My name is John Graubman and I have recently gotten into making wine. I had gotten ahold of 8 free wine kits from 2004 and am now trying two out to see if they are still any good. They've still got a couple months left but hopefully they'll be nice.
Besides that.. the point is I am now going to try and make my first fresh wine from scratch. I'm going from a recipe I found and changing it up a bit.
My ingredients:
Yeast Energizer Acid Blend Anti-foam agent Pectic Enzyme Wine Tannin Yeast Nutrient K1-V1118 Lalvin Yeast x2 10lbs. White cane sugar 5lbs. Honey 2 lbs. Turbinado 22 lbs. of bananas (ripening as we speak)
I am changing this up a bit from the original and putting in honey and Turbinado to give it a more meady/molasses taste. Does anyone have constructive criticism for this recipe? I'm quite new and am trying to get the hang of this, especially being my first batch not from a kit.
Also, I was wondering if I should use bentonite? I've read somewhere that it was also possible to use.
Hello John and welcome. I'm also a home winemaker (over 35 years), but I only make wine from grapes. Although there are a few winemakers on this forum, the topic is rarely discussed, as most of the folks here discuss wines they buy. For home wine making, I highly recommend you go to the following link. There are many folks there who make fruit wines and share their recipes. http://www.winepress.us
Chico - Hey! This Bottle is empty! Groucho - That's because it's dry Champagne.
If it were me, I would hold off on the bentonite until you are sure its not going to clear on its own. I have never had anything not clear to my satisfaction by just letting gravity do its thing. Then if you do need to fine it, I check with a reference to see if bentonite would be the best for this or if maybe another agent would make more sense. I have never worked with banana so not sure what to expect.
As for making it into brandy, I think that it is illegal as home distillation is not legal. Technically, I see no reason why it would not work if you have the equipment.
Good luck, John! But remember when the wine is ready to drink, please do not approach fellow wine lovers and say: "Hey, I have made this great wine, please tell me honestly what you think!"
So I've made it last night and I'm in the first steps, and now I'm waiting for it to cool, as it is slowly cooling. I made it at 1:30 am last night and now it is 10:45. I have to work at 12 and was thinking of leaving it until tonight, say around 9-10 p.m.
Do you think it would be okay to sit that long? I'm not going to ruin it am I? I'm worried I may make it form bacteria or something... Any help is appreciated! And thank you for the constructive criticism!! I love it.
Well too late since you should already be at work but if it were me I would be looking at two things. What temp do you have now and what is your SG? If the temp is below 90 I would probably pitch instead of waiting for a low SG must. However, if the SG is in the 12% potential alcohol range (sorry too lazy to do the conversion to SG) then I would consider waiting as the final alcohol content will kill off a lot of bad things that would eventually lead to spoilage of something in the 6%-8% range.
Where it gets harder is if the temp is say 90-100+ and the must is anything less than 11% potential alcohol. I fear spoilage bacteria during the slow cooling times and many of them can live in higher alcohol environments. Trust me as I have experienced loss of a couple batches of IPA that should have been about 8%. What I would probably do in this case is build a starter to give the yeast a head start and pitch right before leaving and then just hope that enough yeast survives to quickly start fermentation.
Of course if you had a wort chiller that would have been the best way to go. Also if you can seal it up real tight you can wait it out. I friend of mine use to do this with great success. He would seal the entire batch up tight in a carboy and put it on his back porch to cool. Never understood how he did not have problems with this approach but it worked for him.