Strawberry Wine ?

Rookiewinemaker - I don't make strawberry wine so others may have a better idea. I would crush the strawberries and add most of the water you will use. If it were me I would use grocery store reverse osmosis water. I'd add sulfite, chill down cold and let it sit overnight. Stir it up real good and measure specific gravity (be sure to correct for temperature or warm the batch up to room temperature). I would do this because you just don't know how much sugar is in the strawberries. Once you know the specific gravity of the must you can add sugar to increase starting specific gravity. Be sure to stir to assure it's dissolved or use syrup. Then add nutrients, yeast, QS to full volume and and let it go. To make a 7 to 9% alcohol wine your starting gravity should be about 1.053 to 1.069. This assumes you ferment to dryness. If you want the wine sweet you can add sugar to taste. Then adjust sulfite per pH and add K sorbate to prevent further fermentation.

Of course check Jack Keller's web site for strawberry wine recipies and methods

Bill Frazier Olathe, Kansas USA

Bill has already given you good advice, I do make strawberry but I make it to a higher level of alcohol than you are shooting for and I can't keep any of it past a year. (I made 17 gallons last year and I doubt there are 5 bottles left; it's well liked.) I shot for 1.085.

I needed some citric acid and do use a yeast nutrient. I just put my strawberries into a food processor and let it have at it. Some freeze them first to make them easier to mash if you are going to mash them. I don't use a bag but have a friend that does and he says it's the way to go. Some just get new pantyhose from a dollar store for a mesh bag. I never tried that, just seems too odd but I'm old... :) He makes incredible fruit wines. I do sweeten and sorbate after it's dry.

Strawberries do vary in sweetness and tartness. You want to measure both; don't go for a plain old 'do this and that recipe'. Just post any questions once you get some numbers. I went for a TA of at least

6g/l.

Joe

Joe-

Do you sorbate AND sterile filter, or just sorbate? I ask because I am going to start a batch of Strawberry mead and would like to stop the SG around 1.02, but don't really want to add sorbate to the mix.

I've been very very happy with my sterile filter pads from Baeco, but if it was more of a problem with restarting then I might actually buy the 0.2 micron pads as well. Someday soon I'm going to have to make up some petri dishes and see how many cultures I get after a good filtration/recycle for 10 minutes.

Jas> Bill has already given you good advice, I do make strawberry but I make

Bill has already given you good advice, I do make strawberry but I make it to a higher level of alcohol than you are shooting for and I can't keep any of it past a year. (I made 17 gallons last year and I doubt there are 5 bottles left; it's well liked.) I shot for 1.085.

I needed some citric acid and do use a yeast nutrient. I just put my strawberries into a food processor and let it have at it. Some freeze them first to make them easier to mash if you are going to mash them. I don't use a bag but have a friend that does and he says it's the way to go. Some just get new pantyhose from a dollar store for a mesh bag. I never tried that, just seems too odd but I'm old... :) He makes incredible fruit wines. I do sweeten and sorbate after it's dry.

Strawberries do vary in sweetness and tartness. You want to measure both; don't go for a plain old 'do this and that recipe'. Just post any questions once you get some numbers. I went for a TA of at least 6g/l.

Joe

I do not make strawberry wine, but do make pear wine each season. Rather than 'mashing', I add some pectic enzyme to the juice/water fluid into which I am suspending the fruit filled mesh bag. This breaks down the fruit, allowing full access to all the sugars and flavors.

"

I make Strawberry wine all the time I use 6 #'s per gallon DESTEM berries [no need to crush as Pectic will break down cell walls] ADD pectic enzyme ADD 4 gallons water and enough sugar to bring you desired % you are looking for. (sugar and the juice from strawberries will bring it close to 6 gallons) Add K sulfite [kills wild yeast] SET 24 - 36 hrs NOW add yeast I use Cote des Blancs WAIT, WAIT, WAIT You may need to push the "CAP" down daily for the first 4-5 days usually after 10 - 14 days ready to rack remove pulp and transfer NOTE I use 2 BUCKETS to ferment and can't fit in a regular size bucket.

Tom

Home of the MOON RIVER BREWERY and DELANCO VINEYARDS

Jason, Sort of... I have a Buon Vino Mini Jet and I do run any white that gets sweetened through it. The chances of it being a true sterile filtration are pretty slim though. For the money it's a good filter. I do sorbate also but many others have posted that sorbate can be tasted by them and I do believe that. I either can't taste it or don't realize I'm tasting it.

This will sound awful but I rarely drink my sweet wine, it's more for quality control than anything else. Most of that is given away to people who really prefer it so I just don't know what to say about sorbates. If someone _asks_ for another bottle I'm pretty sure you can use that as an indicator of good wine.

I have been reading about low temperature sterilization in a book by Bird, it's an interesting idea. He discusses taking the wine to 54 C

+/-0.2 bottling, corking and casing; _not_ cooling it down. The theory is the wine is sterilized by the long time exposure to the heat. Since most yeasts die at 100 F it seems to make sense, if you have an intentionally small population anyway it might work. I am thinking of trying it on one wine this year; doing half with sorbate and a filter, half this way. I can control temperature but +/- 0.5 F is pretty tough. I rarely don't fine a white so the wines are pretty clean either way. Only one way to find out if it works...

Joe

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