Is sour cherry wine better than sweet cherry wine?

formatting link

"The best cherry wines are made with Tart (sour) cherries or a combination of tart and sweet cherries. I will not go so far as to say that the worse cherry wines are made with sweet cherries alone, but unless carefully and properly ameliorated with malic acid, sweet cherry wines often lack balance."

The above quote is taken from Jack's site. So is this true. Does an 'all sweet cherry' wine suck?

He says, "lacking balance". What do you guys think?

I just transferred my all sweet cherry wine to the secondary today after one week in the primary. The og was 1.096 and now it's at

1.050. Is this normal? I tasted the gravity sample and it was sweet as hell! (duh!) After only an hour a foam appeared on top and it appears that fermentation has started up again. How long should I go before I transfer again? I was thinking 2 months or so.

I didn't add meta at this transfer. Should I have? Should I add a

1/4 teaspoon? I have about 24 liters.
Reply to
Phil
Loading thread data ...

It should taste sweet at those numbers as you suspected and never add sulfite to an active fermentation. I let mine finish before transfering, but if you still have solids in there that could impact the decision. Regards, Joe

Reply to
Joe Sallustio

Don't know all the technical jargon as stated above as to the how & why but all the cherry wine I ever tried to make with sweet cherrys lacked flavor big time. Even tried to mix it with other wines (a couple of times) with no luck. Ended up giving it away & don't know if it ever got drank. Made the same way with sour cherries it was some of the best wine I've ever made. I've fount that tart apples (staymen) as compared to sweeter apples make the best wine also. Good luck.

Reply to
PA-ter

I wouldn't say that. It's not clear to me whether Jack is saying that sweet cherries make a less desirable wine because of the balance issue alone, or whether it goes beyond this. Personally, I'd rather have to acidify than to deacidify so, given a choice between sour *or* sweet cherries, my preferrence would be with the sweet cherries *when considering the balance issue alone*.

However, I think it's important to take a holistic approach when assessing fruit quality and that means I'd be looking at flavour profiles too. If the sour cherries have better flavours then I'd use them. Blends of same fruit type but different fruit variety are almost always favourable (for complexity aswell as balance), so I would be in favour of a blend of sweet and sour cherries. It really depends on your approach to de/acidification, but assuming you're happy going either way I'd go with the blend.

Sure, it's normal to have such an SG after a week. If you're only fermenting juice, I'd transfer much closer to dryness or at dryness. If you are pulp fermenting or you have a lot of SS you may want to transfer earlier (as Joe suggested).

Ben

Improved Winemaking

formatting link

Reply to
Ben Rotter

All I can get is sweet cherries so that is what I use. I have not really been disappointed but have nothing to compare with. Your wine is already underway so don't worry about it. It will pretty much take care of itself. If it comes out a bit off then concern yourself with adjustments but don't worry until then.

Your SG is a little high but if it is fermenting well, and it sounds like it is, once again don't worry, it will do fine.

I would not recommend another racking until it stops fermenting. When the airlock stops doing anything, wait a couple of weeks or even a month so it will drop most of it's sediment and then rack and top up. That is when you might add meta. If you open it after it stops, then you will need to top up even if you do not rack.

Ray

Reply to
Ray

It all depends on your fruit and YOUR tastebuds. I made my first cherry wine out of Door County pie/tart cherries from northeast Wisconsin. It was good at 1 year but then the tartness really came out after that, so my next batch was made out of sweet frozen cherries. I like sweeter wines, so I think I will like this better than the last batch. I would look at this first batch of yours as a trial run, and make changes after you try it. The point is to make something you like and your friends/family like. Besides which, I'm sure cherries from Wisconsin taste a bit different than from somewhere else, so even if you use the same recipe it'll be a bit different. Good-luck. Darlene

Reply to
Dar V

I was wondering if you could share your recipes for the tart apples and sour cherries. I made my first batch of wine out of fresh sour cherries. After

3 weeks I tasted it and it wasn't very good at all. I might have to end up tossing it. I will have some apples soon, and I would love to have your recipe, since you have had good luck. thanks.
Reply to
Nick R

Wait, don't throw your batch out after 3 weeks! That's a little young to think of tossing something. Cherry wine can take awhile, a year or more.... If it doesn't taste good at 1 year old, then consider making it into a wine cooler by adding 7-up or something. Darlene

Reply to
Dar V

The sweet cherry wine I made also lacked flavor at first. Then I got a recommendation to add some mahlab (cherry pits that have had the toxicity taken out) to the fermentation. What a difference! Suddenly my wine tasted like cherry pie! I love it! Check your local middle-eastern grocery for mahlab.

Karen

PA-ter wrote:

Reply to
Karen Heim

Thanks for the advice Joe! That's the kind of info I'm looking for!

I let mine finish before

They were whole cherries with the pits on and I even had some creepy crawlers and a couple of leaves in there. The fermentation was open (lid loosley set on top) for a couple of days, but I got paronoid and airlocked it for the rest of the first week.

Reply to
Phil

Wow that sucks! I sure hope I'll have better luck. If I do it again, it'll be a mix of tart cherries and sweet cherries.

Reply to
Phil

When you say, 'acidify', what do you mean? I brew beer (this is my

1st EVER wine!) and sometimes 'acidify' my sparge water with lactic acid. I do have PH strips. What am I looking for? When do I 'acidify'? Is lactic acid a sufficent substance to 'acidify' with?

I'm gonna do this next year. (do a blend of sour and sweet) the cherry season is pretty much over now.

Yes Ben I was 'pulp' fermenting. (learned a new term;-) and I was just following what it said in the recipie. FWIW my gravity sample jar had pulp and all kinds of crap in it. Not sure it this had an effect on the reading. It started to ferment again to beat the band! Foam on top and lots of airlock activity. It really gives me peace of mind to get it out of the plastic bucket off the couple of leaves, creepy crawlers, pits, and pulp, and into a sterilized glass baloon with a sterilzed stopper and airlock.

Phil

Reply to
Phil

Great to hear! I'm glad to hear someone satified with their final all sweet cherry product!

What kind of adjustments?

Yes it's fermenting in the air locked glass baloon just great!

That sounds like some sage advice. I'll do it like you said. I have lots of time and I'll just let this sucker go.

Reply to
Phil

The main adjustments I make are acidity and tannin. Both can be done by taste but do not try to do it all at one time or you will probably over do it. On the first racking after it clears, taste it to see if you think it need extra acidity or tannin. Add a bit if you think it need it. Do the same on the next racking. Remember, it is easier to add than take away so go easy. You can check acidity by titration but remember, taste is more important than the correct reading.

If you go in for that sort of thing you can also check the pH to adjust the meta. I do sometimes and sometimes I just go by feel.

Ray

Reply to
Ray

To acidify simply means to add acid to the must/wine. This obviously increases the tartness and decreases the pH. The former (for tartness) is only necessary when the must/wine lacks acidity/tartness, the latter is only necessary when at excessively high pH (and is then done for reasons of stability). A desirable pH range would be 3.0-3.6, with whites lying in the lower half of this range and reds lying in the upper half. I wouldn't acidify with lactic acid (at least not by any significant degree) because this will give a lactic (milky/cheesy) character. Use tartaric or malic acid instead.

Yes, it does.

Sounds good then.

HTH, Ben

Reply to
Ben Rotter

DrinksForum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.