So. I'm in secondary. This is a VERY slow fermenter. Coincidentally, my peach wine from the same timeframe (August) is also fermenting very slow. Anyways.
Over the summer and fall, whenever I had a red or pink rose that was in full bloom, I would cut it off, bring it inside, and pluck the petals off, put those petals into ziplock bags, and pop those bags back in the freezer.
I eventually had 100g of rose petals, measured at frozen temperature, subtracting negligible tare weight of zip lock bags, given how light petals are. I made a gallon recipe with approximately 3 pounds of sugar (I don't feel like going to get my notes, but I felt I needed to post here for people. Use your intended ABV and use that much sugar). And, of course, make sure you rinse the petals really, really well. Aphids (or some little green bugs) love them. You froze the petals, but want to wash their frozen bodies off the petals, and, who knows if they come back to life from freezing.
I've finally fermented down to 1.000, which worked out to around 10.8% in my case, and did a tiny taste test. I then added more sugar to work that up to 12%. My thoughts at this stage, after a couple months fermenting:
100g is a *bit* much for a gallon, I believe. However, I wouldn't go too much lower. Next time, I'm going to try 80 or 90 grams. I'll also add, I'm somebody who rarely gets the whole idea of "Flavor is mostly made up of your nose's response". In this case, I actually understand that. I imagine if I plugged my nose, I'd have a very different experience. When I mention this experiment to people, they ask what it tastes like. All I can say is, "Well, it tastes like a rose smells". It's really really interesting, and worth trying.
I think the increase in ABV, though subtle, will help. This didn't feel thick (because it's not), but, there's some sensation of "wew, this just feels thick on the palete and stomach". I'm hoping more alcohol will help cut a bit more.
It's a BEAUTIFUL pinkish-red color. I have pink, red, and white rose bushes. I used only pinks and reds. Another thing I did was, if a petal was looking more than a tiny bit yellow, I discarded it. I got a very vibrant color that way.
This is a slow-burner fermentation. I didn't add much in the way of nutrients. In future batches, I think a very good play would be to add a very generous amount of yeast nutrient, boiled yeast hulls, etc. I think it could be worth playing with acidity, too.
When this first starts, it's going to be an off-putting green color. Don't worry.
So far (we'll see after aging, ABV increases, etc), I don't know that I could drink more than a couple glasses of this without it making my stomach feel a little queezy. It tastes and smells incredible. It's just something that you could imagine messing with your stomach. I'll add more notes on that once I feel the wine is finished, and have indeed imbibed a few glasses.
All in all, I hope this helps the very rare internet-traveler searching for information on rose petal wine. If you have rose bushes, you should try it. It's really interesting, and I'm hoping that in the end, I'll be really happy with it. This just needs more time and care!
I've been scouring flower wine recipes trying to find similar clear instructions but had very little luck so far :/
