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Greeting all

It is my first time making a wine so I put the grape without washing them in order to use its natural yeast and smash and crush it then for 4 days just mixing it. fermentation went so well then I put the airlock . everything washed and purely cleaned but after 40 days I was some white grayish color things on top of it. surely no air went in and it was totally clean but I know I left too much space left . So my question is can I drink it or it is dangrouse? I botteled it today . I put lots of effort but my health and my familys health is more important and I dont care if I have to dump it. . Kindly advise me what to do? I smell it and I can smell alchohol and taste is a bit sour. I appreciate any help. Regards

I'm very new to this. I made a gallon batch with apple juice and it went fine. I made a gallon batch with 3lbs. of gala apples and after a month it tastes very sour, but not the good kind of sour. It went through the normal cycle of bubbling, so I'm not sure what happened.

I didn't add enough sugar at the start, so after two weeks I added another 3 cups. Nothing really changed after another two weeks. Even with the extra sugar, there's no sweetness. I wouldn't want to drink it, but I don't know if it can be saved.

Berrymix wine with strawberries, raspberries, red and black currants i used about 6kgs of berries i added a couple kilos of sugar dont remember how much but I let it fermented to 11-12% abv

SOLVED: It was almost definitely a pH issue. After I added 2 grams of baking soda it started fermenting like crazy. Definitely be a lot more conservative about adding lemon juice or just don't add any lemon juice at all. I don't know why almost all raisin wine recipes call for lemon juice.

Hello, this is my first post on this sub. I've posted this earlier to r/homebrewing but apparently some people either don't want me or this raisin wine "abomination" existing.

I've made a 100% raisin wine with no sugar additions and this is my first time trying to make it. The recipe is as follows:

1,5 kgs (3,30 lbs) of raisins

1 tsp yeast nutrient

1 whole lemon's juice

1/4 tsp white wine yeast

Topped up with water to around 4 liters (1.05 gal.) (couldn't calculate the exact amount because of the water that the raisins sucked up)

I bought 1,5 kilograms (3,30 pounds) of raisins, washed them with half and half boiling and room temperature water for a few minutes and after that with a liter of water with 50mls of white vinegar (to remove the vegetable oil coating)

Then I rinsed them a few more times with clean water and rested, covered in water for 24 hours.

Then I crushed them with a potato masher (and my hand when needed), put them in the fermenter and topped off the liquid to around 4 liters (1.05 gallons). Then I added 1 teaspoon of yeast nutrient, added 1/4th of a teaspoon of white wine yeast and squeezed a whole lemon and put the juice inside.

The gravity when I pitched the yeast was 1.094, but when I checked this morning (48 hours in the fermenter) it was up to 1.102, still no yeast smell, no bubbles, no carbonation. Thinking that the must might be too thick, I've added around 600ml (20 floz) of clean water and the gravity came down to 1.080. Maybe the case will solve itself but I am not sure.

I didn't want to make the post too long but one thing I'm suspicious about is SO2 in the raisins, as the website of the store I bought the raisins from says that they contain SO2 as a "whitening/bleaching" agent.

I took a sample from the fermenter before watering it down and put sugar into it to see if the yeast still works, I will update the post when I have definitive results. Also the fermentation temperature seems to be around 22.8 Celcius degrees. Unfortunately I don't have any tools or equipment to check the pH of the must.

I'm open to any ideas about what the reason could be. Thanks to everyone in advance.

So I’ve already bottled the batch and it’s aged 4 months. I opened a bottle and I just seemed very thin, watered down almost. Is there anything I can do to fix or save the batch? It’s a Cherry, raspberry, and blackberry mix.

Any help is appreciated!

I have been making wine at home for more than 30 years and consistently have this issue. I get a few done well and most look sort of jacked up. I never have seepage or leakage issues, so this is really an aesthetic thing. My corker is a two-handle hand-operated one. I suspect that the part that grips the bottle neck simply slips, so the cork doesn’t go as deep as I’d like.

Do I just need to stop being a cheapskate and get a floor corker?

I'm wanting to make my first batch of Dragon's blood using danger Dave's recipe. The recipe calls for a blueberry, raspberry, blackberry mix but I see some people use a mix with strawberries instead of the blackberries and some use a mix with all four. What's everyone's opinion on the three variations? For those of you whose made all 3 types, Which tastes best?

This is mostly a joke and I don’t expect anyone to solve this for me, but how would one scale up sugar syrup if one did serial dilution kinda thing to decide on backsweetening? (Yes I know I should I have done it with brix but humor me here):

Start with 100g unsweetened wine Add 4g sugar syrup, taste To remaining 86g sweetened wine, add 2 g syrup, taste To remaining 70 g sweetened wine, add 2 g, taste.

At this point we decided we liked the taste but are too drunk to math our way back out 😅😅

Source: https://winemaps.com

7 days in black grapes, tried to experiment with a small batch since I'm new to this. Smell is of strong wine, slightly acidic. It's like a fine layer.

I see many people on here and youtube speaking of alternative wood chips such as maple, cherry, etc

Where are these options coming from? I struggle to find anything other than French oak or American oak listed as for wine making. Or are people using chips listed as for smoking meats? Are these chips safe for using in wine and mead making?

Data is from the UN, latest is 2022. I may do an EU dataset later!

I’m making some Riesling out of juice, and moved it outside to cold stabilize (it’s finally cold enough outside in my sunroom). The issue is, the temps are going to be below freezing at night. I know that the water in my airlock will freeze. Should I replace that with vodka so it doesn’t?

Somewhere in the past month I've lost my browser history about a technique I saw - I think French - for doing multiple harvests and pressings over a short period of time during ripening of the same grape/vineyard, and combining them together. Does anybody know what that's called?

First wine kit in a long time-Vineco Merlot kit with grape skins.

Wine has been in primary for about a week.

Ended up going out of town for thanksgiving and won’t be able to punch the cap for about half of the time in primary (about 5 days).

What are the odds this really affects the end product?

It's my first time making wine at home.

I thought the grape skins were ready to be removed so even though it was only 8 days since I made the solution, I removed it already. And then, I saw online that the grapes skins are removed on the 10th day.

What should I do? Is what I did still okay?

I got my hands on this Vintage Vidrios San Miguel Wine carboy but I can’t seem to find a cork and fermenter that fits. Any ideas on where I can find one big enough? Thank you

I added 1.5 campden tabs to the must (about 2 gallon) and can't get yeast to start. What should I do? I have trying starting yeast twice now. It's been about 2 days.

I've got roughly 90 to 100 bottles worth of wine and mead in primary for my son's wedding. It will rack into secondary in another week or two before a few months bulk aging. My concern is bottle storage until the wedding. My 144 bottle rack in my cellar is full, and not sure I have room for another in an area that is consistently dark. Would there be a significant issue storing the bottles in their cases stacked upright for a year or so? I'd considered storing the cases on their sides but I'm worried they may collapse and I'd lose everything. If like to hear I'm just over thinking, but not sure. The bottles will be corked and tops either shrink wrapped or wax dipped if that makes a difference.

I make over 60 gallons per year which gets split into two 30 gal barrels. I tasted both last night from 2023 vintage and on is fine and one is oxidized. While I am not sure what happened, i may try to cut it into other wine, but for now my question is whether I can get that oxidized taste out of the barrel so I can use it for next year.

My barrels are neutral and I add oak spirals, and from time to time I do sulfite water soak cycles to draw out any old flavors and it works well, but never had 30 gallons of oxidized wine in them.

On a scale of 1-10 the oxidation is probably a 4. Noticeable, but not horrible. Which is why I may cut it.

I have 2 large bags of cut up persimmon's in the freezer from my own trees just waiting to ferment and I wanted some advice.

This is my first year making home wine and I started in summer with ~20 gallons of plum wine (purple and yellow). All of this wine turned out perfectly however I bubbled all of it. Half went into bottles with tablets (which are all still aging) and the other half I put in a pony keg for my kegerator so it was cold and Co2.

I then produced about 40 gallons of different pear ciders from 2 Asian pear varieties that I have on my property. I put about 10 total gallons in bottles and the rest of the 30 gallons in Pony Kegs that are currently aging. Unfortunately, I barely got any apples on my 4 trees for this year so no apple cider.

So...

On to my persimmon's that I want to start on Wednesday, probably 2 x 7 gallons each. In this case, I'm not using my grinder and press, I just cut them up and put them in a good straining bag. I have everything ready, including the yeast. Ill probably use about 12-14 pounds of sugar in each.

When done fermenting, what's the best thing to do with Persimmon? Should I serve it cold or at room temp? Should I not Co2 in bottles or kegs?