Racked first wine

[Stickweaver]

Just racked my first ever wine to a storage demi-john. It is a apple and red grape juice wine (tried fruit juices first to test process). As I siphoned the wine from one demi-john to another I gave it a wee taste. Yuk! It tastes dry and a bit yeasty with a definite fizz on the tongue. Is this right for this stage of the process; is there anything I need to do or will it mellow with age?

I have elderflower. dandelion and rhubarb on the go - I hope these taste better!

[MKG]

A lot depends upon the type of apples used, but in general ...

You have a combination of tannins from the red grape juice and malic acid from the apples. In the absence of sugar (which you've just fermented out), both of those substances taste bitter. However, both undergo slow chemical changes during maturation and the flavour will mellow.

If it tastes yeasty and you can feel a fizz on the tongue, it's very likely that the fermentation is, in fact, not yet finished - so leave that storage demijohn under an airlock rather than a solid bung. On the other hand, as it tastes dry, this may simply be yeast cells held in suspension by thermal currents and dissolved CO2. Store the wine in as cool a place as possible to allow any remaining yeast cells to drop out. The CO2 will come out of solution in time - and this is much preferable to the modern treatment of beating hell out of the wine to force the CO2 out (while introducing oxygen - the process does much more harm than good).

If it still tastes too dry when it comes to drinking time, simply make up a sugar syrup and add it, a little at a time, until you achieve the flavour you want. I know I keep repeating this, but even dry wine afficianadoes don't like absolutely dry wines.

If the worst comes to the worst and you just don't like the results, save the wine anyway - it can always be blended later with a wine having opposite attributes.

Personally, I hate elderflower wine, love dandelion wine, and think you can't go wrong with rhubarb (but that one DEFINITELY needs to be a little on the sweet side).

Mike

[frozenthunderbolt]

dry means it has used all the sugar available. If you leave it the yeast should fall out of suspension and leave a layer on the bottom that you can rack the clear wine away from, this will deal with the yeast taste.
IF not to taste the easiest way is to sweeten using sugar SYRUP (1:1 sugar water dissolved till clear)
alternatively you need to shock the wine with a campden tablet and then add potassium sorbate to prevent the yeast from being able to reproduce, after a week or so you can then rack and sweeten it (relatively) safely before bottling.

[Stickweaver]

Thank you frozenthunderbolt and MKG. Really good advice. I used a carton of chilled apple juice and red grape juice. The recipe I was following was one of the old country wine recipes that called for a tsp of Marmite. Could this be adding to the problem? Strangely, with the rhubarb, I made two gallons. In one demi-john I added the sugar syrup half way through the initial racking process. This container has now stopped fermenting after only two to three weeks. The second gallon I added the sugar solution to the demi-john before then adding the wine on top. This gallon is still fermenting away quite happily. I did give both of them a swift shake last week. Odd?

[MKG]

A whole teaspoon of Marmite? That explains the yeasty taste - it's far too much. The purpose of Marmite is to add vitamin B and provide other nutrients. At a MAXIMUM, you should be using a quarter of a teaspoon.

Anyway, that changes the scenario a little. That fizz is now almost definitely dissolved CO2 - which will disperse - and adding sugar syrup will cure the dryness. To be frank, I don't know about the overload of Marmite. The flavour may fall off over time, or it may not. There's only one way to find out.

Mike

[dave45]

I tend to disagree with Mike on getting rid of CO2 - my results seem to have improved with a bit of vigorous shaking.... After ferment has finished in the bucket and I'm racking into the carboy with finings added to settle, I often find that there is an air gap -i.e. the carboy isn't full. I could top up with water but that would dilute it... Now fit an airlock and give it a good shake... plop plop plop out comes the CO2... keep doing that until no more comes out. Now the space above the wine is predominantly CO2 rather than air/oxygen., so it should resist oxidation problems.

It seems to settle out faster too.

(for buckets and carboys read demijohns... btw I was given 2 "johns" - twice the size of a demijohn... bastard to get bungs to fit them though!)