Sunflower Wine - Partial FAIL

So I recently had access to a large quantity of sunflower petals...So my initial thought was can I make wine from these? Of course I could... Found a recipe by Jack Keller and followed it and have been preparing the must over the last several days. All ingredients were added and last night it was time to pitch the yeast using QA23 Lalvin recommended by my local shop. Guess what I forgot to do??? Forgot to take an initial specific gravity prior to adding the yeast. I looked this morning prior to coming to work and it is fermenting. Looking forward to trying this. I know the wine will be "ok" without the starting reading but I hate when I forget things like that. Just a newbie error I guess. Didn't forget on the last two batches...

I would definitely get a reading right now. I don't think it is going to change that much in the first 12 hours.

I won't be home until this evening, probably close to the 12 hour after the yeast was added mark. I'll get one ASAP...

All is not lost. You can determine SG by measurement or by calculation. How much sugar is in the must and what is the volume of your must? The calculations will be approximate but even when you determine the gravity by measurement , IMO, your readings are approximate - temperature and other particulates in the must affect the reading as does your angle of view and the accuracy of the hydrometer. Since sunflowers presumably contain very little to no fermentable sugars in the pertals, all the sugar will be in whatever amount of sugar you added One pound of sugar will raise SG of one gallon of water by approximately 040. How many pounds of sugar? How many gallons of water?

Below is the recipe for 1 gallon, i doubled to make two gallons.

2 qts sunflower petals
1 11-oz can Welch's 100% White Grape Juice frozen concentrate
1 lb 10 ozs granulated sugar
2 lemons (juice and zest)
3 oranges (juice and zest)
1 tsp yeast nutrient
½ tsp pectic enzyme
¼ tsp tannin
6¼ pts water

That should put you around 1.085, you are fine.

Ok, sounds good. Thanks. I will take a reading when I get home just to see what it is.

Checked the specific gravity tonight... 1.110.

Also another newbie question... I have a batch of welches white grape ready for racking. Is it ok to top up with a simple sugar solution boiled or just use regular water? Prob need less than a cup to top up.

Sunflower wine is coming along good. SG reading of.990 last night and I racked off the lees. About a 1 1/2 gallons of wine with some in a regular bottle to spare. What should I do with that small half bottle left over?

, put in a smaller bottle if you can,and put it in the frig, and use it to top off the wine next time you rack it...

Will that small bottle need to stay under airlock in the fridge? I was thinking of saving it for that reason.

So what does sunflower mus taste like, did you taste a petal before you started this or make a tea from it to see what it tastes like? Very nice yellow color you got going. Did you go pick these or were they already dried? WVMJ

Well not really sure what it tastes like for sure. I had about a cup leftover from racking and tried just a little bit tonight. Its pretty hot right now and doesn't taste too good which is expected I guess. Its made very similar to dandelion with lemons, oranges and the petals only and boiling water poured over them. I picked about 16 cups of petals for about 2 gallon. They were fresh petals however I did freeze them for several days until I could get to making the wine. I should be ready a year from now to try.

Medic8106 said:

Will that small bottle need to stay under airlock in the fridge? I was thinking of saving it for that reason.

Click to expand...

You don't need to airlock in the fridge. The cold will keep it from fermenting.

So today i stabilized and backsweetened the sunflower wine some. I will let it go and bottle in a few weeks. I tried it after backsweetening and I'm not too impressed. It still tastes rather hot. Abv is about 14%. Per the recipe it is to be aged after bottling for 1 year before drinking. Anyone have experience with floral wines? Do they get better with age? It is really nice and clear, picture attached.

You guys are just up the road from us in WV. Did you taste any of the flower part of this wine vs the youngness of it? We have done elderflower and dandelion and you could pretty much start drinking them when they were clear but they did get better as they aged. I planted a big patch of sunflowers last year and forgot all about trying to make wine from them. WVMJ

I really couldn't taste any sunflower at all. Maybe it was just me. I have dandelion wine going that i just started this spring also. The sunflower was much easier to pick than the dandelion.

So I had some sunflower wine that I bottled back in July 2014, started it in 10/13. It tastes much better than when bottled and is smooth with light body. I like it, sure resembles dandelion wine. The hotness smoothed out. Used QA23 on this, recipe from Jack Keller.

Pic of the final bottle.