Apple juice AND concentrate

[Downwards]

I love the apple wine. I think it's because it was my first wine that came out well, that I'm particularly attached to it. I also know I love doing it because I buy the cider in gallon jugs and keep the jugs for bulk aging. I've done apple from concentrate, apple (crushed cider) with black currant, and a cyser that I made with the jugged sweet cider.
I think for my next one though, I'm going to do one made with apple cider and then sweetened as must with apple concentrate instead of any sugar. I would guess that any problems I have with this will be with it being too tart. How would I go about correcting this? Is it time to learn about MLF, being that the malic acid is the tartest tasting, or do I simply adjust the acid with some calcium carbonate? Will aging help with this also, maybe I won't need to adjust at all? Is there an acidity or pH I should watch for that is just too much?

Thanks!

 

[seth8530]

I would give MLF a go and use a yeast strain that can handle the acid. Also, make sure to check the TA and PH before and after fermentation.. That way there will be no surprises.

 

[Deezil]

I dont think you'll have too many problems adding concentrate to apple juice to up the sugar.. Maybe the TA/pH, but you'll want to taste it to determine that..

You could calcium carbonate it, just be careful that you dont overdo it.

If you go the MLF-route, realize that its going to change the perception of the wine as it eats away the acidity, shifting the balance of the wine and can hide flavors you wanted to save or create flavors you didnt see coming.

I have an apple-pear wine that i made last fall, it MLF'd itself, I enjoy the outcome myself but if you're attached to a particular batch with a particular taste-profile, just dont want ya to be disappointed if MLF changes it towards something you havent tasted much before

It's hard for me to stay out of that Apple-Pear

 

[Dokki]

I've back-sweetened with Apple Juice concentrate without issue. Didn't MLF either.

http://siponthis.org/prior-vintages/2011-2/2011-apple-wine/
http://siponthis.org/currently-brewing/2012-apple-wine/

 

[vacuumpumpman]

I always added apple juice concentrate - old orchard, and never had a problem yet.

 

[saramc]

I have an apple-pear wine that i made last fall, it MLF'd itself

It's hard for me to stay out of that Apple-Pear

Funny you said that, I have an apple-pear currently going thru a natural MLF. For 11 months I had fabulous, though a bit tart, crystal clear wine, was a month away of final stabilizing and whammo, vigorous ferment noted just two weeks later. After the racking until lees free I had only touched it to dose with k-meta once a quarter, that is all. I was 'omg, it is MLFing itself!!'. Put a big sticker 'do not add sorbate' on the carboy. Looking forward to seeing where this batch ends up, smells great.

 

[Turock]

Some people do an MLF on apple. But another thing you can try is using a malic acid metabolizing culture such as 71B. The malic in apple doesn't seem as harsh to me as it does on pear. But the 71B will make it nice and smooth. Maybe an option to MLF.

I see no problem with sweetening it with a juice or concentrate--just be sure it's 100% apple juice.

 

[Turock]

Hmmm--MLF'ing itself. This almost sounds pornographic.

 

[Arne]

Funny you said that, I have an apple-pear currently going thru a natural MLF. For 11 months I had fabulous, though a bit tart, crystal clear wine, was a month away of final stabilizing and whammo, vigorous ferment noted just two weeks later. After the racking until lees free I had only touched it to dose with k-meta once a quarter, that is all. I was 'omg, it is MLFing itself!!'. Put a big sticker 'do not add sorbate' on the carboy. Looking forward to seeing where this batch ends up, smells great.

Sara, at least yours was still in the carboy. When I had it happen it was already bottled. Was only a gal. but 3 out of the 5 bottles blew their corks. The other two were put in the reefer and opened shortly thereafter. It was a really nice sparkling wine. Didn't make up for the mess of the first three, tho. Anyway, over the years there have been a lot of threads about refermenting in the bottles and apple seems to be the culprit a lot of the time. Arne.

 

[Downwards]

Turock, I have lots of 71B, maybe I'll see how that goes first and then think about mlf after I taste it. Thanks!

Any way to calculate approx how many cans of concentrate would be needed to sweeten up apple cider to about 1.080? I don't mean hard cider here, I mean fresh cider. Not really looking for exact figures, I know they will vary. Just an approximation of how many per gallon so I'll have a ballpark number to buy.. Going to use about 10 gallons of fresh cider and an unknown number of concentrates.

 

[Turock]

Downwards---Oh, I see what you're trying to do now. I thought you were asking about using concentrate to sweeten at BOTTLING.

Well, maybe the thing to ask yourself is how much concentrate you need for upping the FLAVOR--not so much to hit a specific brix for setting alcohol content. I have never set a fermentation in this way, but I guess I would go by tasting the juice. Once you get a couple cans of concentrate in there, then check the SG. If you're happy with the flavor, finish off the SG with sugar to hit your target.

I'd be careful doing this--sometimes you're shocked by how much the SG rises with just a couple cans of concentrate.

 

[Downwards]

Exactly! The flavor is what I'm after here. I like the flavor in commercial hard ciders- very crisp and apple-y. In the wine I've made the apple just isn't there, at least not in the same way. I figure it's because I'm sweetening it with sugar syrup, and not with apple syrup- for lack of a better term.
I want an apple wine that is just blasting with apple flavor.

Side note: I did actually back sweeten my cyser (made from cactus and sage honey and soft cider) with apple concentrate though. I really like that too! Sadly, I used elderflower as an adjunct there and it's a little too strong right now. It it doesn't mellow, I'll make another batch of cyser the same way and add it..

 

[Turock]

OK--here's another idea. Have you ever looked at the Vintner's Harvest, Alexander's Sun Country, etc. for an apple PUREE? I'm not sure if they sell pureed apple.

Last year we bought some peaches from the Amish auction that didn't have real high flavor. So we added a can of peach puree(I think it was Vintner's Harvest) to the primary. Wow--turned out with excellent flavor.

It's not that I'm against 100% apple concentrate--but the puree might be fanastic if you could find it. Might have more flavor.

The other thing about apple is that to bring the flavor out to its best, apple can take a couple years to really come into its own. So making it every year eventually gives you enough to be bottling while more is aging up for you. Several year old apple is really good. Last year we made apple on the fruit--not pressed juice. We wanted to experiment with seeing if all fruit made any difference. We used several varieties of apples. Still too young to evaluate so the jury's still out on that.

What do you think about an f-pack with a high-flavored apple? Maybe Golden Delicious? And don't forget to do a cool ferment on this in order to retain the volatiles. Like 70-72 degrees.

 

[Turock]

And yet another thought---retention of flavor doesn't always happen in the primary. Adding flavor right before bottling really bulks up the taste. Like backsweetening with 100% apple concentrate instead of just plain sugar.

 

[Downwards]

I did go for this one- 5 gallons of cider (came with 5 more gallon carboys for aging in!!) and 5 apple juice concentrates. While I was at the store I couldn't resist adding two bottles of blueberry juice to the cart, and then to the fermenter at home. Still required about 6 cups sugar to get to 1.080. pH was about 3.5, used lalvin kv1116. Started day before yesterday and its already 1.020. Fermenting at 67-71 F.

 

[saramc]

Apple with blueberry sounds delish!, and do not hesitate to consider playing with a touch of vanilla when doing tasting trials. Just a smidgen of a good vanilla extract can make apple shine. Something to think about.

 

[Arne]

Apple with blueberry sounds delish!, and do not hesitate to consider playing with a touch of vanilla when doing tasting trials. Just a smidgen of a good vanilla extract can make apple shine. Something to think about.

Totally agree,Sara. The vanilla really makes the apple pop. Arne.

 

[Downwards]

Sadly, I have a great big bag of vanilla beans that need to go into something, but they won't find their way into this wine. The reason is that I'm using this one to experiment with "oaking" with other fruit woods ( http://www.winemakingtalk.com/forum/f74/other-woods-38436/index2.html#post427912 ) and I am afraid that I will complicate things further if I do the vanilla as well. Guess that just means I'll have to make another batch though, because this really sounds great.

 

[Turock]

Go buy a bottle of vodka and put about 8 vanilla beans in it. If the package is unopened, they'll last. But once it's opened, they can dry out. We bought a package of 25 vanilla beans so once opened, I had to make 2 batches of extreact to preserve them. Extract is so easy to use--can even dose just one glass at a time to see how you like it--then you have all the remaining extract to dose a whole carboy if you like it.

I always have extracts sitting on the kitchen counter.

 

[dralarms]

How long does it take to make the extract?