Other Tweeking Cheap Kits

[joeswine]

Give it time in the bottle it will prove it self out

 

[ThreeSheetsToTheWind]

Hey joeswine!

In early December, I bought a 60 bottle/12 gal Shiraz kit at Costco for 60$. I did half exactly like the instructions said, turned out surprisingly nice.

The other half, I brought the volume down to 5 gal, added a pound of raisins, tannins and it's now sitting on oak chips. All I can say is WOW! Totally different glass of wine. I'm sold on the idea!

So I've been eyeing a chardonnay kit, and I think I'll be picking one up next time we go grocery shopping.

What is your go-to recipe for enhancing a cheap chardonnay? I really appreciate any input.

 

[Mismost]

Hey joeswine!



So I've been eyeing a chardonnay kit, and I think I'll be picking one up next time we go grocery shopping.

What is your go-to recipe for enhancing a cheap chardonnay? I really appreciate any input.

i tweaked a Chardonnay..... This is a lighter bodied wine, reducing the volume resulted in a "thick" wine, I don't suggest it. Although you could always add the water back in at the finish it you experienced this problem.

that said the zest of half a grapefruit was very pleasing
and I've also added chopped dried apricots to the primary.
less seems to work better for me with white wines

Joe may have much better ideas!

 

[ticsee]

Hi, I have a question about tannis. What kind of tannis do you use? LD carlson wine tannin is chestnut extract (that label says).
I was making fontana kits with reduced volume before I found this thread and now I have reduced cabernet with zante currants and reduced gewurtztraminer with golden raisins and elderflowers (tea bag came with kit) in buckets.

Also I would like to hear what do you think about using gum arabic. I have used it 0.2g/l right before bottling to mellow harsh tannins, get body and get reds to be drinkable sooner.

What I found about tannins if I understood right is that we want astringent not bitter ones, long ones (skins) are responsible for astringency and short ones (seeds) for bitterness. In some paper read gum arabic supposed to be removing (little bit more) short ones. -reducing bitterness and mellowing harshness. (ppvp should be better in removing shorts)
So my thinking is if adding more long (hope chestnut) and than reducing with gum arabic, ratio of long to short tannins could be reduced not waiting for years and still keeping desired astringency.

Thanks

 

[ThreeSheetsToTheWind]

i tweaked a Chardonnay..... This is a lighter bodied wine, reducing the volume resulted in a "thick" wine, I don't suggest it. Although you could always add the water back in at the finish it you experienced this problem.

that said the zest of half a grapefruit was very pleasing
and I've also added chopped dried apricots to the primary.
less seems to work better for me with white wines

Thanks for the advice mismost. I was thinking along the same lines with the grapefruit zest. Apricots sound like a great idea too. I remember seeing the use of some fresh grapes in this thread, would that be worth adding to the mix as well?

 

[cmason1957]

Thanks for the advice mismost. I was thinking along the same lines with the grapefruit zest. Apricots sound like a great idea too. I remember seeing the use of some fresh grapes in this thread, would that be worth adding to the mix as well?

Just remember less is more. pick one and do that, mixing them may well lead to a muddied mess that your senses can't really figure out what is going on.

 

[joeswine]

That's correct..

 

[ThreeSheetsToTheWind]

Ok, I bought the Chardonnay kit, it comes with oak to add to primary, going for the full 6 gal, no tweaks so far. I'm going to wait until at least secondary to see which way I want to take this.

The kit came with 1118 yeast. I've got some lalvin 71B that I could use instead. Would I benefit from the malolactic conversion or since this is a kit wine, do you guys think it's already balanced and shouldn't be messed with?

Also Mismost, would you care to ballpark the amount of dried apricots you would use for a 6 gal batch?

Thanks for all the help guys. I really appreciate it.

 

[PodumSchmuck]

Ok, I bought the Chardonnay kit, it comes with oak to add to primary, going for the full 6 gal, no tweaks so far. I'm going to wait until at least secondary to see which way I want to take this.

The kit came with 1118 yeast. I've got some lalvin 71B that I could use instead. Would I benefit from the malolactic conversion or since this is a kit wine, do you guys think it's already balanced and shouldn't be messed with?

Also Mismost, would you care to ballpark the amount of dried apricots you would use for a 6 gal batch?

Thanks for all the help guys. I really appreciate it.

What kit are you making? The reason I ask is I'm thinking of a Chardonnay for my next kit.

 

[ThreeSheetsToTheWind]

Here in Canada, Costco sells a box that contains two 30 bottle/6 gal kits for 60$.

 

[PodumSchmuck]

Here in Canada, Costco sells a box that contains two 30 bottle/6 gal kits for 60$.

Wow! That's cheep. Thanks.

 

[ThreeSheetsToTheWind]

Yup. I bought a shiraz kit there before Xmas and was pleasantly surprised. Now I need a white, and then either a cabernet sauvignon or a merlot.

 

[sour_grapes]

Conventional wisdom is that you should NOT attempt MLF on a kit.

 

[cmason1957]

I wouldn't use the 71B on a kit. They are already balanced.

 

[PodumSchmuck]

Anybody know of a "pure" Cabernet Sauvignon kit. I'm on my 3rd Cabernet Sauvignon kit now but from what I understand they're all blended.

 

[ThreeSheetsToTheWind]

Conventional wisdom is that you should NOT attempt MLF on a kit.

I wouldn't use the 71B on a kit. They are already balanced.

Thanks guys. I ended up going with the 1118.

Sour grapes, just to clarify, I wasn't going to go full blown MLF by introducing bacteria. I had just read that 71B yeast is capable of converting some malic to lactic. I'll just save my yeast for another project.

 

[cmason1957]

Anybody know of a "pure" Cabernet Sauvignon kit. I'm on my 3rd Cabernet Sauvignon kit now but from what I understand they're all blended.

Anybody that tells you they know for sure, unless they work at the place that makes the kits is fibbing. But, don't forget that bottle of wine you buy at the store that says Cabernet Sauvignon can be up to 25% something else. I don't even worry about it. If you want totally pure you probably have to buy grapes.

 

[PodumSchmuck]

Anybody that tells you they know for sure, unless they work at the place that makes the kits is fibbing. But, don't forget that bottle of wine you buy at the store that says Cabernet Sauvignon can be up to 25% something else. I don't even worry about it. If you want totally pure you probably have to buy grapes.

I suspected as much.
Thanks for the reply.

 

[Mismost]

Ok, I bought the Chardonnay kit, it comes with oak to add to primary, going for the full 6 gal, no tweaks so far. I'm going to wait until at least secondary to see which way I want to take this.

The kit came with 1118 yeast. I've got some lalvin 71B that I could use instead. Would I benefit from the malolactic conversion or since this is a kit wine, do you guys think it's already balanced and shouldn't be messed with?

Also Mismost, would you care to ballpark the amount of dried apricots you would use for a 6 gal batch?

Thanks for all the help guys. I really appreciate it.

I noted it but not the actual amount.... But it was a small bag maybe 12-16 ozs. I dumped them in boiling water and moved off the heat ....soaked them. When cooler i chopped them up and added them and the water to the primary. Added a mummy note...nice not overpowering at all

Need to remake that batch.... It was a Fontana kit

 

[ThreeSheetsToTheWind]

Great. I bought two pounds, so one for each kit. I think I'll only add them to secondary, see what happens. Thanks for the reply