Strawberry wine (BOMM method)

[Seamonkey84]

since I’m just starting out and kinda enthusiastic... I just pitched my third batch within a week. This is my 5th batch since I started brewing a month ago.
As the title says, I’m doing a strawberry wine, but using the staggered protocol laid out in “Brays one month mead”. Only difference is the sugar source. Let’s see how this goes.
So two days ago, I found a great deal on “fresh” organic strawberries, only a dollar a pound! Basically about to be over ripened, so I ended up buying 8 pounds. I cleaned and chopped up 7lbs, and dumped into a strainer bag. I then covered with enough water to do a Campden tablet soak. I also added peptic enzyme to complete the “wine making liquor”. I realized that just covering the fruit would fill the bucket to the one gallon line, so to account for adding sugar solution and yeast starter (and volume loss after removing fruit pulp), I’m aiming for a 1.5 gallon batch.
This morning the bucket looked and smelled like a strawberry daiquiri. I added a solution with 2lbs of sugar, rounded 1/4tsp of potassium bicarbonate, 1/2tsp Fermaid K, and 1/2tsp Fermaid O. Then add some Wyeast 1388 from a starter culture I’ve been maintaining.
Now 12 hours later, the mix still smells wonderful and looks completely different! The particulates clumped together and floated up, leaving the rest a beautiful clear red.

I can’t wait to see how this one turns out. I may have to see if I can get a new bucket and just jump into a bigger batch right away... although I also have a watermelon that I bought the same day that needs to be used... I think I may have a wine problem! Did I mention I don’t even drink wine (yet)?! I’m a whisky guy usually. More playing and dabbling

 

[Vinman58]

P

since I’m just starting out and kinda enthusiastic... I just pitched my third batch within a week. This is my 5th batch since I started brewing a month ago.
As the title says, I’m doing a strawberry wine, but using the staggered protocol laid out in “Brays one month mead”. Only difference is the sugar source. Let’s see how this goes.
So two days ago, I found a great deal on “fresh” organic strawberries, only a dollar a pound! Basically about to be over ripened, so I ended up buying 8 pounds. I cleaned and chopped up 7lbs, and dumped into a strainer bag. I then covered with enough water to do a Campden tablet soak. I also added peptic enzyme to complete the “wine making liquor”. I realized that just covering the fruit would fill the bucket to the one gallon line, so to account for adding sugar solution and yeast starter (and volume loss after removing fruit pulp), I’m aiming for a 1.5 gallon batch.
This morning the bucket looked and smelled like a strawberry daiquiri. I added a solution with 2lbs of sugar, rounded 1/4tsp of potassium bicarbonate, 1/2tsp Fermaid K, and 1/2tsp Fermaid O. Then add some Wyeast 1388 from a starter culture I’ve been maintaining.
Now 12 hours later, the mix still smells wonderful and looks completely different! The particulates clumped together and floated up, leaving the rest a beautiful clear red. View attachment 627368
View attachment 627369
I can’t wait to see how this one turns out. I may have to see if I can get a new bucket and just jump into a bigger batch right away... although I also have a watermelon that I bought the same day that needs to be used... I think I may have a wine problem! Did I mention I don’t even drink wine (yet)?! I’m a whisky guy usually. More playing and dabbling

Looks great! I'm going to the pick your own farm next week for strawberries. Hope to get 5 or 6 pounds and get one in the bucket

 

[Seamonkey84]

I can’t wait till picking season starts around here, got a while to go still for us up here in Maine. This batch using Wyeast 1388 smells and looks beautiful. I have a batch of concord/blueberry wine using Lalvin 71B that about to ferment dry, and it’s cloudy and almost has a fumey type smell. It’s in a room that isn’t getting heated much, so it’s ranging from 67-72 currently through the day for the past week that it’s been going. But it’s also using just Fermaid K (fed in three steps) since I didn’t have Fermaid O when I started it.

 

[jgmillr1]

1/4tsp of potassium bicarbonate

What made you need to add the bicarbonate? The pH of strawberries (3.65ish) already borders on the high side.

Might be worth buying a budget pH at some point along with an acid titration kit so you can measure and accurately target your acid corrections.

 

[Seamonkey84]

What made you need to add the bicarbonate? The pH of strawberries (3.65ish) already borders on the high side.

Might be worth buying a budget pH at some point along with an acid titration kit so you can measure and accurately target your acid corrections.

The potassium carbonate/bicarbonate is called for in the one month mead protocol, it carried through with his berry Melomel,so I did it with this batch too. It’s to provide the yeast with potassium so they tolerate higher ABV and also buffers the must during fermentation to keep the yeast happy. Bray (loveofroses) advises against adding acids up front.
I guess I’m working on the idea that changing the sugar source from honey to white sugar wouldn’t make that much of a difference to the recipe as neither provide the yeast anything besides sugar. The additions of different fruits would matter, but I haven’t looked into what fruits would need buffering and what doesn’t.

 

[jgmillr1]

Most fruit have sufficient trace elements to supply the yeast with what they need. You can also use something like fermaid during yeast rehydration.

It considered best practice to make most of your acid adjustments prior to fermentation since it allows for better integration with the must. Of course, care should be exercised when adjusting a must because some acid may still be tied up in the fruit that the yeast will release later.

You'll just want to be aware of the pH and acid level so you can dose the wine with enough sulfites and correct excess or deficient acid.

 

[Seamonkey84]

Most fruit have sufficient trace elements to supply the yeast with what they need. You can also use something like fermaid during yeast rehydration.

It considered best practice to make most of your acid adjustments prior to fermentation since it allows for better integration with the must. Of course, care should be exercised when adjusting a must because some acid may still be tied up in the fruit that the yeast will release later.

You'll just want to be aware of the pH and acid level so you can dose the wine with enough sulfites and correct excess or deficient acid.

I used a liquid yeast, but I did get some GoFerm to hydrate dry yeasts with in the future. I’ll be getting a test kit for future batches. I won’t be adding additional Sulfites (besides the Camden tablets in the beginning) as I have a friend that is sensitive to it. This batch is my experiment to see what the BOMM protocol will do to a wine. Since mead usually needs to be aged for at least 6months, if not years, and the BOMM is drinkable at bottling. Granted, I know a straight mead is different from one with fruit in primary or a fruit wine, but his protocol works.

 

[Soulshine2]

since I’m just starting out and kinda enthusiastic... I just pitched my third batch within a week. This is my 5th batch since I started brewing a month ago.
As the title says, I’m doing a strawberry wine, but using the staggered protocol laid out in “Brays one month mead”. Only difference is the sugar source. Let’s see how this goes.
So two days ago, I found a great deal on “fresh” organic strawberries, only a dollar a pound! Basically about to be over ripened, so I ended up buying 8 pounds. I cleaned and chopped up 7lbs, and dumped into a strainer bag. I then covered with enough water to do a Campden tablet soak. I also added peptic enzyme to complete the “wine making liquor”. I realized that just covering the fruit would fill the bucket to the one gallon line, so to account for adding sugar solution and yeast starter (and volume loss after removing fruit pulp), I’m aiming for a 1.5 gallon batch.
This morning the bucket looked and smelled like a strawberry daiquiri. I added a solution with 2lbs of sugar, rounded 1/4tsp of potassium bicarbonate, 1/2tsp Fermaid K, and 1/2tsp Fermaid O. Then add some Wyeast 1388 from a starter culture I’ve been maintaining.
Now 12 hours later, the mix still smells wonderful and looks completely different! The particulates clumped together and floated up, leaving the rest a beautiful clear red. View attachment 627368
View attachment 627369
I can’t wait to see how this one turns out. I may have to see if I can get a new bucket and just jump into a bigger batch right away... although I also have a watermelon that I bought the same day that needs to be used... I think I may have a wine problem! Did I mention I don’t even drink wine (yet)?! I’m a whisky guy usually. More playing and dabbling

Id love to make some good strawberry wine...If Deana Carter would come sing it to me barefoot while I made it ...

 

[jgmillr1]

I know a straight mead is different from one with fruit in primary or a fruit wine, but his protocol works.

Nice, hope it all works out for you.

I've never been fan of mead. I made a few batches a long time ago and bought a bottle or two since then. But I've always found it to be a waste of good honey that could have gone on homemade biscuits. Sorry!

 

[Seamonkey84]

Nice, hope it all works out for you.

I've never been fan of mead. I made a few batches a long time ago and bought a bottle or two since then. But I've always found it to be a waste of good honey that could have gone on homemade biscuits. Sorry!

Eh, I’m thinking of running a side by side taste test for myself, sugar vs honey in a fermentation of the same fruit/juice. Since I’m thinking about doing a simple grape juice batch anyway, I might do it with that. I know the few meads I’ve tried tasted very similar to the few white wines I’ve had. Both were semi sweet but neither tasted like honey or grape juice. I’m very new to wines, I don’t even drink it yet, just needed another hobby (like a hole in the head). Kinda dawned yesterday, just how many bottles I’m going to be needing... I have about ten gallons in various buckets/carboys, I could literally fill a tank with wine now!

 

[Seamonkey84]

Late night update, this batch was already due for its nutrient addition (1/3 sugar break) . Also, since I wanted it to finish at ~1.010, I added enough sugar to bump it another 20 to boost it from my OG of 1.110 (Wyeast is said to chew through 120SG points)

 

[Seamonkey84]

Double post

 

[Seamonkey84]

Just added the final dose of nutrient, should be finishing up in the next couple of days. The color has shifted slightly, only a tint of yellow as it’s not as vibrant a pink as it was at first. After I pull the fruit bag, I’m thinking i might split this (now nearly two gallons), and to one add another pound or two of strawberries in during secondary to make sure that flavor really pulls through. If it’s too much I can always combine the two again.

 

[Seamonkey84]

Just took a gravity reading, hovering just about 1.030 right now, a few more days to go if this follows my first batch and slows down those last 20 points. I’m going to remove the fruit bag tomorrow and prob add another few pounds in to make the flavor really come out. Or should I wait for the gravity to stabilize before adding a second batch of fruit. I know the additional fruit juice will prob drop ABV enough for the yeast to dry up the last 10sg points I wanted to keep, but I can always back sweeten.

 

[Seamonkey84]

I’m looking at my notes, and realized I’ve only used about half the Fermaid O I should of for this batch well I’ll have to see how this turns out, most likely why it slowed down a bit sooner than the other batch, and why the watermelon I started 6 days later already caught up.

 

[Seamonkey84]

Just tested it and the SG is currently 1.020. I removed the fruit bag yesterday, I’ll try it once it stabilizes and see if I want to add a few pounds of frozen fruit. The smell is still of a nice sweet strawberry.

 

[jtratcliff]

berry interesting... It never occurred to me to try the BOMM protocol on a fruit wine...

But it kinda makes sense... to someone who has only ever made 2 batches of fruit wine
(that are still fermenting) and 1 batch of JOAM, but who recently purchased the ingredients
for a BOMM....

I might give this a go...

For me, the primary goal is to make a decent tasting fruit wash for distilling into a German-style
Schnapps...

 

[Seamonkey84]

hope you got enough of the ingredients. you can make a starter with your yeast, and just save some for later. then split the starter between a few small batches even. Then keep the cycle going. For someone whose use to tinkering with my hobbies, the BOMM method is right up my alley. The set it and forget it approach just seems too boring lol.

 

[Seamonkey84]

I added another three pounds of strawberries in yesterday and Just about filled the bucket to the top... so 10lbs of strawberries total, in about 2-2.5 gallons now. The fermentation started back up too of course. I now have the whole bucket sitting in a bin in case it started getting out of hand.

 

[Seamonkey84]

So I finally racked this batch 4 days ago. I ended up with stirring some stuff up, so filled two full gallons of wine plus a lot of lees. After settling in the fridge for a few days, I attempt to do a second racking, but got more lees into it while trying to combine the second gallon into the same jug. So I’ll end up with about 1.25 gals in the end.
Here’s the gallon that I have to rack again, then there’s another jug that is about 3/4 lees.

 

[Blacksmith1]

Gotta be careful when racking. I have had the same issue. If you dont have an auto siphon or your cane sits too low in the must use a couple rubber bands to put a chopstick or kabob stick on it to keep it above the lees.

 

[Seamonkey84]

Yea, my issue was doing it solo, and not having three hands. Oh well, more racking is needed anyway. I’m letting everything settle again, I still need to empty the second gallon that’s mostly lees.

 

[Blacksmith1]

If you see the lees building up too fast you can rack early.

 

[Seamonkey84]

Yea... this is all technically the first racking... since this was with the BOMM protocol, I racked all the stuff into these bottles from the bucket to let the yeast do the cleanup while it cleared/cold crash. The only stuff I left in the bucket was the lees that were really packed... which in hindsight was probably the yeast.

 

[Seamonkey84]

Reporting back after a few months aging and then bottling. Based on my amateur taste, wyeast 1388 makes a pretty decent wine. Still very strong strawberry aroma, and still very good flavor, but you can definitely tell it’s been processed into wine. At 1.010,
It’s got enough sweetness to offset the 16%abv, and enough tannins to give it a nice mouthfeel. Not a watery sweet strawberry daiquiri that it smells like. Very drinkable right now, not sure if any will get to age as I only got 6 bottles plus two single serving size bottles.