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I generally prefer higher end, full bodied red kits (WE Lodi Ranch Cab, MM Amarone), but I still find them to be a bit thin for my taste. I was going to buy grape packs to add some more body and ABV% to them, and had an idea: Would it work/be worthwhile to get a kit or two of Paklab, and use...

I started one in late September - as of bottling 2 weeks ago it was really good. I added a pound of raisins to the fermentation, which definitely helped. Unfortunately, at 1.5 months (after using all the oak), I decided that it needed more oak, and definitely over oaked it. It's still very...

Is it worth adding these to higher end kits that already have a grape pack, or is that excessive? Starting a cc malbec and mosti RI amarone shortly.

If you don't like really sweet wines, you'll probably want to add some of the f pack before fermentation. I never liked really sweet wines; I found that 3.5 lbs of sugar and 40% of the F-pack in the primary worked really well. Caveat - I found that, at that abv level, mine took 3 months or so...

Yea, a glass a day - great. A bottle a day - less so. But it's so good!

Those primaries look good - definitely what I'd expect. I really need to make myself a batch of dragon's blood to try. I was looking for a cheap, fast option to refill my racks while stuff ages; maybe I"ll start one this weekend. I see a major flaw with your setup. You have far too many...

I was more using the liver damage as an excuse for a challenge - how good of a red grape wine can I make at that alcohol level (and is it even possible)?

Similar to what others said, stretching out the time is always a good thing, and the differences between the methods are minor. The kit instructions are invariably too short. My only qualm with Keller's method is how he doesn't use a primary bucket (IIRC). I feel weird having my wine sit on...

Few drinks can compare to a big, bold, 14% cabernet, or a 15% abv amarone. Unfortunately, if you like to drink like I do, and love the taste of those wines, you could be 10-20 years away from your liver taking a permanent vacation. It's a crap shoot, and you could get lucky, could get unlucky...

I do the small bottle thing too, works great for the secondary. That room looks bright. Are you covering your carboy? Light kills wine.

Bit of a late response on the water - but home filters do a good job of taking minerals and chlorine out of the water cheaply and conveniently. Think Brita or Pur attached right to the faucet.

I agree with grapeman, you should be fine. Are you sure it's 1.5 inches? Typically the lees stick to any sloped part of a carboy, and especially with a red that's mostly opaque, it can be nearly impossible to differentiate between 1 mm and 1.5 in in a carboy. The only way to really know before...

You're fine. Anything but a kit, you would have probably k-meta'd first, them let sit for a day or two before fermentation, so your start is pretty typical (just not necessary for sterile kits). As for the sprinkling vs mixing yeast - I don't think it makes much of a difference. It's probably to...

I also suspect that, each time he took a sample, there was some semi-forceful backflow of room air into the carboy to replace the vacuum. Not a problem in practice, but in the experiment it was repeated many times. Also, he added more wine to top off each time - that wine may have been left open...

With how shallow the wine is, I would suspect that much of that foam is due to the agitated wine trapping the air above it, which definitely leaves me concerned about introducing oxygen.

Nope. The first thing the yeast does when you put it in the wine is to use up all the oxygen, and reproduce. You'll quickly have many more times as much yeast as you put in, and they'll have no trouble handling that amount of yeast.

What do you do with all that wine? On the plus side, aging the higher end ones must be easy - not much demand to drink it.

Bumping instead of starting a new thread: Those Fior D'uva grape packs look like a great way to add body; I'm getting consistently frustrated by the lack of body in kit reds. 2 questions for their use though: How would you choose the type of kit to buy, if you're not making those types. I...

How strong are you? I have great luck hooking up the vacu vin to an airlock (just the bottom part of the 3-piece - I cut off a lot of the outer cup), and shaking the carboy (most probably aren't strong enough), or 'rolling' it around its base, without letting wine get to the bung...

Don't know this particular kit, but I did an island mist pomegranate zin recently. At the store, they recommended adding 5 pounds of sugar. I added 3, and about half the F pack in the primary. At 1 month, it was very hot (alcohol taste) and not very good, but at 2 months it's delicious (and I...