Batch #1

Primary Fermentation

Got up at 5:30 a.m. and crushed 22 pounds of wild apples (avg. diameter 1″) in 1.5 hours. Combined the resulting massive pile of mashed apple with several gallons of hot water + sugar solution (about 12 pounds of sugar) and everything else except the yeast right before I had to leave for work at 9 a.m. Then pitched the yeast at 9 p.m. and it was already aggressively fermenting by morning. Fingers crossed that the other 25 pounds of apples isn’t over-ripe by the time I can start the second batch. Might need to consider buying a second primary fermenter.

Secondary Fermentation

By the time I removed the mesh sack full of apple pulp and drained and squeezed everything I could out of them I was still at least a half-gallon short of 6 gallons. So I added water and stirred a little. Also, quite a bit of light lees went into the carboy. That’s not a problem in my eyes, but it does mean I’ll probably need to add more water down the road. Two hours after the transfer and addition of water fermentation became noticeable again. 2011-06-19: fermentation has all but stopped. A lot of orange pulp has settled to the bottom of the carboy.

Clearing

At this point the notes for both batches is the same. Continued below.

Batch #2

Primary Fermentation

See the #1 batch details. We don’t have a giant refrigerator, so these apples have been sitting on a table in my basement for seven days since I started the first batch. Needless to say, the apples were much more ripe this time around. I even included apples that were slightly overripe, thinking that they might have a positive impact on the overall flavor. Another thing I’m trying – rather than opening another bag of yeast – is to keep the lees of the first batch’s primary fermentation. I have about 2 cups of lees that is still fermenting. I fed it a little fruit juice and some sugar as I was preparing the second must. Hopefully it’s nice and lively come time to pitch the yeast.

Secondary Fermentation

This second batch is a bit darker in color, more amber than yellow right now. More like cider I guess. After racking into the carboy it didn’t seem to be fermenting, even after a full day. 2011-06-19: fermentation is picking back up. Still not much more aggressive than the current state of the first batch which was started a week earlier. Perhaps using the lees from the first batch to start fermentation gave the yeast a big head start and I could have racked this wine earlier?

Clearing

Added 6 crushed Campden tablets and stirred a lot of carbon dioxide out. 2011-07-07: Racked off of lees and lots of pulp. Topped-up with about 1/2 gallon of water. 2011-07-24: very little lees settling out, wine still cloudy 2011-08-07: This and the other batch of Jim’s Little Apple are still very cloudy. Added a bag of chitosan and stirred it up. Unfortunately I’ve already racked these wines off of their lees, so perhaps the chitosan will do no good. If no progress is made, I’ll mix in the lees from the Sauvignon Blanc that is clearing right now (I’m not even recording the process on that wine, since it’s a very simple kit).

2011-08-21: Wine has remained cloudy. Today, after racking an almost perfectly cleared Sauvignon Blanc batch, I evenly distributed the Sauv. Blanc’s lees into these two apple wine batches. I then racked them both and stirred them up. My hope is that reintroducing some lees will allow the wine to clear. 2011-09-17: Over the last few weeks I have re-introduced lees (from Sauv. Blanc) and also used Chitain and another “Super Klear” chitain and something else mix to no avail. Finally realized the problem was a Pectin Haze. Last weekend added pectic enzyme to both batches. This week they started clearing. Will rack and add more pectic enzyme this weekend.

2011-12-12: The final wine ended up having a very light flavor. To create a more interesting wine I blended 6 gallons of Crabapple wine with 12 gallons of this “Wild Apple” wine. Once those were all well blended I also added a bit of brandy to the mix for a little flavor and kick. The end result is, I think, a pleasant white wine with a light apple flavor.

Batch #1

Primary Fermentation

I think I picked about twice as many apples this year. Enough for two batches. For this batch I crushed about 20 lbs. of crabapples. I am also experimenting with a bit more sugar this time, up from 12 lbs. to 20 lbs. I’m interested in making a higher alcohol content wine. I don’t know if an additional 8 lbs. is enough to greatly increase the specific gravity, but we’ll see.

Also, last year I ended up doing about a 50/50 blend with a simple white grape juice wine to mellow out the overwhelming sour/bitter flavor. This year a good friend let me pick apples from his wild apple tree, which has fruit that’s about 3/4-inch in diameter, and make wine with it. That wine has turned out to have a pretty light flavor. Those apples were much more edible on their own. In my opinion the sourness of the crab makes a much more interesting wine. With that said, my plan for this year is to blend the earlier wild apple wine with the crabapple wine. 2011-08-16:SG = 1.070; 2011-08-19: SG = 1.050

Secondary Fermentation

Nothing too exciting. As usual, after removing the fruit in the mesh bag about a gallon of water needed to be added. Since I am still working to get my earlier wild apple batches to clear I did top-up with a bit of that earlier apple wine. 2011-09-17 Barely fermenting. Pretty much done, but some bubbles to come to the top.

Clearing

Batch #2

Primary Fermentation

Though I was sure that I had weighed the apples and evenly split the harvest for two batches of wine, after mashing apples last night it was pretty obvious that the mesh bag was almost twice as full as the previous batch. So much for me being precise! Regardless, I’m sure it will be fine and very similar to the first in taste. Also, I apparently added slightly more sugar. I’m on a roll with this one. Rather than starting with a fresh packet of Lalvin yeast I simply collected some of the lees from the first batch and fed it with fruit juice until it was pitched into the second batch. This practice is efficient and I think the active population of yeast is very high and, as a result, the primary fermentation gets off to a much faster start this way.

Secondary Fermentation

2011-09-17 Still fermenting pretty heavily.

2012-01-02: Wine got put on the back-burner for a while but never seemed to clear. Turned out to be a pectin haze.Mixed in a few teaspoons of pectic enzyme and it was very clear within a week. Mixed in a packet of Super Kleer and now it practically sparkles.Will bottle soon.

Primary Fermentation

Preparing the must was simple. These particular cans of fruit base don’t actually include any fruit. It’s just juice. I had my mesh bag ready to go only to discover this fact. The elderberry juice looks and smells very similar to the grape juice that comes with the red wine kits. I’ve had homemade elderberry wine before, so this doesn’t surprise me. I think elderberries can make a very good red wine. 2011-05-23: specific gravity = 1.034

Secondary Fermentation

The primary fermentation took a while, but the air temp during that time was lower than normal with very cool evenings. After a full day the secondary fermentation is still going strong. 2011-06-04: Still fermenting but beginning to ebb after a full week of aggressive secondary fermentation. 2011-06-19: Still fermenting, but quite slowly now.

Clearing

Added 6 crushed Campden tablets and stirred a lot of carbon dioxide out. 2011-07-24: About a 1/4-inch of lees on the bottom. Wine looks very clear at this point, but a few more weeks of bulk aging should be fine.

Bottling

Ended up using part of this batch for a blend with the Hippo wine batch using a 2:1 ratio. “1″ being the elderberry. After the blending I bottled about 17 bottles of straight elderberry wine. So far it tastes delicious.

 Primary Fermentation

The usual process for these kits: bring a gallon of water to boil, pour it into the primary fermenter, stir in bentonite, pour all of the kit’s grape juice into the primary fermenter, top-up with cool water, stir, check specific gravity, if SG is good add french oak chips, stir oak chips into must, and, finally, sprinkle yeast evenly on top of must. The temperature is going to get into the 80s today and even warmer for the oncoming week, so I am keeping the primary fermenter upstairs in the kitchen.

I don’t use the bucket cover for the most part. I stand my stirring spoon in the middle of the bucket and drape a wet cotton dish towel over the must and spoon handle, which resembles a small tent over the bucket top. If you cover the must with the bucket lid and airlock, it’s really no different than being in a air-sealed glass carboy. All of the homemade recipes say to cover the must with a dampcloth, providing ample oxygen to the yeast while keeping anything unwanted out. This approach seems to work very well.

Secondary Fermentation

2011-05-22: Still some light fermentation occurring.

Clearing

Added the potassium sorbate, metabisulfite and half of the chitain and stirred and stirred and stirred. I always attempt to stir until the carbon dioxide bubbles stop coming up. But they never stop coming up. I only used half of the chitain-stuff so that I could use the other half on my dandelion wine which doesn’t seem to be clearing at all over the last few weeks. 2011-06-19: Clearing well. I was able to collect the lees from the primary clearing, refrigerate and capture maybe another 20 oz. of wine. Still need to top-up a bit more, probably with some of my Cabernet Franc from last September.

2011-07-24: A decent amount of lees as well as the most of the oak cubes settled to the bottom. The wine is quite clear. I racked into a clean carboy but did not reintroduce the oak cubes since we are well beyond the 8 week mark.

Bottling

Decided to turn this already-blended red wine kit into an even further blend: I mixed in a smaller portion of this year’s elderberry wine in a 2:1 ratio. I think the elderberry has a very strong, fruity flavor that seems to be lacking in any of the red wine kits. Due to the blending I ended up with about 45 bottles of this wine.

Primary Fermentation

Assembling the ingredients took some time. Since I needed dandelion flower heads I went ahead and did my wife the service of pulling the entire dandelion plant out of the ground. I did this for my entire front yard and part of my backyard. That was pretty much a full day. Overnight, after lightly rinsing the dandelion flower heads, I put them all into our largest bowl and covered with water. This might have leached some of the flavor out of the dandelion heads prior to adding them to the must, but I also know that this would help clean them too. Then the next day I drained off that water and placed all of the dandelion heads and some lemon and orange zest into a mesh sack in the primary fermenter.

I poured a gallon of hot water over the dandelion heads, added several cans of concentrated white grape juice, added water and then spent a good hour juicing oranges and lemons. After topping up the must and checking the specific gravity, I let it sit for about 12 hours to let the campden tablets do their work, killing off any unwanted bugs. I got the yeast started about a full day before it was pitched. After the yeast was pitched it took a good day and a half before there was heavy fermentation.

Secondary Fermentation

Not much to report.

Clearing

Added 6 crushed campden tablets and stirred up really well. 2011-05-22: Wine is still cloudy with very little serious clearing happening even at the very top of the carboy. Today I shook the jar a little and  a lot of air was escaping the wine. So I spent 15 minutes or so repeatedly shaking the jar and then allowing the air to escape. Perhaps the air trapped in the wine was preventing it from clearing properly. We’ll see.

Secondary Clearing

Well, the primary clearing didn’t clear much at all aside from the really heavy stuff. The wine was still cloudy today so I added another dose of campden tablets as well as half of the packet of chitain from my red wine kit. Then I stirred and stirred and stirred, chasing out yet even more carbon dioxide bubbles. After a few hours this already looks like it will be a more successful clearing. Fingers crossed. 2011-06-04: Finally clearing nicely. Still cloudy but after 7 days a healthy quantity of lees has settled to the bottom.

Bottling

Wine was very, very clear. Racked into the primary fermenter and sweetened with 3 cups of sugar. Filled 30 bottles.

Primary Fermentation

The usual process with a few new activities: boil/simmer banana slices with star anise and ginger root slices for 40 minutes and poor resulting fluid into primary fermenter with sugar, white grape juice and orange juice. Once all 6 gallons of the must was assembled I let it sit for 12 hours or so and then added my 12-hour primed yeast. Within a few hours fermentation appeared to be taking off. Fermentation picked up by the second day and on the third day fermentation was violent.

Secondary Fermentation

Racked into carboy this morning. Fermentation is slow already, but still happening. 2010-12-30: Still fermenting. 2011-01-07: Still fermenting. Moved the carboy upstairs to warm it up and hopefully kick the fermentation into second or third gear.

Clearing

The frequency of bubbles finally dropped to a very limited level this week, so I added 6 cambden tablets and stirred the wine and lees up real good. I also did a taste test: the over abundance of orange juice that I added to the must has made it so any taste of banana is pretty well disguised. Before stirring, the wine was already quite clear towards the top of the carboy. The flavor is distinctly citrus. I’m thinking it might be best with a slight sweetening. We’ll see.

Secondary Clearing

Wine was only slightly cloudy and an inch or so of lees had collected at the bottom. I racked the wine into my primary fermenter and added 2 cups of sugar (sweetened according to taste). My wife also thought that the wine could use more “spice”, so I sliced up another inch-long segment of fresh ginger and a tablespoon of whole anise and dropped them into a freshly cleaned carboy. Then I racked the sweetened wine into the carboy, over the ginger and anise.

Primary Fermentation

The usual process. Used a starter for the yeast, giving it a little less than a 24-hour head start.

Secondary Fermentation

Racked the wine into carboy, added oak cubes and kept overage in large vodka bottle to be used for topping up later.

Clearing/Second Clearing

On the second clearing I added 1/3 tsp of grape tannin per gallon of wine and topped-up the wine with my dry crabapple wine as well as reserves saved in the fridge from the primary fermentation.

Bottling

Not much to report, but I did start using a different cork on this set, which is a premium cork composite. I started with the cheapest cork composite corks, but they were leaking on long storage. I switched to a foam-rubber cork after that and have been pleased with the result except for the fact that they’re made out of foam rubber. Out of interest in using something more ecologically-friendly I am trying out these slightly higher-grade composite corks.

After tasting a good result from soaking oak cubes in the recent Cabernet Franc vintage I’ve decided that every red wine kit should use these soaking cubes. The “sawdust” that comes with some of these kits is just not sufficient. I think the kit makers put too much of an emphasis on quick production. They could just as easily include a bag of these oak cubes and have a better result (in my mind). I’m even starting to think that I should use the oak cubes on every batch of wine I make.

Primary Fermentation

Business as usual except for using a yeast starter rather than just sprinkling the active dry yeast packet across the top of the must. I didn’t start the yeast starter as far ahead of assembling the must this time, but even this limited head-start provided a faster fermentation.

Secondary Fermentation

As of this racking it seems like the fermentation is mostly complete. These kits always seem to finish early.

Clearing

Spent more than twenty minutes trying to stir all of the carbon dioxide bubbles out of the wine. They never seem to stop coming to the surface, so I just stop when I get tired. I added the clearing materials provided with the kit during this stirring. I ended up having about 4 cups of wine extra after making room for the oak cubes. It was a good opportunity for a taste test and I am quite pleased. This and the Cab Franc both seem to have more depth and character than their less expensive brethren that I worked with previously.

Secondary Clearing

Racked the wine off of some pretty thick and deep purple lees into a fresh carboy. Stirred the wine vigorously on and off for 20 minutes to evacuate any dissolved carbon dioxide. Re-added the oak cubes after rinsing them off. Topped up the carboy with fresh water.

Tweaking

2011-01-14: Did a taste test and, though decent, I wanted to try to make the wine better. It tasted thin so I added the recommended quantity of grape tannin. This might be a huge no-no, but I’m speculating that the tannin will improve this wine after a few months of aging in the bottle. Will do another taste test in two weeks.

2011-01-22: Racked wine.

I am making this wine because it sounded interesting and because I wanted another wine to blend my crabapple wine with due to its overly sour/tannin flavor. Though, I might change my mind. The crabapple is still clearing in the carboy, so in a week or two I’ll taste test it again. Who knows? I might find it to be just fine by itself. Regardless, this experiment with cheaper ingredients might prove to produce a pleasant everyday wine.

Primary Fermentation

Mixed 12 cans of Welch’s White Grape Juice with 7.5 lbs. of sugar, some water, pectic enzyme, yeast nutrient and acid blend. I was short on acid blend so I substituted a little lemon juice. And while we’re being honest, the grocery store only had 8 cans of the Welch’s 100% White Grape Juice, so I grabbed 4 cans of Welch’s White Grape Juice Cocktail. Who am I trying to kid, anyway?

Secondary Clearing —> Blend with Crabapple Wine

This wine cleared very easily. The final taste is a pleasant dry white wine, but I am using it to blend with my crabapple wine. I’m hoping this lightly flavored white will mellow the crabapple’s heavy tannin and sharp flavor (not sure how else to describe it at this point . . . maybe bitter?). Please follow the crabapple vintage to see how that turns out.

I’ve also been reading up on yeast starters over at Jack Keller’s website (a great resource for home winemaking). Supposedly the longer it takes for your yeast to get up and running once its been introduced to the must, the more flavor you are losing. It makes sense, but I highly recommend reading Jack’s page to get the whole story.

With that said, I have decided to give using a yeast starter a try.

Primary Fermentation

Business as usual except for using a yeast starter rather than just sprinkling the active dry yeast packet across the top of the must. In trying to follow Jack’s instructions I got a bit confused. There’s several steps and a lot of waiting involved. In order to make sense of it I ended up breaking his long description up into a traditional recipe format. I think this is easier to understand so I have added this yeast starter recipe to my site for others to use.