Sour wine

Roy, post your recipe and we might be albe to help more.

What I can say is generally speaking all freshly fermented wine will be a bit tart, somf of that will mellow over time.

a.. 1/2 gallon Watermelon Juice b.. 1 1/2 pounds sugar c.. 2 1/2 tsp Acid Blend d.. 1/8 tsp Tannin e.. 1 tsp nutrient f.. 1 Campden tablet g.. wine yeast and nutrient h.. Starting S.G. 1.090, acid .65 Cut melons into quarters, remove rind & seeds. Cut melon into slices. squeeze out juice into primary fermentor thru a strainer bag.put strainer bag into primary fermenter.add in all other ingredients to primary except yeast. Stir and Cover. After 24 hours add yeast.When S.G. reaches 1.040 (3-5 days) pour juice into secondary fermenter. press juice from strainer bag into secondary fermenter and discard bag. ferment as normal.

i..

Well it is definately the 2 1/2 tsp of acid blend that is making it tart. I am sure they mean for it to be sweetened at the end.

For a dry low acid fruit wine I would expect to see only about 1 1/2 tsp of acid added per gallon.

It may be a procedural problem that is associated with watermelon wine. If you read the write-up on watermelon wine on Jack Keller's site, he comments that watermelon juice has a tendency to actually sour faster than the yeast can take off. He recommends that you get a very vigorous starter going BEFORE you press the juice. Then immediately introduce the juice to the starter.

Ray

That is not in with the watermelon wine in the requested recipies section it is in the 10 watermelon wines section and in the wine problems section in case anyone else wants to read it....

I still think it is not that though, but just too much acid blend. 3.1 Grams of acid blend will raise the TA by 0.1%, and he added about 10.25 grams of acid blend so he raised the TA by 0.33% I used the page below to figure out how much acid blend is in 1 tsp...so it may be off there

Jack Kellers wines only use about 1 tsp of acid blend per gallon.

I had a feeling that there was too much acid blend. I will give it some time to clear all the way then experiment with adding some sugar or honey to it.

I took care to start the yeast before the crush and did the crush in one gallon increments adding the yeast to the first batch. When the crush was finished it looked like a fizzing soda. I do not know how I could of got the yeast going any faster.