First Attempts at Making Wine

[doofus]

Hello, this is my first time brewing and my first time on this forum.

I currently have two batches of plum wine fermenting.
As this is my first time, of course I did absolutely no research on wine-making other than to make sure all equipment was clean and sterile and to find a couple recipes that I could combine to suit what I had on hand.
So at some point, I will have to pick up a book and get some real wine-making knowledge.
But really we had a plum tree dumping kilos of fruit on the ground which brought hordes of wasps and made life unpleasant in the garden.
Rather than throw all these away, my wife made loads of plum jam and I dusted off my yet unused christmas gift, a beer making kit to brew up some plum wine.

As a first attempt I really just want to make something palatable that will get us sauced while hoping to avoid a bucket full of rotting, moudly mess.

Now, let me post the two recipes for the batches I'm making and then I have a question (with more to follow, I'm sure).
Please note that the recipes are a patchwork of a few recipes that I found while searching on the internet for plum wine recipes.
The recipes have been altered to match what I actually used in my batches. I have not omitted any ingredients.

Vat I: "Cherry" Plum Wine
This recipes uses some wild, cherry-sized plums. They were collected off the ground and frozen.
Before adding to the fermenter, they were soaked in warm water for 10 seconds (on handful at a time) which made them easy to skin and easy split to remove the stones.

- 3.5 qt. water
- 1 lb plain white sugar
- 1 lb plain unbleached sugar
- 3 lbs. forzen wild “cherry” plums
- 1 Campden tablet
- 1/2 tsp. pectic enzyme
- Champagne yeast

1. Boil water and sugars
2. Soak frozen plums in warm water for about 10 seconds. Remove from water and remove skins, stems, and pits. Do this a handful at a time.
3. Put in straining bag in bottom of primary fermenter
4. Pour hot sugar water over fruit and fill up to 1-gallon mark
5. When cooled add Campden tablet. Cover and fit with air lock.
6. After 12 hours add the pectic enzyme.
7. 24 hours later add yeast and stir.
8. Remove straining bag after a week.
9. When must reaches Specific Gravity of 1.030, rack to secondary fermenter.
10. Rack again in 2-3 weeks.
11. Rack again in 2-6 months.
12. After it ferments out, stabilize with Campden tablets or stabalizer and add 2-6 oz of sugar to sweeten if needed.
Bottle and age 6-12 months.

This is the recipe that I'm following. The step in blue is where I am now.
Something I did not do that I will do in the future is mash up the fruit in the straining bag when I put it into the fermenter.

With regards to step 9, I took a sample stuff yesterday and read a specific gravity of 0.994.
The recipe says to rack to a secondary fermeter at 1.030.
I'm already past that point, yes? That is, specific gravity decreases as fermenting progresses?
If that is the case, then what should I do with this batch? Bottle it, drink it, or attempt to recover with more water or sugar?
After measuring the sample I drank it. Tastes sort of like wine and with the slightest bit of fizz on the tounge.


On to the second batch...

Vat II: Unplanned Plum Wine
We have another plum tree which tried to kill all the grass under it by creating a carpet of plums on the ground around it.
After sorting through kilos of plums on the ground and on the branch it was decided to to freeze a couple carrier bags full.
These were used for the second batch. About halfway through preparing the plums, we realized we did not have enough sugar so we grabbed anything on hand to make up the numbers: white sugar, plain sugar, dark sugar, molasses, golden syrup, and honey.

- 7 qt. water
- 4 lbs mixed sugars, syrup, and honey
- 6 lbs. frozen wild plums
- 1 banana
- a few handfuls of wild blackberries
- 1/8 tsp. tannin
- 1 Campden tablet (recommended)
- 1 tsp. pectic enzyme
- 2 tsp Young’s Super Wine Yeast


1. Boil water and sugar/honey.
2. Soak frozen plums in warm water for about 10 seconds. Remove from water and remove skins, stems, and pits. Do this a handful at a time.
3. Put in straining bag in bottom of primary fermenter
4. Pour hot sugar water over fruit
5. When cooled add tannin, and Campden tablet. Cover and fit with air lock.
6. After 12 hours add the pectic enzyme.
7. 24 hours later add yeast and stir.
8. Remove straining bag after a week.
9. When must reaches Specific Gravity of 1.030, rack to secondary fermenter.
10. Rack again in 2-3 weeks.
11. Rack again in 2-6 months.
12. After it ferments out, stabilize with Campden tablets or stabalizer and add 2-6 oz of sugar to sweeten if needed.
Bottle and age 6-12 months.

Again, the blue step is where I am.

I also sampled this batch yesterday and saw a specific gravity of 1.002.
As with the other batch, the recipe calls for racking to a secondary when the specific gravity reaches 1.030.
So I ask the same question: drink, bottle, or add more sugar/water?

This one also sort of tasted like wine as well.

So I'm not sure where to proceed from here as the recipe fails me at this point and I didn't read any wine-making theory to know what to do other than drink what I have.

Any suggestions would be appreciated!

Thanks,

Josh
.

 

[Marrsy86]

With the first batch you have gone past the reading your recipe told you to go do as the hydrometer readings decrease as fermentation goes on. It should still be fine to rack though and continue with your recipie.

I havent read any books on homebrewing, I have gained all my knowledge from the internet and mainly this forum.

I would recomend you read this. Helped me alot at the start :)

Cheers

Marrsy

 

[oldbloke]

The racking is just to get the stuff off the sediment that might impart a nasty taste, the gravity they suggest you do it at is just a guide.
Your first batch is just about done - rack it and let it carry on until it clears, then bottle. It may take a long time to clear and if it throws much sediment while you're waiting, rack it again.
If you can read through it now, you could bottle it immediately, but probably best to leave it until you're sure the yeast is finished.
The slight fizziness is due to a small amount of the carbon dioxode produced by the yeast still being dissolved in the wine - most of that will go when you rack/bottle, the rest when you pour into your glass. But you can give it a good shake to force some out if you want (after racking - otherwise you have to wait for the sediment to settle again...)
The second batch isn't finished yet and wants racking sometime but it's probably not urgent.
I generally add a crushed Campden whenever I rack to cut down on the risk of oxidation and infection, but if you're still actively fermenting it's not as important and it would slow the yeast right down for a day or so.

Stabilising - only really necessary of you haven't fermented all the way to dry, to stop the yeast. Otherwise you may end up with fizzy wine or exploded bottles. And a Campden won't do it - you need 1tsp potassium sorbate AND a Campden, per gallon. If you've fermented all the sugar away though, the problem doesn't arise, but I still use a Campden anyway as it's exposed to oxygen as it goes into the bottle. I get fiddly and put 1/6th of a Campden in each bottle then syphon the wine onto it, but stirring the whole crushed tablet into the gallon should be fine.

My plum wine has a bit of ginger and a couple of cloves per gallon, tends to be a bit harsh when brand new but nice after a few months and lovely after a year.

 

[doofus]

With the first batch you have gone past the reading your recipe told you to go do as the hydrometer readings decrease as fermentation goes on. It should still be fine to rack though and continue with your recipie.

I havent read any books on homebrewing, I have gained all my knowledge from the internet and mainly this forum.

I would recomend you read this. Helped me alot at the start :)

Cheers

Marrsy

Marrsy,

I did find that that thread on the orange wine and was one the first things I started reading when I joined the forum. Very informative!

I believe I will rack that first batch as you said.

Josh
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[doofus]

...Your first batch is just about done - rack it and let it carry on until it clears, then bottle. It may take a long time to clear and if it throws much sediment while you're waiting, rack it again...
...The second batch isn't finished yet and wants racking sometime but it's probably not urgent.
I generally add a crushed Campden whenever I rack to cut down on the risk of oxidation and infection, but if you're still actively fermenting it's not as important and it would slow the yeast right down for a day or so...

Stabilising - only really necessary of you haven't fermented all the way to dry, to stop the yeast. Otherwise you may end up with fizzy wine or exploded bottles. And a Campden won't do it - you need 1tsp potassium sorbate AND a Campden, per gallon. If you've fermented all the sugar away though, the problem doesn't arise, but I still use a Campden anyway as it's exposed to oxygen as it goes into the bottle. I get fiddly and put 1/6th of a Campden in each bottle then syphon the wine onto it, but stirring the whole crushed tablet into the gallon should be fine.

My plum wine has a bit of ginger and a couple of cloves per gallon, tends to be a bit harsh when brand new but nice after a few months and lovely after a year.

oldbloke,

Thanks for the info. After reading your tips, Marrsy's, and some other threads on here, I'm going to go the route you pretty much detailed.
The extra info on stabilizing is good too.

Good tips for the cloves and ginger. Sounds like a nice sipping wine.

Now for bottling, I don't have the corks or equipment for corking. Can I just use beer bottles and my capping equipment?

Josh
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[oldbloke]

Since it's not fizzy, so pressure isn't a problem, any bottle and capping system will do, really.
But t'missus and I tend to drink a winebottle'sworth between us of an evening, and we have wine bottles around, so....
I did get my corking tool cheap on ebay though.