WineXpert Chocolate Raspberry Port!
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Tim Vandergrift
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Joan,
I just got a note from Linda telling me that they hadn't seen your email from October 12th,so I thought I'd hop over here and see if I could help.
Keys to getting a port kit to ferment down all the way are 1) Temperature and 2) stirring.
While the instructions say '65-75F', we have to put that big a spread in to cover off everyone's situation. If we make the spec tighter, we get an awful lot of calls about people who just can't keep their house or even their fermentation area at a more specific temperature.
But the fact of the matter is, if you ensure that the port kit is 75F or even slightly warmer (not as high as 80, though) before you pitch the yeast to it, it will have a much more vigorous start than a kit pitched any cooler, and the vigour of a fermentation at the start is a very good indicator of the thoroughness it will display at the end.
For some folks this means putting the kit on a heat register, wrapping a brew-belt around the box before use, or even immersing the bag in a sink of hot water. However you manage it, it makes a big difference.
Stirring is another key. Yeast has a multi-stage life cycle. The growth, or anabolic phase relies on each individual yeast cell making enough fatty acid esters to bud off daughter cells. They can do this through one of two paths. First, they can use YAN (yeast available nitrogen) to sythesize FAE's and we boost the nutrient levels of YAN as much as we can without altering the flavour profile of the kits (nitrogen tastes bitter-salty).
Second, they can uptake oxygen to make it through another chemical path. If you stir you kit very, very hard--hard enough to whip air into it and oxygenate it--the incorporated air will boost yeast anabolism and speed fermentation towards completion.
That's all well and good for the future, but if you're stuck now, you have bunch of options. First, get your temperature up to 75F. In your post you mention having the belt on, but double-check the actual temperature. Most heat belts will drive a 6-US gallon carboy to 72F, but some are not as hot as others . . .
Second, give the port a very hard stir with a drill-mounted whip. Bring all of the yeast up off of the bottom and stir hard enough to get some air into it. Don't be shy, punish it, and keep it coming for at least two minutes.
Take a gravity reading after warming/stirring, and another one three days later. This should do the job, but if it doesn't you still have options. A starter won't work, because the alcohol content is far too high--any starter you try will simply die when you toss it in. Much better is to take another wine (a 6-gallon kit, any kind, as long as it doesn't have oak or elderflowers in it, and it uses the same kind of yeast that was in the port), get it going at 75F and lots of stirring, and when you rack it on day 5-7 from the primary, leave the yeast behind, and rack your port on top of the yeast bed.
The yeast will be fully conditioned to alcohol, and very hungry. That should knock it down within a few days, as long as it's all warm and gets a good stir.
If you have any questions, go ahead and shoot them through to tim (at) winexpert (dot) com, and we'll be happy to sort them out. The Cocolate Raspberry Port is a fabulous kit, and it gets even better with age. I know you'll enjoy it.
I just got a note from Linda telling me that they hadn't seen your email from October 12th,so I thought I'd hop over here and see if I could help.
Keys to getting a port kit to ferment down all the way are 1) Temperature and 2) stirring.
While the instructions say '65-75F', we have to put that big a spread in to cover off everyone's situation. If we make the spec tighter, we get an awful lot of calls about people who just can't keep their house or even their fermentation area at a more specific temperature.
But the fact of the matter is, if you ensure that the port kit is 75F or even slightly warmer (not as high as 80, though) before you pitch the yeast to it, it will have a much more vigorous start than a kit pitched any cooler, and the vigour of a fermentation at the start is a very good indicator of the thoroughness it will display at the end.
For some folks this means putting the kit on a heat register, wrapping a brew-belt around the box before use, or even immersing the bag in a sink of hot water. However you manage it, it makes a big difference.
Stirring is another key. Yeast has a multi-stage life cycle. The growth, or anabolic phase relies on each individual yeast cell making enough fatty acid esters to bud off daughter cells. They can do this through one of two paths. First, they can use YAN (yeast available nitrogen) to sythesize FAE's and we boost the nutrient levels of YAN as much as we can without altering the flavour profile of the kits (nitrogen tastes bitter-salty).
Second, they can uptake oxygen to make it through another chemical path. If you stir you kit very, very hard--hard enough to whip air into it and oxygenate it--the incorporated air will boost yeast anabolism and speed fermentation towards completion.
That's all well and good for the future, but if you're stuck now, you have bunch of options. First, get your temperature up to 75F. In your post you mention having the belt on, but double-check the actual temperature. Most heat belts will drive a 6-US gallon carboy to 72F, but some are not as hot as others . . .
Second, give the port a very hard stir with a drill-mounted whip. Bring all of the yeast up off of the bottom and stir hard enough to get some air into it. Don't be shy, punish it, and keep it coming for at least two minutes.
Take a gravity reading after warming/stirring, and another one three days later. This should do the job, but if it doesn't you still have options. A starter won't work, because the alcohol content is far too high--any starter you try will simply die when you toss it in. Much better is to take another wine (a 6-gallon kit, any kind, as long as it doesn't have oak or elderflowers in it, and it uses the same kind of yeast that was in the port), get it going at 75F and lots of stirring, and when you rack it on day 5-7 from the primary, leave the yeast behind, and rack your port on top of the yeast bed.
The yeast will be fully conditioned to alcohol, and very hungry. That should knock it down within a few days, as long as it's all warm and gets a good stir.
If you have any questions, go ahead and shoot them through to tim (at) winexpert (dot) com, and we'll be happy to sort them out. The Cocolate Raspberry Port is a fabulous kit, and it gets even better with age. I know you'll enjoy it.
Tim Vandergrift
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I am on many wine forums and see this problem with this kit many many
times and havent seen a cure for this.
</td></tr></t></table>Wade
Winexpert is one of the most responsive kit companies in the industry. I'm not sure which forums you have visited, but we support Winepress.us, and this question has come up and been answered on a regular basis, both by myself as a moderator on that forum, and by others who have benefited from the advice available there.
We'll keep on doing our best to give people answers as quickly as we can, and as usual, we stand behind the kits we make.
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I am on many wine forums and see this problem with this kit many many
times and havent seen a cure for this.
</td></tr></t></table>Wade
Winexpert is one of the most responsive kit companies in the industry. I'm not sure which forums you have visited, but we support Winepress.us, and this question has come up and been answered on a regular basis, both by myself as a moderator on that forum, and by others who have benefited from the advice available there.
We'll keep on doing our best to give people answers as quickly as we can, and as usual, we stand behind the kits we make.
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Thanks for stepping in here a bit Tim. What you are saying reinforced what my thinking was on this problem. I hadn't answered it because I have never done the Choc Rasp Port. I think the start of the problem was doubling the kit up without doubling - adding all the components. Maybe WE could add a line to the directions making this clear to everyone- If you double the batch, use everything included in both batches together. I'm sure it has been designed to the proper amounts of all components for proper fermentation.
Tim, Im glad you joined in and never knew you had even been a member. I know your a busy man so cant visit all wine forums. I have had many problems with your kits in the past and have had very hard times getting through to someone and when I finally did didnt get much support from the W.E. company like I do with others. My retailer (George) did resolve most of the problems himself though and i must admit he even had to help me another time with another company which I usually stand behind fully. Dont get me wrong, I like most of your products it just seems that yours are the only ones I have problems with clearing or fermenting fully. (These are Usually the Speciale kits)
Rich I think 3 packets of yeast that are the same size as the ones you use to ferment out 10 gallons or more is plenty enough to ferment out 6. This subject has come abot with many people making 3 gallon batches also. I am going to quote your post here Tim on to a forum that I run cause there are a few people there making this kit there and there is nothing I hate more then a person not being happy with their wine.
Rich I think 3 packets of yeast that are the same size as the ones you use to ferment out 10 gallons or more is plenty enough to ferment out 6. This subject has come abot with many people making 3 gallon batches also. I am going to quote your post here Tim on to a forum that I run cause there are a few people there making this kit there and there is nothing I hate more then a person not being happy with their wine.
And Wade, I sent an email to the WE's customer service addy you posted and it bounced back after a few days. I tried it again thru their website and had a reply in minutes from Linda. Another reply came with the post from Tim suggesting what to do.
I did another SG check first and it has dropped slightly since racking it to glass and splashed the heck out of it. The brew belt is back on and I set it a bit lower on the glass to get the temp above 75. I stirred and stirred and stirred some more this evening and added the lees from a kit that needed racking.
I had lost hope but I'm seeing a glimmer!!! I will keep you all posted.
I did another SG check first and it has dropped slightly since racking it to glass and splashed the heck out of it. The brew belt is back on and I set it a bit lower on the glass to get the temp above 75. I stirred and stirred and stirred some more this evening and added the lees from a kit that needed racking.
I had lost hope but I'm seeing a glimmer!!! I will keep you all posted.
Tim Vandergrift
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You're very welcome Joan: keep in touch with us and let us know how it's progressing.
There is life!! =) My SG is at 1.020! The combination of a warmer must, LOTS of stirring, and adding fresh lees has done the trick! Thanks again Tim and Linda for your help with this. (Tell the bosses at WE I say you both you need raises!)
I don't know if this happens with other ports or high alcohol WE wines, but I would suggest adding the remedy to your "Knowledge Base" page or make it search-able in your blog, Tim. It has been most helpful!
One more question... do I need to add both packets of k-meta when stabilizing and clearing or is one enough? It seems like one would be enough but as we all know...I've been known to be wrong a time or two but I'm not wrong about the raises.=)
Thanks again!
I don't know if this happens with other ports or high alcohol WE wines, but I would suggest adding the remedy to your "Knowledge Base" page or make it search-able in your blog, Tim. It has been most helpful!
One more question... do I need to add both packets of k-meta when stabilizing and clearing or is one enough? It seems like one would be enough but as we all know...I've been known to be wrong a time or two but I'm not wrong about the raises.=)
Thanks again!
I'm having pretty good luck with this kit so far. I did a double batch since I don't have any 3 gal carboys.
My starting SG was 1132 which is the highest I've seen in a kit wine so far, so I stirred every day starting with day 2, and it took 9 days to get close to 1018 which I figured was "close enough" to chaptalize. So I mixed up both bags of sugar with 3 cups of hot water, then added 2 tsp of yeast nutrient (DAP) into the sugar mix, then mixed it all into the batch aggresively to get a bit of oxygen in there, and added the brew belt to the primary. I also snapped down the lid to seal up the primary since it's slowing down quite a bit.
It seems to be continuing at a fairly active pace so I'll let it go undisturbed for a couple days now and check again. I'm guessing it should be ready to be transferred to the secondary here shortly.
My starting SG was 1132 which is the highest I've seen in a kit wine so far, so I stirred every day starting with day 2, and it took 9 days to get close to 1018 which I figured was "close enough" to chaptalize. So I mixed up both bags of sugar with 3 cups of hot water, then added 2 tsp of yeast nutrient (DAP) into the sugar mix, then mixed it all into the batch aggresively to get a bit of oxygen in there, and added the brew belt to the primary. I also snapped down the lid to seal up the primary since it's slowing down quite a bit.
It seems to be continuing at a fairly active pace so I'll let it go undisturbed for a couple days now and check again. I'm guessing it should be ready to be transferred to the secondary here shortly.
I made a Strawberry Chocolate Port that came out very goo even though it was supposed to be a wine and was very nasty until I really really doctored it up. JW also made a Orange Chocolate Port. Hers his link below. The recipe for mine is on my link in my signature.
Orange Chocolate Port
Orange Chocolate Port
Question on the F-Pack for this kit:
I know the direstions say to add after adding the Chitosan. But would it not make more sense (I'm planning on aging this till next year) too let the clarifier do its thing for a few weeks, rack and addthe F-Pack, then bulk age it.....
Thanks
I know the direstions say to add after adding the Chitosan. But would it not make more sense (I'm planning on aging this till next year) too let the clarifier do its thing for a few weeks, rack and addthe F-Pack, then bulk age it.....
Thanks
uavwmn said:Bummer, I started my double kit yesterday and no yeast activity as of this morning. Should I wait another day to see if it starts up? Must was 75 degrees when I started and the spare bedroom is warm in there.
I would give it a really good stir and don't forget to stick you ear next to the must and listen for the popping. BTW, I always keep extra EC1118 on hand, just in case and rehydrate the yeast before pitching.
VC
