Sherry Making

[Tonester1963]

Hello, I'm making sherry for the first time or anything like this ever. My dad made Dandelion Wine back in the 1970's in L.A. when I was a mall child 6yrs old. I'm trying to make Sweet Sherry for the first time. I have together all things needed...wine making kits, demi-johns, airlocks and other materials. At first I purchased apricots cutting, mashing the apricots, 1/2 kilo of sugar into 25ltr pail and last fermentation for 6 days. Day 7 I removed the mash, syphen into 2 demi-john jugs and started doing the ABV% one a week weekly for the past 4wks "BUT" the %ABV went up from 0.992 to 1.020 then back down and now going up very very slowly. Can anyone please help, %ABV very low and not sweet at all, tasting like wine...Im trying to reach 20%-25% alcohol. Do I mix some with lots of sugar and mead and let that ferment for a bit and reintroduced back into each??? Thanks...Tonester1963

 

[Stevieboy]

1/2kg sugar is not a lot - that will ferment out dry in no time - assuming you've only put a few pounds of fruit in. Add sugar, dissolved in water a little at a time to bring up the ABV. Did you use a high alcohol tolerance yeast?

 

[An Ankoù]

Not an expert on sherry, but isn't it a strong wine which has been fortified by adding even more alcohol and then left to oxidise somehow? Doesn't sound like a straightforward process to me and I wish you all the very best of good luck with it.

 

[Tonester1963]

Yes, Lalvin EC-11. Would I need to add more yeast with the sugar or not also can I mix the sugar with the liquid in. the demi-john instead of water...I have a 3rd demi-john empty and sanitized?? Just changed my avatar because I love to fish whenever l can.

 

[Tonester1963]

Not an expert on sherry, but isn't it a strong wine which has been fortified by adding even more alcohol and then left to oxidise somehow? Doesn't sound like a straightforward process to me and I wish you all the very best of good luck with it.

Not an expert on sherry, but isn't it a strong wine which has been fortified by adding even more alcohol and then left to oxidise somehow? Doesn't sound like a straightforward process to me and I wish you all the very best of good luck with it.

Same as wine making but you keep the airlock open with cheese cloth.

 

[Stevieboy]

At this stage you could just pop the sugar in and swirl the DJ. Shouldn't need more yeast. The reason we dissolve in water is to make it easier for the yeast to attack, but you can just put it in undisolved.

I just happen to have some Raisin sherry on the go for Christmas....

 

[Tonester1963]

At this stage you could just pop the sugar in and swirl the DJ. Shouldn't need more yeast. The reason we dissolve in water is to make it easier for the yeast to attack, but you can just put it in undisolved.

I just happen to have some Raisin sherry on the go for Christmas....

At this stage you could just pop the sugar in and swirl the DJ. Shouldn't need more yeast. The reason we dissolve in water is to make it easier for the yeast to attack, but you can just put it in undisolved.

I just happen to have some Raisin sherry on the go for Christmas....

Ok. Thanks, will dissolve 3-klo of sugar into an empty DJ with warm water and entraduced slowly back in each of the 2 DJ and that may up the sweetness and hopefully % little at a time. Thanks for the help, will let you know what happens. Thanks again StevieBoy

 

[johncrobinson]

The technique of adding sugar in small doses to up the final alcohol content is well known and is refered to as "sugar feeding".There is plenty of info on the internet about how to go about it.

The basic reason the technique works is because if you add ALL the sugar in one go Osmotic pressure can stress the yeast just as much as increasing alcohol levels do.Sugar feeding avoids this extra stress on the yeast,Giving them a better chance to get the job done.

Also the yeast need to be well nourished and preferebly a high alcohol strain as well.
The most popular strain of yeast used for this purpose is EC-1118. which is a champagne yeast.
On a good day alcohol levels of more than 18% abv may be achived.

A true sherry yeast is also highly alcohol tolerant and arguably should be better suited to sherry making but may be harder to purchase.

 

[itry]

I love sherry. Just my take on it and what works well for me. You should use a desert wine yeast to accomplish the correct outcome.
What recepie are you following ? As sherry is spanish and they generally use maderia grapes. Their very sweet. To get to 20 / 25% you will need to feed the mix with sugar as described above and to get to 20 / 25% you probably wont make it. You may get to 18 or 19? But itll be a mission. I would forget this experiment as a sherry as i dont think it will come out like the sherry you want. I would just accept this as an unknown alcohol experiment and see what happens. To be fair their is not alot of info out their on home brew sherry. Its a bit of a dark art that you get to by investigating.

Next time
Desert wine yeast
Sugar as a base
Sherry flavouring(grapes /essance)
Investigate feeding as described above

Sherry flour yeast is extremely hard to get hold of. White labs sell one wlp700 but its rare to find it. I had to wait almost two years before i got it.

Sherry is kept in a soleria. The soleria acts like a water butt system. You top it up with fresh stuff one end and it over spills into the next barrel thats slightly older and so fourth. Untill the final barrel is really old and matured.
Sherry flour yeast creates a film over the sherry protecting it from air. This is how its fermented with out sealing. The flour helps age and mature the product.