Next project, Apple wine.

[Wysh]

So, my next project.

Apple wine from a recipe by Gladys Mann. Home Wine and Beer Making.

8lb apples.
4 oz Barley
4 oz chopped Sultanas
Yeast
Yeast nutrient
Zest and Juice of one Lemon
Water
4 lb Demerara Sugar
Citric Acid
Pectin Destroying Enzyme
2 Campden Tablets.

A couple of questions.

I selected a Vintners Harvest Wine yeast CY17 as it is for sweet/white/blush and dessert wines and allegedly ideal for a longish ferment.

Any flaw in my thinking here?

I also ordered this barley, would this be ok or is something else recommended?
What is the barley for in this recipe?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00E9BNFAI/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

 

[Tau]

Adding crab apples to your batch of apples will improve the wine, otherwise often tastes like very strong cider. The sultanas will add vinosity and the barley malt body, contains starch and as it has both alpha and beta amylase in barley they will break that down into maltose. Make sure that yeast you selected can metabolise maltose and the fructose from the apples and sultanas (all yeast should be able to, but some yeasts may have had the ability breed out).

If you can find some crab apple will improve the wine a lot.

 

[Wysh]

Thanks for that, I can't get any crab apples at the mo so have gone for a mix of apples, mostly cookers.

The destructions call for the apples to be chopped up and subject to a period of aerobic (sp?) fermentation followed by normal anaerobic fermentation.

Would there be any benefit in me getting a small cider press and pressing the fruit after the first fermentation or would that produce too much and stronger juice?

 

[Tau]

A press is handy if you're gonner be making hard cider or wine from apples on a regular basis. I have blended crab apples before fermenting on the must and then straining after a few days through muslin or a bleached white pillow case (sterilised) I found better with apples so you can squeeze with pressure to get out the juice.

 

[Wysh]

Going to make a start on this tomorrow after work and evening meal.

 

[Tanzanite]

i make apple wine every year its fantastic sparkling, or mixed with gooseberrys and elderflower. personally i would add some white grape concentrate and leave out the barley, if its a dry to med wine use a champagne or german white wine yeast if its dessert then i would use a half kilo of sultanas, quarter kilo dried apricots and grape concentrate with a sauterns yeast adjusting the citric acid at rackings. chop the sultanas and apricots in a food processor simmer in couple pints water for ten mins add to bucket with all the chopped apple add pectolase and just cover with water , mush and press every day for 4 days strain into a clean bucket. add a campden tablet then leave overnight, add sugar to enough boiling water to dissolve. nutrient and yeast ferment in bucket until the main activity slows, then strain into demi johns to finish. Rack, clear and age, makes a bang on dessert wine you can back sweeten ,add citric acid to taste