Hey guys,
I am hoping to make a blackberry port and I have a few questions for the knowledgeable community before I attempt it. I am planning on making the port out of Farmer's Pick (by Welch's) Blackberry Juice (100% juice). While it says 100% juice, not all of the juice is blackberry; it also contains grape and pear juice. My wife and I don't mind though, because we really like the taste. Nevertheless, because of this, I am not planning on adding any grape concentrate to add body, like many blackberry wine recipes recommend. I am planning on using an appropriate amount of pectic enzyme, but other than that, I am so far just planning on using the juice and sugar with Lalvin 71B-1122, which has worked well for fruit wines in the past. I am planning on using the traditional fortifying method, waiting until the wine has fermented to 10% and then adding brandy to 20% to stop fermentation. My questions are as follows:
1) Should I use the method I described above or should I just add sugar to enough gravity for 10% and then backsweeten after adding the brandy?
2) If I am interrupting the fermentation at 10%, what alcohol content should I aim for in the recipe? Should I add sugar so that the wine would be 12% or 15% if it were not interrupted? I know that this is largely a matter of how sweet I want the port to be at the end, but any advice as to achieving a traditional port sweetness would be helpful.
3) If I interrupt the fermentation at 10%, does anyone know of a good online calculator to calculate how much 80 proof brandy I would need to add to bring the wine from 10% to 20%? I know that I could do the math and somehow figure this out, but I would trust an online calculator better than my memory of how to dilute an emulsion.
4) Will I need to add acid blend to adjust the ph? I do not have a ph reader, so I don't know the ph of the juice, but many port recipes I read recommended adding acid to help with the high alcohol content.
Answers to any of these questions would be very helpful and thank you in advance!
Many thanks,
M4rotku
I am hoping to make a blackberry port and I have a few questions for the knowledgeable community before I attempt it. I am planning on making the port out of Farmer's Pick (by Welch's) Blackberry Juice (100% juice). While it says 100% juice, not all of the juice is blackberry; it also contains grape and pear juice. My wife and I don't mind though, because we really like the taste. Nevertheless, because of this, I am not planning on adding any grape concentrate to add body, like many blackberry wine recipes recommend. I am planning on using an appropriate amount of pectic enzyme, but other than that, I am so far just planning on using the juice and sugar with Lalvin 71B-1122, which has worked well for fruit wines in the past. I am planning on using the traditional fortifying method, waiting until the wine has fermented to 10% and then adding brandy to 20% to stop fermentation. My questions are as follows:
1) Should I use the method I described above or should I just add sugar to enough gravity for 10% and then backsweeten after adding the brandy?
2) If I am interrupting the fermentation at 10%, what alcohol content should I aim for in the recipe? Should I add sugar so that the wine would be 12% or 15% if it were not interrupted? I know that this is largely a matter of how sweet I want the port to be at the end, but any advice as to achieving a traditional port sweetness would be helpful.
3) If I interrupt the fermentation at 10%, does anyone know of a good online calculator to calculate how much 80 proof brandy I would need to add to bring the wine from 10% to 20%? I know that I could do the math and somehow figure this out, but I would trust an online calculator better than my memory of how to dilute an emulsion.
4) Will I need to add acid blend to adjust the ph? I do not have a ph reader, so I don't know the ph of the juice, but many port recipes I read recommended adding acid to help with the high alcohol content.
Answers to any of these questions would be very helpful and thank you in advance!
Many thanks,
M4rotku