Raspberry wine going wild

[podz]

I'm making a batch of raspberry wine and it's been fermenting very hard for 7 days solid now, showing no signs of slowing down. I'm doing primary in my 20 liter carboy since that's all I have.

I cooked 5.3 kg of frozen raspberries, added in 3.5 kg of sugar, 400 grams of raisins, wine yeast and nutrient and topped up with water. S-lock is still bubbling faster than once per second. Lees are being totally upheaved into a blizzard of seeds once every 3 or 4 minutes, round the clock. Really thick cap of yeast and raisins floating up top.

I've got a secondary vessel now. How long should I continue to wait before racking to secondary? I mean, how long can this really violent fermentation continue?

 

[DoctorCAD]

Are you punching the cap down several times a day?

Oh, and no need to cook the berries, you may have set the peptins (I think that's the term?) so that it may not clear now.

Secondary when below 1.010.

 

[podz]

Are you punching the cap down several times a day?

Oh, and no need to cook the berries, you may have set the peptins (I think that's the term?) so that it may not clear now.

Secondary when below 1.010.

I'm stirring the carboy until the cap is completely dissolved, once or twice a day. It reforms itself in a few minutes.

Only point to cooking those berries a bit is that they wouldn't otherwise go down my funnel ;-) I don't care too much if it clears or not. This batch is for midsummer's eve and it's meant to be entirely drank then. I plan to stop fermentation about 4 days prior, and put in clearing agent about 3 days prior.

I had a sample earlier when stirring. It tastes berry, berry good and already with I estimate around 13% ABV. At this point, it's almost like Fresita (a strawberry sparking wine that's sold in Europe).

I couldn't get an initial gravity reading at all because the must was so thick, honestly. Tested yesterday at about 1.080. I'm guessing this is going to be hitting about 18% ABV within the next week.

 

[saramc]

You could definitely rack around 1.010, but I would be more concerned about leaving the raspberries/seeds for too long. They will start turning white, void of color, when they are ready to be removed. You should be quite close at 7 days.
What size batch, what type of yeast?

Exactly how do you plan to stop the ferment?

 

[podz]

Are you punching the cap down several times a day?

Oh, and no need to cook the berries, you may have set the peptins (I think that's the term?) so that it may not clear now.

Secondary when below 1.010.

You could definitely rack around 1.010, but I would be more concerned about leaving the raspberries/seeds for too long. They will start turning white, void of color, when they are ready to be removed. You should be quite close at 7 days.
What size batch, what type of yeast?

Exactly how do you plan to stop the ferment?

I just stirred and tested, tastes really good and at 1.010 now. Yes, the seeds are white and devoid of colour now. The batch is 20 liters. The yeast, I got in a wine kit that had 6 packages of powders and liquids that cost about 5 bucks - it didn't specify anything except "wine yeast", and said that it is supposed to be super fast and capable of hitting 18% ABV. One would imagine some poor quality yeast in a kit like that, but the aroma is actually very good. There is also a package of powder in that box that is capable of stopping fermentation - some sort of yeast killer, I suppose.

This is my first batch of wine, but certainly won't be my last. I am really quite happy with the way it's going so far.

 

[podz]

Oh, and no need to cook the berries, you may have set the peptins (I think that's the term?) so that it may not clear now.

Seems that despite my mistake of cooking the berries, it will be clear anyway.

I started this wine two weeks ago tomorrow. I racked off the fruit and added half a kilo of sugar on day 8 to bump up the alcohol even further and it's down to 994 again.

This carboy has been in my sauna, which is not heated, and the temperature had been steady at about 20c. Since the heatwave here in Finland has ended two days ago, temps in the sauna have dropped to about 15c. All the yeast dropped and compacted pretty tightly, and the wine became bright and looks relatively clear to me. Not cloudy at all.

Taste is nice, too - better than most commercial rose that I've had. My only regret is that I used too few raspberries. I used 5.3kg (frozen). Next time, I will use 7.5kg.

 

[saramc]

Just so you know, that is not 'yeast killer' (pasteurization or alcohol toxicity are the only yeast killers) but is likely potassium sorbate which can be used in combination with k-meta to stabilize a must which is at its final gravity (and clear, no longer dropping sediment, ie 6 months down the road) in order to prepare to backsweeten it. The k-meta acts as antioxidant/antibacterial while the sorbate creates an environment in which any remaining live yeast cannot multiply.

 

[podz]

Just so you know, that is not 'yeast killer' (pasteurization or alcohol toxicity are the only yeast killers) but is likely potassium sorbate which can be used in combination with k-meta to stabilize a must which is at its final gravity (and clear, no longer dropping sediment, ie 6 months down the road) in order to prepare to backsweeten it. The k-meta acts as antioxidant/antibacterial while the sorbate creates an environment in which any remaining live yeast cannot multiply.

Thanks for that explanation, saramc. I'm starting to get a better understanding of the processes involved. Still a newbie, but learning.

Bubbles had slowed to about once every 7 seconds and reading was at 994. There was about 5-6 cm of yeast at the bottom of the carboy, so I decided to rack again. At the same time, filled up a 1.5 liter wine bottle and my decanter for some enjoyment. End result, I had to add 4 litres of apple juice to my carboy to top it up again. Fermentation picked back up to a few bubbles per second after about 12 hours, but I don't see any yeast at the bottom of the carboy or anywhere else.

So, now it seems I will have a mix of raspberry / apple wine.

I understand the reasons why wine is aged, but that was never my intention with this wine. It was made for drinking, entirely, very soon after it is finished. My wife and I already drank that which I had extracted and we both loved it. To put things into perspective, she is middle aged and I am stone aged ;-) and we regularly drink Valpolicella and Ripasso. And we still thought that our own raspberry wine was really good. As did a few of our guests.

 

[podz]

Taste is nice, too - better than most commercial rose that I've had. My only regret is that I used too few raspberries. I used 5.3kg (frozen). Next time, I will use 7.5kg.

Time to make raspberry wine again. This time I got 7.5kg of raspberries, currently thawing in my sauna. Also, now I have a fermenter bucket and mesh bag, so no need trying to cram raspberries into a carboy.

I learned a lot from this first wine. Mostly what a massive pain in the butt and huge amount of work it is to try to do primary in a small mouthed container when working with fruit.

The other thing I learned is that the american style carboys are very poorly shaped for winemaking. This time, I have a proper demijohn in which to do my secondary. I don't use my carboy for anything except cider now, and that's only if my other fermenters are already full.

 

[shhh]

Good luck Podz, the second time around on a recipe is always easier and in my opinion come out better.
Let us know some things you did the same and other that you did different.

I'll be starting a Raspberry wine as soon as my Strawberry Blueberry goes to secondary.

 

[podz]

I used the same frozen raspberries and the same 5-packet wine fermentation kit. Everything else was done differently, now that I actually have some equipment to work with.

This time I used a large mesh bag to put the fruit in. Trying to rack off from a million raspberry seeds is definitely not my idea of having fun.

Not using my brain, I forgot to count for displacement by 6kg of sugar and ended up near the 28 litre mark on my fermenter. I'm guessing that I will be able to rack 23-24 litres by the time I pull out the bag, what with also leaving the lees behind. I thought about just adding another 2.5kg of raspberries, but now it won't fit in my fermenter...

 

[podz]

Hit 0.996 in 8 days flat, that was fast. Room temperature has been 18-20 celsius.