Choke cherries--2014

Just recieved an email from my oldest daughter. Attached to it was a picture of her freezer with the caption "Is this enough?" 7 Gal. bags of choke cherries. Don't know when I am going to get them, but think in the near future the house is going to smell of fermenting yeast. Guess it is about time, havn't made anything since last winter. Arne.

Sounds like there will be another good wine started in the near future!!

BOB

Mite be ready to taste by fair time, but won't be very good then, Bob. I'll try and save a bottle for you. Sounds like the choke cherries mite be making the trip to here today. Weigh them and get them thawing. Won't be long before they ferment. Arne.

My sister went and checked where we pick choke cherries and they aren't quite ready, but we sure are!!!

40 lbs is a lot of chokecherries. Got em mostly thawed, dosed with k-meta and some water added to em. Pectic enzime within the next hour or so and tonite check the s.g. rest of the ingredients, and pitch the yeast. Next week the house will smell of fermentin yeast. Spose it will call the fruit flys in too. LOL, Arne.

Arne, how is your chokecherry wine proceeding?? is it throwing a lot of sediment? ooohh...interested in an update and what steps you have taken.

i am about to start my batch, after last years first trial run, will use probably a third saskatoons to 2/3rds chokecherries and thinking of using a grape pack or raisins this time.

It is sittin in the carboys, have to rack it off the lees one of these days. Tastes pretty good already and starting to clear. Also made a seconds off this one. Seconds color is almost as dark and almost as flavorful as the first. Sure stretches the fruit out. Arne.

Chokecherry wine: is this ok for a complete novice?

Sorry to hijack this thread but all of you seem to be experienced & local (ish) to me. It has been such a wet year in Jackson (WY) that the chokecherries are everywhere. I have years of experience with jelly/jam/syrup & so forth but now have about 60 lbs of whole cc's in the freezer. So here are my questions:

1) Is this a reasonable project for someone who has never made wine before? By reasonable I mean a 50% chance of getting something drinkable after investing in the equipment. (not a wine snob, btw, but don't like sweets)

2) Is there an equipment list somewhere online that explains which pieces & parts are required & what they're used for? I have looked at various equipment "kits" and what concerns me is that the "basic" kits seem to have cheaper grade components. Your thoughts?

3) What would be the best amount for a novice to work with? 1 gal? 5 gal? I froze the cc's in 3 lb lots after reading that this amt would be good for 1 gal.

4) One thing that has puzzled me a lot is do you have to wait for the full aging time to tell if you're on the right track? Most of the recipes for cc wine say it needs to age in the bottle for 9-12 months. If I'm going to get a failure a year from now, what am I going to do with next year's crop in my freezer?

Wow, this is more than I meant to ask but as I wrote the questions kept popping into my brain. Thanks so much for your attention.

wyogal said:

Sorry to hijack this thread but all of you seem to be experienced & local (ish) to me. It has been such a wet year in Jackson (WY) that the chokecherries are everywhere. I have years of experience with jelly/jam/syrup & so forth but now have about 60 lbs of whole cc's in the freezer. So here are my questions:

1) Is this a reasonable project for someone who has never made wine before? By reasonable I mean a 50% chance of getting something drinkable after investing in the equipment. (not a wine snob, btw, but don't like sweets)

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95% chance of it being drinkable.

Just ferment dry. Easier then trying for a sweet wine anyway!! I never make sweet wines.

wyogal said:

2) Is there an equipment list somewhere online that explains which pieces & parts are required & what they're used for? I have looked at various equipment "kits" and what concerns me is that the "basic" kits seem to have cheaper grade components. Your thoughts?

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Cheep parts are not always bad. Especially to start with. They may just last a few years instead of decades. Not a big problem!
All you need is a food grade bucket, auto syphon, carboy and bung with an airlock. Some sort of sanatizer as well. You can use a hose or racking cane, but an auto syphon is sooo much easier to work with! Worth the extra price.
Wine additives you will need for fruit wines. Peptic enzyme, yeast nutriant, campton tabs or powder, wine yeast. You can get tannins and acid blends as well.
There are "stickies" at the top of this site that help with starting your wine making. There is also a listing, somehere on here, of vendors. They will have the equipment you need and often have info on their sites. I like the free how to info on the eckrouse.com web site. They do not have the best equipment prices, but have a books worth of free info in their questions section of the web site.

wyogal said:

3) What would be the best amount for a novice to work with? 1 gal? 5 gal? I froze the cc's in 3 lb lots after reading that this amt would be good for 1 gal.

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Three galleon size is a good starting place. The fruit will fit in a five gal bucket for fermentation and three gall carboys are easy to handle. Get the betterbottle brand. Glass is heavy! One galleons are good starting batch size. Any batch size will be fine!

wyogal said:

4) One thing that has puzzled me a lot is do you have to wait for the full aging time to tell if you're on the right track? Most of the recipes for cc wine say it needs to age in the bottle for 9-12 months. If I'm going to get a failure a year from now, what am I going to do with next year's crop in my freezer?

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You can drink the wine after a week (after it has been started) if you want. I sample often for "quality controle" the wine will be very drinkable after a month or three. I do not bottle untill I like the wine. After it has been bottled you can let it age or drink. Save a few bottles untill after they are 12-18 months old. Samlpe them to see if you want to wait next time. They may improve, and may not, with age.

wyogal said:

Wow, this is more than I meant to ask but as I wrote the questions kept popping into my brain. Thanks so much for your attention.

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great a reply Julie. My first batch of wine ever was choke cherry, and I loved it...I do have a few bottles left, I am attempting to keep it that one year time! I have 2 more batches of choke cherry going, yep choke cherries around here were great this year....not too many Wyominites that I know of on this forum, welcome, wyogal.

my first batch of wine ever (1 year ago) was chokecherry and saskatoon. between my dad and the helpfullness on this forum my wine has turned out! smooth, clear, 12 percent, but a little bit light on the body. has a beautiful saskatoon aroma! hoping to improve that this go around and upping it to 5 gallons rather than 3. i feel i had not enough fruit in it (used whole saskatoons but the leftover pulp from chokecherry syrup. this time my gallon pail is more than half full of the same - which is probably more than double berry quantity as last time. this should take care of the body, i am assuming.

Thank you Julie--this was exactly the kind of advice I was looking for! Very helpful, practical, encouraging and very insightful also. I had been thinking about the weight of the fluids, but had completely overlooked the weight of the glass! And yet that's just the sort of thing that could be very discouraging.
And thanks for the encouragement FabricTDF. You two are just what I needed to push me into the "yes" column! I don't have a lot of time for forum participation (too many hobbies and a business) but will try to post on my progress. Cheers!

Wyogal,
I used a little over 3 lbs. of berries per gal. of wine. Chokecherries are pretty strong berries so don't seem to need as much fruit as some other berries. Froze the berries, thawed them out, put them in a ferment bag. You can get one at a paint store, they sell them as paint strainer bags. This will make them easier to remove. Added water. I let them thaw, added k-meta, wait 12 hours or so, added pectic enzime. Wait another 12 hours or so, bring the s.g. (specific gravity) up to 1.085 or 1.090 or so with the addition of sugar. Added 1/2 called for nutrient, 1/2 called for energizer, and pitched yeast. I used red star champaine, but there are many others you can use. When ferment gets going good, stir at least once a day. When it fermented down to 1.060 or so, added the other half nutrient and energizer. Warning, it can foam up and over when adding the nutrient and energizer. Add slowly if your primary fermenter is rather small. You mite set the fermenter on a large pan or in a large garbage bag just pulled up a bit around the bottom. If it does go over, this makes the cleanup much easier. I ferment on concrete so it is no big deal, but if you have it over a nice floor, put something under it. Anyway, ferment it down to 1.010 S.G. or so and transfer it to the secondary carboy. Now it can ferment to dry, below 1.000 S.G. and staying the same for at least 3 days running. Next, transfer to another carboy leaving the lees (the junk that has accumulated on the bottom of the carboy.) Now you can give a dose of K-meta (campden tabs). Let it sit and clear or you can use finings on it to help it clear. You can taste it now and it should be tasting like wine. This will be really dry and it mite take a little sugar in the glass to help it along. When it gets totally clear, you can stabalize it if you are going to sweeten it, if not sweetening, you can just add k-meta and bottle. If sweetening, I always let it sit for a couple of weeks after sweetening to make sure it doesn't referment before bottling. I made a seconds wine with mine. When I pulled the fruit out, I transfered to the secondary carboy, added a few cans of frozen white grape juice, left the lees in the primary, put the fruit bag back in, added some water, nutrients and energizer, sugar to 1.085 or so and left it. When ferment restarted, stirred it every day til it got close to dry, put it in carboys and finished like above. Good luck with it, Arne.

Another Wyomite here. Doing chokecherries wine as well. Picked them on Teton Creek at Alta. First time for this fruit hope it turns out well.

You ought to be just fine, Elkdog. Use at least 3 lbs of berries per gallon. Keep the must warm, give it nutrient and energizer, start with half the nutrient andenergizer, add the other half when the specific gravity gets down to 1.060 or so. Start out with your specific gravity around 1.085 to 1.090 or so. Use a wine yeast instead of bread yeast. Bread yeasts work, but the wine yeasts have been designed for winemaking. If you run into any snags or problems, jump on here and ask away. Good luck with it and welcome to the forum. Arne.

Elkdog said:

Another Wyomite here. Doing chokecherries wine as well. Picked them on Teton Creek at Alta. First time for this fruit hope it turns out well.

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Welcome to the forum Elkdog. Isn't Alta almost in Idaho? You should do fine with the choke cherries, they make a great wine.

Arne said:

You ought to be just fine, Elkdog. Use at least 3 lbs of berries per gallon. Keep the must warm, give it nutrient and energizer, start with half the nutrient andenergizer, add the other half when the specific gravity gets down to 1.060 or so. Start out with your specific gravity around 1.085 to 1.090 or so. Use a wine yeast instead of bread yeast. Bread yeasts work, but the wine yeasts have been designed for winemaking. If you run into any snags or problems, jump on here and ask away. Good luck with it and welcome to the forum. Arne.

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I am down to 1027 SG and its bubbling like crazy. What is warm, I have the thermostat set at 70 degrees. Is that warm enough? At what SG do you like to drink it at. It is a beautiful color before stirring.

fabrictodyefor said:

Welcome to the forum Elkdog. Isn't Alta almost in Idaho? You should do fine with the choke cherries, they make a great wine.

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Yes Alta is. In fact you cannot get there from Wyoming, you have to go into Idaho and then back into Wyoming. It is right under the Tetons.

It is fermenting down, sounds like, 70 is just fine. With winter coming, my ferments will probably be done much cooler than that, as long as it is warm enough that they keep fermenting everything works ok. Only thing is, when it is cooler, the ferment slows way down. I am not usually in a hurry, so that is ok with me. Arne.

Thanks Arne & update

Thank you Arne for the wonderful step-by-step narrative. My equipment & supplies arrived Thursday, and so I started right in. 9lbs cc's from the freezer for 3 gal batch, and followed your procedure and sort of averaged out the recipes. My DH is a chemist, so we measured SG before sugar as you suggested, and also pH.

the CC's this year were so sweet you could eat them off the tree. Still very astringent but sweet, so I started with 1/2 lb sugar/1 lb fruit and measured 1.081 sg. I added another 3/4 lb sugar to bring to 1.092. Took your advice on the yeast nutrient and energizer. The astringency is so great that I didn't add any tannin, and the pH measured 3.51 so I didn't add any acid either.

So I am off and running, and couldn't have done it without all of you. Many thanks!