Back sweetening wines

[Gwen]

Just out of curiosity really:

How often when making country/fruit wines do you have to back sweeten them?

Is it something you end up doing with each batch of wine or just the odd 1 or 2? I do prefer a dryer wine but my hubby often turns his nose up at them if I leave them natural and not back sweetened.

If you do back sweeten what is your go too ingredient?

Thanks Gwen

 

[Chippy_Tea]

When i first started i couldn't stand dry wine so i used to add a teaspoon of sugar to the bottle of wine then shook it until it dissolved just before drinking, it did the job for us some members use sweeteners but others say they leave an aftertaste.

 

[Stevieboy]

If I have to I use unfermentable wine sweetener, but I usually add sugar in stages throughout fermentation, to achieve sweetness I require, and stabilise with, er , stabiliser.

 

[Tess Tickle's Brewery]

It depends what yeast you choose Gwen and how much sugar you choose to put into your must. (not sure if you meant attenuation or not)

Erythritol works for us if we're trying to keep it low carb, but otherwise just stabilise and then use sugar. (or like stevie says, step feed it)

I despise dry wine.

 

[Mr_S_Jerusalem]

Ah I can't stand sweet wine.

If my wine tastes anything other than bone dry I assume I've made a mistake.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Ah I can't stand sweet wine.

I think we are between the two, used to drink cheap supermarket white wine which was very sweet and now prefer a dryer wine but not bone dry.

 

[Gwen]

but I usually add sugar in stages throughout fermentation

I am still always learning new things and never done step feeding before, so need to have a read up on that

not sure if you meant attenuation or not

and had to google attenuation in homebrewing/wine as never come across that before.

Like I say. I am still learning as a baby of wine making of only 5 years

 

[Tess Tickle's Brewery]

Bless you Gwen.

Each yeast has an alcohol tolerance and when they reach somewhere around their certain ABV, they've had enough and stop. So if you put more sugar in than the yeast are happy with, then you'll end up with a sweet wine. If you put less in it'll go dry. Usually. Yeast can't read packets though and they do what they want

So obviously you should choose the yeast with the right level of tolerance for what you want. A lot of wine yeasts stop at around 13% ish. But there are some which will go to 15 or even 18%.

 

[Wynott]

I don't want to use sweeteners. I mostly make country/fruit wines, and start them off with 2 - 2.5lbs of sugar, aiming for gravity of 0.1080 or thereabouts. When all the sugar has been used and/or the specific gravity is 0.995 (to my taste) I test it from time to time, and add small amounts of sugar to bring it back up to 0.995. This does sometimes take longer, but I find it quite reliable. The speed of fermenting varies according to yeast, as Tess says, and I find also the time of year/temperature.

I'm no expert, but hope this helps a bit.