White Niagara (experiment)

ceeaton · May 10, 2015

For someone new to this "sport", it is nice to see that 7 1/2 months of patience has payed off with a beautifully clear white wine. Thank you for sharing everything on this post. It has been very inspirational to me.

Elmer · May 11, 2015

ceeaton said:
For someone new to this "sport", it is nice to see that 7 1/2 months of patience has payed off with a beautifully clear white wine. Thank you for sharing everything on this post. It has been very inspirational to me.

I am the least patient wine/beer maker ever created!
I think it was more:
10% patience
40% forgetting about it
40% too busy making beer
10% white wine not being a priority during the cold winter.

Ok so there is a little to do with patience!

Elmer · Jun 1, 2015

After taking a sip and determining it was was missing something I added 2 cubes of oak, 2 weeks ago.
Yesterday I bottled.
I tried what was left over and there was a young, tart taste.
Having used some grapes, I wonder if this contributes to the slightly off taste.
I have no expertise in white wine, so I have no idea what a good bottle of white should taste like and where my bottle is.
SWMBO is unable to describe her palate, so I am going to roll with what I have!
Time to move on to the next!

Gravyo · Aug 16, 2024

Turock said:
Pam--D47 is THE yeast for Chard. I'm impressed with how you've progressed in knowledge since you first started on this forum!! You must be doing alot of studying. Doing battonage will impress you--it definitely influences flavor and gets the wine ready for drinking earlier than usual. Not sure that's so important on a white, but it's a good experiment if you've never done it. Doing it on a red lessens the time for the flavor to come forward.

When we do Niagara, we ferment on the skins and pulp. We did a head-to-head comparison of our Niagara, done on pulp and skins, against a Niagara done by pressing and using the juice only. Ours had much more fruity flavor than using just the juice. So if you're a fan of that fruity flavor, ferment on the pulp and skins. We like to set the PH at 3.2, use a good dose of pectic enzyme or Lallyzme C-Max. I recommend the Lallzyme because Niagara can be hard to clear at times.

We like to pick this grape when it has a brix of 14 and it's still green. They lose much flavor when they begin to turn yellow, altho you can add SOME clusters of the yellow ones. Just be sure most of them are green.

On the 2nd or 3rd day of the ferment, add a dose of bentonite to the primary. Bentonite really helps clear the wine,espcially if you set the PH at 3.2.

Ferment the whole way on the skins and pulp. Use Montrachet culture--it's fruity profile really enhances the flavor of this grape. Do a cool ferment to retain the volatiles. Set the vat in a wash tub or similar container and add water and ice as needed to keep the ferment around 68-72 degrees. The cool ferment will extend the entire ferment to 7 or 8 days instead of the usual 5. Press the grapes at the end.

If you end up doing quite a few gallons of this wine, take 5 gallons of it when it's ready to bottle and add 2 cans of frozen limeaide from the freezer case. Add some more sugar to it--we like an SG of about 1.020 because it takes that much sweetness to balance the acid of the wine and the acid of the lime. The wine will be dirty--quite cloudy. But don't strain the lime pieces out because the lime flavor will not be as good. This is a really great drink--especially in summer. MANY of our friends LOVE this wine!! Be sure to shake the bottle up before opening to distribute the limeaide. Only do 5 gallons at a time and drink within 6 months because the limeaide doesn't age too well--loses that great lime flavor.

Turock, I'm going to attempt to make my first small batch of Niagara wine from grapes I've grown this year. (Probably around a gallon.) Can you give me a recipe for this amount of juice? We like a sweet, fruity, smooth wine. Thanks in advance.

winemaker81 · Aug 16, 2024

Welcome to WMT!

Gravyo said:
Turock, I'm going to attempt to make my first small batch of Niagara wine from grapes I've grown this year. (Probably around a gallon.) Can you give me a recipe for this amount of juice? We like a sweet, fruity, smooth wine. Thanks in advance.

This is a 9 yo post, and some of the members (including Turock) have not been on the forum in 3+ years, so you're unlikely to get the answer you expect. However, others including me can help you.

Do you have a press? If not, you'll need to improvise one, or use a fine weave nylon mesh bag to hold the fruit so you can squeeze it.

Typically white wines are made from juice; however, I recommend fermenting on the skins as without a good a good press, you'll get less yield from the grapes before fermentation. I made an "orange" wine from Vidal last fall, detailed in this post:

https://wine.bkfazekas.com/2023-vidal-in-detail/

There isn't what I consider a recipe -- it's a method that is reactive to what you have on hand.

After crushing the grapes, check the specific gravity -- you'll want an Original Gravity (OG) in the 1.080 to 1.090 range. I doubt you're have above, but if it's below you add sugar to bump up the SG.

Then add yeast nutrient and a package of white wine yeast. Use a food grade container that is no more than 3/4 full, to avoid a "boilover" if you have an especially vigorous fermentation. Home Depot sells the 5 gallon orange buckets which are food grade. Cover with a towel to keep "stuff" out.

When the SG hits 1.000, press out the juice and move the liquid to a glass jug with an airlock -- 1 US gallon / 4 liters. Hopefully you'll have too much wine to fit in the jug -- put it in smaller containers, also with airlocks.

Let the wine rest for 2 weeks, then siphon off the sediment. Clean the jug and refill it. If there is more than 3" airspace below the stopper, top with a neutral white wine (anything will do). Add 1 Campden tablet, well crushed. Let the wine rest 3 months, keeping an eye on the water level in the airlock.

At this point the wine is about 4 months old and may be ready for bottling. Note that the wine is bone dry and you may not find it pleasant. This is not a problem.

You have 2 choices at bottling:

1) Bottle as-is. When serving, have sugar syrup available (I keep a bottle of Agave nectar handy) and let people sweeten to taste in the glass.

2) Backsweeten. Add potassium sorbate + Campden to prevent a renewed fermentation in the bottle. Backsweeten to taste.

Note: this is banged out in 3 minutes off the top of my head, so I'm sure I left things out. But it gives you a starting point.