance back sweetened to 1.000 or 1.005.

There is more than one way to build a food product. ,, ,, Humm ,, ,, What I just suggested was two dosages of raspberry. The first provides pH under 3.5 from the acids in raspberry to successfully ferment. The second dose gets to 0.75% TA which combined with sugar provides maximum raspberry flavor.

Some red raspberry numbers pH 3.04; 3.19; 3.46, 3.01; 2.93. Related TA numbers,, 2.26%; 2.18%; 2.26%; 2.60%; 2.22%. (Average 2.30%) Typical SG is 1.035 so it doesn’t contribute much sugar.

 

[winemaker81]

Overall, your recipe sounds good. Two things jump out at me:

Volume -- starting with 1 US gallon volume means you won't have enough wine, post fermentation, for a gallon jug. I suggest 1.25 gallons initial volume.

Tea flavor -- I have no idea what the wine should taste like, but 6 teabags in 1 gallon may not be enough flavor. If the wine is supposed to taste like a raspberry sweet(-ish) tea, then bumping the number of bags to 10 might be necessary to get better tea flavor.

 

[BigDaveK]

My concern would be the flavor from the tea bags also. Had to do some checking, the average tea bag weighs 2 grams. For my 1 gallon hibiscus wine - which turned out fantastic - I used 2 oz dried hibiscus, equivalent to approx 28 tea bags. My sassafras and catnip wines were both a bit over 30 equivalent bags.

 

[winemaker81]

My concern would be the flavor from the tea bags also. Had to do some checking, the average tea bag weighs 2 grams. For my 1 gallon hibiscus wine - which turned out fantastic - I used 2 oz dried hibiscus, equivalent to approx 28 tea bags. My sassafras and catnip wines were both a bit over 30 equivalent bags.

Frickin' wow.

Something to consider is that "Twisted Mist Raspberry Iced Tea Wine Cooler" is not the gold standard. It's a starting point, and "better" is certainly possible.

Dave's opinion is worth consideration.

 

[BPL]

2 qts brewed tea (6 tea bags)

Be cautious with teas and tea bags. Some tea leaves contain sulfites or sorbate used as preservatives. If the yeast doesn't start up or is sluggish, you'll have a pretty good clue what's wrong.

 

[Jovimaple]

Be cautious with teas and tea bags. Some tea leaves contain sulfites or sorbate used as preservatives. If the yeast doesn't start up or is sluggish, you'll have a pretty good clue what's wrong.

Good to know! I was planning to use Lipton black tea but I will check the box.

 

[Jovimaple]

My concern would be the flavor from the tea bags also. Had to do some checking, the average tea bag weighs 2 grams. For my 1 gallon hibiscus wine - which turned out fantastic - I used 2 oz dried hibiscus, equivalent to approx 28 tea bags. My sassafras and catnip wines were both a bit over 30 equivalent bags.

Wow!

 

[Jovimaple]

Overall, your recipe sounds good. Two things jump out at me:

Volume -- starting with 1 US gallon volume means you won't have enough wine, post fermentation, for a gallon jug. I suggest 1.25 gallons initial volume.

Tea flavor -- I have no idea what the wine should taste like, but 6 teabags in 1 gallon may not be enough flavor. If the wine is supposed to taste like a raspberry sweet(-ish) tea, then bumping the number of bags to 10 might be necessary to get better tea flavor.

I sampled one of the bottles last night and the tea taste is very subtle so the raspberry flavor is definitely dominant. As the kit is meant to be a wine cooler, it's light bodied and best over ice. A refreshing summer beverage.

 

[Raptor99]

Be cautious with teas and tea bags. Some tea leaves contain sulfites or sorbate used as preservatives. If the yeast doesn't start up or is sluggish, you'll have a pretty good clue what's wrong.

Or skip the teabags and get some good, loose leaf black tea. It depends on what type of tea you like to drink. Liptons is near the bottom of the list as far as quality goes.

 

[BPL]

loose leaf black tea

Same thing applies. Be cautious of what is on the label. For that matter, not all countries have requirements of labeling as the USA.

 

[Raptor99]

I understand the need to be cautious about preservatives, although normally tea does not need preservatives. But the quality and flavor of the tea is also important.

 

[Rice_Guy]

Be cautious with teas and tea bags. Some tea leaves contain sulfites or sorbate used as preservatives. If the yeast doesn't start up or is sluggish, you'll have a pretty good clue what's wrong.

The FDA rules are if I a processor add sulfites or sorbate I will have to put that on the ingredient label. I do not currently consume any teas which have added sulfite or sorbate.
Naturally occurring? As harvested the moisture content of green leaf tissue should be 60%, with some possibly at 50% moisture and volatile. Sulfate which is oxidized will survive that level of moisture. I question if sulfite, which is reduced state would survive. Sorbate will be an issue with pear fruit, one characteristic of the sorb family is that they have a sweet taste. It would be interesting to see if any journals have published on how many ppm (mg per liter) might be typical.
— On an ease of use, loose tea leaves makes sense. Why buy extra packaging. Likewise instant spray dried tea might be used. This would let one tweak the flavor profile at bottling time. Instant tea with commercial raspberry cider might be a model system for flavors. ,, Folks that have looked at my posts see that I am a big fan of polyphenols (antioxidants) which includes tannins. Black tea is a good source of astringent tannin, but then again LD Carlson and Scott Labs also has astringent flavor tannins. Smoky notes are in some tea, light oak might provide this if desired.