Raspberry Port?

Winemaking Talk - Winemaking Forum

Help Support Winemaking Talk - Winemaking Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

cfmiller

Member
Joined
Nov 8, 2011
Messages
37
Reaction score
1
Would like to make this. I have the Vitner's Harvest can. I plan on only making 3 gallons just like my research here said to so. However, I do have a few questions that I have been unable to reliably answer by sifting through the old threads.

The recipe on the back calls for 7 pounds of sugar. Threads indicate VH says to use more than needed, but not sure if this is the case with the raspberry. Should I just put it all in since I plan on making a port, or use the hydrometer to get to the recommended SG?

Rather than try to arrest the fermemtation a la traditional port, I am simply going to ferment dry and back sweeten and add brandy. Is there a specific amount of brandy per gallon I should use? Also, should I hold back some of the juice and freeze to backsweeten or just make an f pack?

In the alternative, if someone has a recipe for port using VH, I would appreciate that.

Thanks so much for the time
 
cfmiller said:
Would like to make this. I have the Vitner's Harvest can. I plan on only making 3 gallons just like my research here said to so. However, I do have a few questions that I have been unable to reliably answer by sifting through the old threads.

The recipe on the back calls for 7 pounds of sugar. Threads indicate VH says to use more than needed, but not sure if this is the case with the raspberry. Should I just put it all in since I plan on making a port, or use the hydrometer to get to the recommended SG?

Rather than try to arrest the fermemtation a la traditional port, I am simply going to ferment dry and back sweeten and add brandy. Is there a specific amount of brandy per gallon I should use? Also, should I hold back some of the juice and freeze to backsweeten or just make an f pack?

In the alternative, if someone has a recipe for port using VH, I would appreciate that.

Thanks so much for the time

I did a blueberry by adding sugar until the yeast stalled out. (Lalvin EC-1118) backsweetened with juice. For my port, I did not fortify, I liked the taste as it was.

Start you must with an SG of 1.095. After it drops to 1.050, add more sugar to get it back to 1.095.
 
As far as how much brandy to add, it really depends on the ACV of your finished wine and what you want the port ACV to be. You can use Pearson's Square to determine how much brandy to add. You do need to consider that you may end up diluting the flavor of the wine if you have to add a large amount of brandy to reach your new ACV. Some people fortify with a high proof pure grain or a combo of pure grain/brandy. I like to use E&J VSOP for the brandy. I actually went to liquor store and bought one 50ml bottle of every brandy they had and had a tasting session to figure out what brandy I preferred.

I agree 100% that if you need a high gravity must to avoid stressing the yeast you will want to start at perhaps 1.090-1.095 and when gravity has dropped by 1/3 then you add a portion of the remaining sugar, repeating this step feeding until your target OG is reached.

What yeast do you plan on using?
 
Last edited:
To avoid diluting the wine, when fortifying I normally use high proof neutral spirits. When I start the wine I also start the spirits by flavoring with the same fruit I am using in the wine. I let the fruit macerate in the spirits to add the same flavor as the wine will have. You can also add sugar to the spirits for back sweetening. Basically you are making a high proof liqueur.
 
The yeast should have the highest possible alcohol tolerance so that less fortifying spirits are needed. I agree with the previous post on adding sugar until the yeast quits.
 
I was planning on using Lavin 1122. Good idea?

That has only a 14% alcohol tolerance. When you say you want to make a port-style wine, what final ACV are you looking at, because port to me ranges from 19%-23%?

If using the VH wine base I would use one can for 3 gallon batch, but I would also buy one can of raspberry puree. Plus, adding 7# sugar in a 3gal batch will give you a SG of about 1.110 just from that sugar, way too high considering the fruit is not yet accounted for. If it were me, I would add the fruit and top up to 2 gallons, then check SG to figure out how much simple syrup to add to reach your beginning target. But if you can give us an idea of what ACV you want your wine to be vs ACV of finished port, we can help with the SG issues. You may find you want to keep some of the unfortifed wine, I always do.
 
Last edited:
I would like around 18-20 ABV. Thanks for the all the help, this is quite an education.
 
I made a 15% ABV raspberry port-style wine, in 2011

Because i used so many berries (12lbs/gallon), i didnt worry much about the body of the wine, although in hindsight, it couldnt have hurt in a port -a couple bananas, maybe some white grape juice or concentrate, or even some golden raisins.

If you want 18-20% ABV in the finished product, you'll want to ferment out atleast 16% or it'll take a lot of brandy (depending on the size of the batch) to bring that ABV up to where you want it..

Pearson's Square (theres a write-up in the tutorial section) will help you figure out, based on the ABV & volume of the batch of wine and ABV of the brandy you'll use, just how much brandy it'll take

I can see why you'd want to use 1122 with raspberries, and sara was right in that it generally only makes it to about 14% ABV ... I dont really know how long you've been doing this and how comfortable you are using different yeasts because a few can be finicky - for that reason, i'd probably recommend 1116 (18%) because it acts a lot like 1118 can, just without the H2S being as big of an issue...

If you've gotten your feet wet quite a bit, you could venture into some of the red wine yeasts - D80 or D21 (both 16% ABV tolerant) could be nice with this, if you can manage their nutrient needs

I do have to disagree with paubin, to an extent - although i think it just comes down to philsophy, as to why we do things different - i dont see port as being just a "high proof liqueur" - if that was the aim, i'd add a splash of raspberry juice to a fifth of vodka and call it a day..

To me, port is multi-faceted like that of a musical orchestra... Now theres nothing wrong with that solo jazz musician pouring his soul out through the saxophone (raspberry + neutral spirit & raspberry) and while it can touch you in a way, it lacks the magnificence of a world class orchestra with each section working in harmony.. Brandy helps bring a few of those facets with the characters carried over from the original grapes, mixed in with the woods during aging, and the marrying those compounds will do with the raspberries, in time.. It's hard for me to call it "dillution", knowing that those facets are actually being added

Paubin did have a good tip about soaking the fruit in whatever spirit you choose, as it will help introduce more of the original fruit flavor (not changed thru fermentation) back into the wine, adding to the layers

Lol, have i rambled enough?.. I have a thing for ports :D
 
Thanks so much for all your help. I really appreciate it. Glad to have this forum to go to whenever I run into a problem. If I can't find the answer via search, I can always have the answer in the next couple of hours.
 
ONe thing on step feeding, its better to let the yeast get down to a much lower level like 1.01 and then raise it just to 1.02, repeat as often as the yeast will eat the sugar. If you dont let it drop enough and add to much sugar at once you can stall the fermentation, better to let it go down little steps.

Some oak wont hurt, a few dried elderberries to boost the color and tannins, even a bottle of black cherry concentrate to backsweeten will add some complexity to your port.

WVMJ
 
Deezil, When I mentioned "high proof liqueur", I was referring to the fortifying alcohol. I guess I didn't make it clear in my own ramblings...;) I would never call a port or a sherry anything but what there are. One of the finest beverages known to man !
 
Last edited:
I made a chocolate rasberry wine that I back sweetened. I added the brandy that was called for. I have it sitting in a fermenter, for a few days jelling together before I bottle. I tasted it tonight and it seems a bit medicine after taste. On the front it is clearly rasberry w/ slight hint of chocolate.

Any suggestions on getting that medicine taste out? Would time cause it to mellow out? Or should I add more sugar/juice?
 
Be sure you are looking at the 3 gallon recipe not the 5 gallon one. And in reality the sugar quantity on the can or any recipe is not applicable for your goal. The staged sugar additions or addition of brandy or spirits later mean you should also consider that in your starting volume. The VH wine bases are excellent for 3 gallons so if you start with 3 gallons and add brandy other spirits in a quantity of say a quart or more, you will actually be diluting your wine and losing flavor.

There are several high alcohol tolerant yeasts out there so using the info gleaned from the previous posts, I would consider the 2 schools of thought provided to you 1) Flavor First or 2) ABV first and then determine your yeast based on that and the attributes of the yeasts available.

I think the flavor first line is a solid one, you can always boost the ABV later but you cannot recover lost flavors.
 
Last edited:

Latest posts

Back
Top