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I've tried all grapefruit, and we found that the flaviour is a bit overpowering so now I add 1l grapefruit to 4l of other juices for a 5gallon batch just to give bit of an edge to wines, The combinations are endless of course, as is personal taste. Personally I ferment as dry as I can, you can...

Hey APINTA, always remember that no question is silly if you don't know the answer, just because some of the top home wine making brains of the universe answer the questios on here, they all had to learn sometime, usually from members before them, so never be afraid to ask a 'silly' question...

I still work on that basis now Chippy, although I use Restart as standard, I make up a starter bottle and keep it going, after using about 1/2 - 3/4 of it I top up with water and sugar and a 1/4 tsp of Tronozymol. If I'm not doing wine for a bit then I wait for it to settle, pour off the alcohol...

That's strange I don't remember you in my class at school ... we did all that! You will probably need to go to a Home Brew Shop, it's a bit specialised for Wilko's good as they are, Each sachet is meant for a gallon, so you need three, unless you are as tight as I am and use starter bottles to...

Having read back though your post I gather you have used around 1450g of sugar per gallon, this could give you an ABV of 16.5 -17.5%, this is pushing the limits of many yeasts so a sachet of 'Restart', which has a much higher alcohol tolerance, could be your answer, you can make a starter up of...

If I could humbly suggest use some 'Tronozymol' yeast nutrient, and if really necessary some 'Restart' yeast, they are like the 'Semtex' and 'C4' of the wine making world. If they don't work then you really are fu.... er ,,, stuffed.

If you're having a problem with slow fermentation, some fruit juices are slower than others notable blueberry, then it could be worth trying 'Tronzymol' a very good nutrient can help rejuvenate stuck ferments and if you really want to go down the 'Semtex' route add some Young's 'Restart' yeast...

Sorry to disappoint you Chippy but the wine bottles are from drinking (Before I saw the Light!) the cheapest wine that Aldi's do around £3 a bottle. It actually was quite a reasonable wine! 1.5L bottles of course don't have a 'collar', I'm using the 75cl bottles which tend to.

Hi Guys & Guyessssss, Has anyone come up with a less lethal method of removing the metal 'collar' from screw top bottles so you can use Novatwist caps other than jamming a knife underneath the 'collar' and cutting them off?

You need to have a total of around 1190g of sugar for an SG of 1100, this should give a final strength of about 13.4% if you ferment to 1.000, of course if you ferment too lower FG then it will be stronger, 0.990 is about 15%. Get it even lower and you fall over. As Cheapbrew says add the sugar...

Hi Smokey, I've too have been making the blueberry and RGJ for some time, the only differences between our recipes is I use 2l of blueberry juice and the sugar works out at 765 grams, this gives a real full flavoured rich red coloured wine, the nearest I have got to a red wine using WOW. Oh and...

This is a CJJ Berry recipe : 2 kilos bananas - peeled 1/4 kilo banana skins 100 ml grape concentrate 1 lemon 1 orange 1.5 kilos sugar 4.5 litres water yeast and nutrient Amylozyme "Use black or spotted bananas, whatever you can scrounge. Place bananas and fruit peel into a cloth bag and put...

Hi Maynard, opinions vary about temperature 20 degrees is fine for fermentation some advocate higher some slightly lower. The fermentation will slow down after a few days, what you're seeing is quite normal, it will slow even further as it goes on. As for hope it will be ready by Valentines day...

Hi FatDad, Good to see you have bottled your beetroot wine in dark bottles, keep them in a dark place as the colour can fade and it becomes an unappertising dirty brown if it's kept in the light. CJJ Berry says that the high level of oxalic acid can cause kidney stones in some susceptible cases...

I agree Chewie, pomegranate does make quite a dark wine as does blueberry but the RGJ can make a difference to the colour as well. I've found that Sainsbury's seems to make a good dark one, the last time I used Asda's it wasn't quite so dark. Chippy mentioned in a similar discussion a while back...

Update Chewie, I noticed that Aldi's sugar is back up to 45p a kilo but Farmfoods are back down to 39p a kilo, not quite as cheap as Looch was saying it was at B&M but maybe you have one near you. Just looked at their site and B&M are back up to 45p as well ... just got to keep an eye out...

Sorry Chewie but Aldi still had sugar 39p a kilo, I think Lidl do too.

You still need to wait until it has cleared then rack off the sediment, filtering is good for getting rid of very slight 'haze' but the filter pads do clog up easily if you try filtering a cloudy wine. And they are expensive! I use 'KwikClear' for wine that has settled and been racked or for...

The only thing you have to be careful of is that you don't kill the yeast with too much alcohol, most can't take much more than about 15%. If that's not strong enough then you need a yeast that is high alcohol tolerant. Recently I have been using Young's 'Restart' yeast with 'Tronozymol'...

Although CJJ Berry doesn't include it in his recipe for Rice & Raisin wine, he does mention that for a starch haze the addition of amylase will help it clear.