Strawberry Wine (August 2021)

[jeskremer]

DAY ONE
Added 3.5# of frozen strawberries and 1# of frozen red currents to a sterilized pail. Boiled 1 gallon purified water. Poured into pail. Used a sterilized vita-mix to roughly chop berries and pour back into pail.

Placed a top on the primary and put into refrigerator so juices have time to extract into the water. Will come back in five days to add pectic enzyme.

[jeskremer]

DAY 5
Removed from refrigerator. Mixed 1 tsp pectic enzyme with 1/2 cup warm water to dissolve. Poured into must.

Pectic enzyme helps reduce haze from hot water (beginning of how jelly is made).

[jeskremer]

DAY 6
Dissolved 1/8 tsp potassium metabisulfate (campden) in 1/2 cup warm water. Poured into must.

This is used to kill wild yeasts 24 hours before adding the wine yeast.

[jeskremer]

DAY 7
Sanitized everything. Used a strainer to strain juice off of chopped berries, then ran through nylon bag strainer again.

Added 1/8 tsp tannin and 1/2 tsp CITRIC acid dissolved in a glass of warm water. Added to must. (Recipe states that 1/2 tsp strong black brewed tea could replace tannin and 1/2 lemon could replace citric acid also.)

Optimal pH is 3.4-3.6. Came in at 3.45.

SG was 1.00. Slowly added sugar to reach 1.085. Stirred vigorously to dissolve and introduce O2 which will help the yeast. Took about 2 1/2#. Potential alcohol is around 11.5% then.

ORIGINAL SG - ENDING SG x 135.87 = ABV %

My hope is that because the fruit sat in water longer before starting fermentation that there will be more fruit flavor - hopefully keeping the alcohol a hair lower helps also.

Added 1 tsp yeast nutrient and 1/4 tsp Pasteur Red yeast. Covered to sit in 75 degree house.

[jeskremer]

FOUR DAYS AFTER ADDING YEAST
SG 1.035

[jeskremer]

SIX DAYS AFTER ADDING YEAST
Moved to secondary. 1.020 SG

[jeskremer]

TWO MONTHS AFTER MOVING TO SECONDARY
I wanted it off the lees earlier, but didn't get to it. Racked yesterday.

FYI There is also a 50/50 strawberry raspberry wine from leftovers that didn't fit into the carboy. After racking, added about 1/2 bottle of grape kids wine to top it off.

[jeskremer]

June 10, 2022
About seven months after starting, bottled.

Slightly bitter. Tastes like strawberry, but a bit more watery/alcoholy.