user 22118
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So, today is your lucky day as I am a winemaker and we happen to make a sparkling wine using the methode champenoise (the ferment in the bottle method, not the carbonate with Co2 in a tank). If you just add sugar to a bottle like you do with beer, you will have very varied results rather than if you follow this guide, where you should get more consistent.
If I may offer you the first piece of advice, if you are going to even try to make it using a fermentation in the bottle, please get some sturdy champagne bottles that have a full punt (the curve at the bottom). They are designed to withstand an outrageous amount of pressure.
My second bit of advice is to not ferment it to the full volume of Co2 that commercial sparkling goes to and you will have a much more successful time and it is relatively simple to do.
That said, here is a very basic outline and if I don't respond to the comments, sorry, but I have kinda dropped off this site a bit.
All of the above is a lot of fun to do if you are into it. It is quite the process to undertake though and when it fails, it stings to the heart. I wouldn't do this on your prize winning wine for the first time, but also you want quality in and quality out, so don't go with some crap either. When you are ready to drink this, remember that the wine has sediment that you will want to disgorge (remove) and if you are planning to drink it Saturday, then throw a bottle upside down into the fridge Monday. The sediment will fall to the cap, where when you open it you need to do it from an upside down at the hip movement. Hard to describe. Here is a video. We actually freeze the neck, but you don't have to in order to drink it right away. Good luck!
***Word to the wise. This process is an exact measurement process. Don't assume you have 5 gallons of wine (which ring is five gallons on your bucket, the top one or the bottom one??) and don't assume a cup of sugar to weigh a certain amount. Use your scale or borrow one from someone. Too much or too little carbonation can be either a major disappointment or an extreme case of bottle bombs. Please measure everything out correctly. :rockin:
PS...I heard that More Beer might be getting into a product called encapsulated yeast (ProElif) that allows people who don't want to make the starter still produce sparkling wine. It is expensive and has a lifespan so I don't know if they are going to carry it or not, but if you want that route then calling them won't hurt you.
If I may offer you the first piece of advice, if you are going to even try to make it using a fermentation in the bottle, please get some sturdy champagne bottles that have a full punt (the curve at the bottom). They are designed to withstand an outrageous amount of pressure.
My second bit of advice is to not ferment it to the full volume of Co2 that commercial sparkling goes to and you will have a much more successful time and it is relatively simple to do.
That said, here is a very basic outline and if I don't respond to the comments, sorry, but I have kinda dropped off this site a bit.
1. Make a CLEAN wine that doesn't have any off smells and tastes really good. If you carbonate it, all of the good and bad are expressed 10 fold. Don't have more than 12% alcohol either or it doesn't work very well. I advise more like 10-11% as the bottle fermentation adds another 1%abv and the pressure in the bottle along with the alcohol just decimates the poor little yeasts. That is a starting brix of roughly 19-21%, depending on yeast choice.
2. When you wine finished fermentation, you will want to clarify it in order to remove as much sediment as possible. Getting it cold really helps this process and when it is cold if you can add about 5grams/5gallons of cream of tarter it will help you drop the tartrates from the wine as well (those are the wine diamonds at the bottle of your wine when you pull it out of the fridge. Harmless but if you care what it looks like then...). Make sure to mix the cream of tartar into a slurry with some of the wine before adding. Keep cold 24hours after the addition of the cream of tarter and then rack off the sediment while as close to 32*f as possible.
3. Your clear and cold stabilized wine is now ready for you to bottle, so time to make up your starter. This process is the real pain in the ass, but you have to do it otherwise you will get irregular carbonation levels in the bottles. Some might carbonate and some might not, so make sure to make the starter correctly to 2%-4% bottling volume (400-750ml for 5gal).
4. Your starter finished and you wine ready, time to bottle! First is to plan ahead and have both the wine and the starter at the same 68*f temp. Then you will shake up your starter flask and add it into your bottling bucket and rack your wine on top. Make up your sugar solution (10-12oz per 5 gals) that you want (I always add equal amounts of sugar and water to a microwave safe bowl and heat to dissolve for consistency in carbonation) and into the bucket as well. Finally add some Diammonium Phosphate in it at a rate of 2lbs/1000gal, which is an inane amount, but remember it matters. It's like a teaspoon or something. Then stirring constantly you will bottle your wine into the champagne bottles. Keep the wine about 70*f for a month and then you have sparkling wine
2. When you wine finished fermentation, you will want to clarify it in order to remove as much sediment as possible. Getting it cold really helps this process and when it is cold if you can add about 5grams/5gallons of cream of tarter it will help you drop the tartrates from the wine as well (those are the wine diamonds at the bottle of your wine when you pull it out of the fridge. Harmless but if you care what it looks like then...). Make sure to mix the cream of tartar into a slurry with some of the wine before adding. Keep cold 24hours after the addition of the cream of tarter and then rack off the sediment while as close to 32*f as possible.
3. Your clear and cold stabilized wine is now ready for you to bottle, so time to make up your starter. This process is the real pain in the ass, but you have to do it otherwise you will get irregular carbonation levels in the bottles. Some might carbonate and some might not, so make sure to make the starter correctly to 2%-4% bottling volume (400-750ml for 5gal).
***You need to decide the final amount of carbonation you would like. Let me put it like this, beer is around 2.5-3.5vols and sparkling wine is closer to 6. That means that if you are adding 6-8oz of sugar for your beer to carbonate you want twice that for sparkling wine. I don't think it is needed to go the full amount, as less is just great when the options are still wine or fizzy wine. Don't go to the full sparkling amount and instead maybe aim for 10-12oz of sugar, which will still be very highly sparkling.***
For a larger volume we do like a six day process, but for this to work out easily for you, you will do a two or three day process with less steps. Step one is to rehydrate your yeast in warm water. Use about 11g of Prise de Mousse wine yeast. It is a beast. Then you want to add a pinch of sugar into it and wait about 15-20mins for it to foam. Then you will take 200mls water and 300mls of wine along with 80 grams (2.8oz) of sugar and mix really well in your flask so the sugar dissolves. When the yeast is ready, add to the sugar/wine/water and give one last healthy shake to aerate. If you have some wine nutrient then I would add a pinch now (you need some nutrient at bottling, so get some now). Keep this at 68* for two days until the yeast has finished the fermentation of this liquid. You want it to be below zero on your hydrometer. 4. Your starter finished and you wine ready, time to bottle! First is to plan ahead and have both the wine and the starter at the same 68*f temp. Then you will shake up your starter flask and add it into your bottling bucket and rack your wine on top. Make up your sugar solution (10-12oz per 5 gals) that you want (I always add equal amounts of sugar and water to a microwave safe bowl and heat to dissolve for consistency in carbonation) and into the bucket as well. Finally add some Diammonium Phosphate in it at a rate of 2lbs/1000gal, which is an inane amount, but remember it matters. It's like a teaspoon or something. Then stirring constantly you will bottle your wine into the champagne bottles. Keep the wine about 70*f for a month and then you have sparkling wine
All of the above is a lot of fun to do if you are into it. It is quite the process to undertake though and when it fails, it stings to the heart. I wouldn't do this on your prize winning wine for the first time, but also you want quality in and quality out, so don't go with some crap either. When you are ready to drink this, remember that the wine has sediment that you will want to disgorge (remove) and if you are planning to drink it Saturday, then throw a bottle upside down into the fridge Monday. The sediment will fall to the cap, where when you open it you need to do it from an upside down at the hip movement. Hard to describe. Here is a video. We actually freeze the neck, but you don't have to in order to drink it right away. Good luck!
***Word to the wise. This process is an exact measurement process. Don't assume you have 5 gallons of wine (which ring is five gallons on your bucket, the top one or the bottom one??) and don't assume a cup of sugar to weigh a certain amount. Use your scale or borrow one from someone. Too much or too little carbonation can be either a major disappointment or an extreme case of bottle bombs. Please measure everything out correctly. :rockin:
PS...I heard that More Beer might be getting into a product called encapsulated yeast (ProElif) that allows people who don't want to make the starter still produce sparkling wine. It is expensive and has a lifespan so I don't know if they are going to carry it or not, but if you want that route then calling them won't hurt you.
