Failed Jam wine experiment

[Arcs]

Umm ok I nicked this recipe from youtube.
So....4 jars of Strawberry jam.
half a kilo of sugar
champagne yeast.

And the end result? Not even fizzy water. What's gone wrong? I see it going the motions of fermentation still after 4 weeks. It's red but red murky water and has produced mucho yeast but certainly no alcohol. Erm what's gone wrong?

Thanks in advance :c

 

[An Ankoù]

Well if it's still fermenting then it's producing alcohol. More info needed: what size were the jars of strawberry jam, What was the batch size? I've made wine from jam and it's turned out great. I doubt much has gone wrong. Did you put any pectin degrading enzyme in there, by the way?

 

[Arcs]

Afraid not good Sir. It's just murky red water rn. No alcohol. :c Cheapo 27p Sainsbury's Strawberry jam. I think it was 3 or 500g jam jars erf

 

[Arcs]

Earlier I gave it a spank and gave it more sugar and some tannins ie sultanas. Hoping that wasn't a waste :/ I assume by doing that I have kicked off the fermentation again. Although, I will admit, no heat pad, has been here in my living room as this is the only place to keep it warm.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

The jam may have had preservative in it.

 

[An Ankoù]

Doesn't sound good, arcs. I came across jam wine when I wanted some jars to put a chutney in and found the cheapest ones in Lidl containing their marmalade, which I was quite prepared to throw away. But being a tight Yorkshireman I formulated marmalade wine and it was great. The pickle was good, too.
I calculated how much sugar to add to my 6 jars from the ingedients list on the side of the jar, but it was much more than half a kilo, and gave it a good dose of pectinase. The thing is that strawberries are pretty crap anyway when it comes to colour.
I'll dig out the recipe in the morning if you're still interested. In the meantime, don't chuck your wine out, get some pectic enzyme from Wilkinsons, Put a couple of teaspoonsful in there. See if you can find room for another half kilo of sugar and hide it somewhere for three months.

 

[kelper]

I'd love a recipe for Yorkshire Marmalade wine! Even from a froggy.

 

[Arcs]

Ok, well I am interested Ank so hit me up with that recipe. I am gonna let it sit for a bit before I get to wilko - perhaps for another two weeks. I'll feed it the half kilo of sugar tho. I do know I have succeeded in breeding a rather large champagne yeast colony for future use tho hehe.

 

[Arcs]

Well for all this wait some two months later and it still just about tastes like red water :c So I did what you said and now we'll see. Seems the yeast just ate all the sugar and produced nothing :c Gonna come back to it in 3 months like you said.

 

[Arcs]

So Ankou, after 3 days now, uhm, it doesn't seem to be doing very much. Would recommend adding another kilo of sugar? As the half kilo seems a bit meh :c

 

[An Ankoù]

If it tastes sweet- like unfermented, watered down jam then the fermentation has failed. Possibly due to preservatives in the jam, as Chippy said. But if it's not sweet- just "meh" as you say, then the sugar will have turned into alcohol regardless of whether you can taste it or not. Can't tell without looking at it. I presume this is a one gallon batch you're making?
Here's the link to my marmalade wine recipe: Jam wine

 

[fury_tea]

Well for all this wait some two months later and it still just about tastes like red water :c So I did what you said and now we'll see. Seems the yeast just ate all the sugar and produced nothing :c Gonna come back to it in 3 months like you said.

Yeast can"t eat sugar and produce nothing. That's not how this works.

I make cider and ginger ale with fruit juice and sugar. It takes 2-3 days to produce some pretty potent alcohol, then I leave it to clear for a couple of weeks. Something has gone seriously wrong here, and I wouldn't waste any more time on it of I were you.

 

[Arcs]

I am gonna add another kilo of sugar on it and see if I can revive it somehow and if that doesn't work then I am gonna call time of death 18.15 April fools day lol. Nah. It was a 2.5 gallon batch. It was red until I added the sultanas for tannins. Now it has sorta gone white - ish hehe. It's a gj I don't need that FV for anything rn. I've copied that recipe - tyvm. But I'll keep yer posted after a few weeks of adding the kilo and let yer know how it is getting on =) I have never ever had a failed brew and I'd like that record remaining untarnished xD

 

[Arcs]

Yeast can"t eat sugar and produce nothing. That's not how this works.

I make cider and ginger ale with fruit juice and sugar. It takes 2-3 days to produce some pretty potent alcohol, then I leave it to clear for a couple of weeks. Something has gone seriously wrong here, and I wouldn't waste any more time on it of I were you.

True, but in my case all it has done so far is produce more yeast colour and no alcohol :P

 

[Arcs]

Seems from your recipe I used much less Jam hmmm!!!

 

[Arcs]

Ok I've just figured to have a small taste of it before I add more sugar. Seems there is a faint taste of alcohol in there. It's very clear! So.... me thinks aye, it's worth adding more sugar to it and eventually this will work. But it deffo now looks like a white wine lulz

 

[An Ankoù]

The quantities you mention are about right for a gallon. That's why it tastes weak and watery.

 

[Arcs]

not after this afternoon xD It was supposed to be for a 2Gl batch actually. But I digress, this will be fixed later =)

 

[Arcs]

Ok so now another 1.5 kg of inverted sugar added to the mix. Obviously I had to add another gallon of water to that because of the inverted sugar. But after an hour it's kicking off rather nicely. It's not going to be perfect in any means that I know.

But there's a lesson to be learned here. Youtube is a fun platform with a lot of topics but when it comes to homebrewing recipes. Of the two I have tried they both sucked and I had to either save it in some way and or try again but with a different approach to get the right result. For those curious, first it was the coffee wine, err just effing no! No, No, No ....... Leave a cold brew for a day before adding sugar and yeast to it. Even a bad taste of treacle does not describe this one. Euch!! - As bad as watching Uncle Roger review Jamie Oliver make Egg fried rice. Had to add cream after finished fermentation and a spoon of sugar in the glass to back sweeten it to make it passable. The retry was to leave the coffee to go cold which in my case was 90 minutes then add some inverted sugar to it and leave to ferment. This gives a nice glowy taste to it that's just the right amount of strong coffee but with the alcohol coming through enough to say,'Aye! Now I see what you mean about coffee wine.' I did even try make a mead of this and that works really nicely too!

That strawberry wine recipe from youtube, well we know about this via here. I am gonna try this again with Ank's take on it and see if I can tweak it a bit when I get round to thinking about this again.

But for now, as Ank said, two more months. Then we'll see what I have. And I'll let yer know =)

 

[Nicks90]

It sounds like you have put 2kg of sugar in a 3 gallon mix and only 4 jars of cheap mediocre jam.
You've basically got a weak-assed sugar wash with a hint of strawberry.

You could rescue this by dumping in a full bottle of strawberry lowitz Syrup. Not only will that add more sugar and abv, but a proper strawberry hit to the brew