Sweetening Wine - Darlene (and anyone else of course)

Joel, Hey, sounds like you've been busy. A couple of questions, were the wines fermented to dry before you decided to stabilize and sweeten? and did you try testing your SG in between adding the sugar to your wine and/or after you were all done sweetening? I guess I wouldn't worry about it now...the zucchini and the cherry require a bit more aging, so I wouldn't necessarily be overly concerned about present taste, other than to write it all down for future reference. I ferment to dry, rack and age over a period of 7 months or so, and then I stabilize and sweeten, let the wine sit some more (about a month; Jack recommends at least 10 days), and then bottle. Back when I first started and decided that I don't really like dry wines, but something a bit sweeter, not too sweet though - I started like this...first, I did know what my ending SG was for the wine was. I would (as Jack suggests) add a crushed campden tablet, add wine stabilizer, and then add the sugar. However, since I didn't know how much sugar I wanted to add, I would start with adding 1/8 cup sugar, mixing it in, checking the SG, and taste. Then, I would add another 1/8 cup sugar, check the SG, and taste. Time consuming, I know, but I learned a lot. The trick is, each fruit and veggie wine is different (take notes on everything so you don't forget), so with each batch, I learned what I liked and didn't like. Hope this helps a bit... Darlene

wrote in message news:niR7g.74526$gE.65326@dukeread06...

I always bench test with small samples. Get the samples to the temperature you will be serving at then add small amount of sugar and taste then add a little more if necessary and taste, etc. until you find the level you like. Then extrapolate that amount to the total amount of wine and sweeten it all.

If you get a few people to help with the taste testing you can blame someone else if it doesn't turn out right in the end.

Thanks Darlene and Mike. Just the type of info I was looking for. As always, this group is a great help.

Joel

My method is a bit different, but along the same line of thinking. I take equal amounts of sugar and water ie: 1 cup water to 1 cup sugar. I first boil the water and while it is hot I add the sugar and stir it up real good until it is a clear syrup. I don't boil this as you dont want to carmelize the sugar and have an off taste. Cool the mixture next. Now I take a bottle of dry wine and then I use a syringe to add a known amount of sugar syrup mixture. A typical semi sweet dose is in the range of 25-40 ml per bottle. This is dependant on several factors such as: is the wine truly "dry" or is there residual sugar present, is it acidic and needing the addition of more sugar to come into balance, personal preference etc. Another benefit of individual additions is that you can make your wine several different sweetness levels within the same batch. Or you can extrapolate the amount to add to a whole carboy if you like. Don't forget to sulphite and sorbate your wine together so as to not create bottle bombs. HTH John Dixon <