Flavored ports and brandy?

[roblloyd]

I have 2 ports going along nicely right now. I was thinking of adding brandy to them. What do you think? If yes how much and when? Both are 3 gallons. Looking clear but I'm still bulk aging until I need the carboys again in case anything else wants to settle out.

WE Chocolate Raspberry Port

Diamanti Dark Chocolate Orange

The Dark chocolate orange is amazing right now. Smells unbelievably good. The WE one has smells good but not nearly as much and has more of a chemical smell I seem to have with all the WE kits. It goes away with age.

So do I add brandy? I'm hoping no one says to do 1/2 of each type as that sounds like a lot of extra work to keep straight and I don't have smaller carboys. Unless it's ok to add at bottling time? Then I could bottle 1/2, add brandy and then bottle the rest labeling immediately.

I picked up 750ml of E&J VS and E&J XO. Are those recommended?

 

[Luc]

Maybe this item should not be in the general area.........

A port IS a fortified wine. So to any wine you make as a port style wine you should add alcohol.
But then kit wine manufacturers seem to dictate people how to make wine a different way and still give it traditional names..

Luc

 

[roblloyd]

Wasn't sure what area it should be in since it's two different kit manufacturers and seemed general....

So how much do I add and when?

 

[Flem]

Hi Rob. I think someone recommended I add one bottle (750ml) of E&J per gallon of my RJS Coffee Port. I had considered splitting it into 2 gallons fortified and 1 gallon not. I'm probalbly going to just fortify it all.

 

[Deezil]

If you have a final ABV in mind, you can use the Pearson's Square to tell ya how much you need to add.

Pretty sure ive seen E&J recommended before.

 

[roblloyd]

They are already 19%. Is there a % goal to reach or is it just to balance the flavor out?
When do i add it? Now while its aging in the carboy or at bottling time?

 

[Wade E]

You got 2 of them to 19# abv??? If yoiu got it there I wouldnt paly around with it anymore!

 

[roblloyd]

As long as my math is right:

WE Choc Rasp Port is - 19.8% ABV
Diamanti Dark Choc Orange Port is - 15.6% ABV

So what do you think?

 

[Deezil]

I wouldnt mess with a good thing. You mention the Dark Choc Orange is amazing as is, at 15.6% - and thats where i'd leave it. The Choc Rasp is already in the lower range of a port..

Ports were originally made because the english went to war with france. The english started buying their wine from portugal, but by the time the boats could get from portugal to england, the wine would spoil. So they started spiking the wine with brandy before setting sail - when they landed, some months later (i assume) they found that the spirit had mingled with the wine quite nicely.

This translates into the modern version of port, which has its fermentation halted early with a spike of hard spirits - usually a brandy (*******ed wine). The object is to balance the natural residual sweetness, with the level of alcohol - theres acidity levels and tannin levels that need to balance too.

 

[Kev]

Thats very interesting. I learned a few things in this thread.

In December i did the 15L batch of the Wine kitz Chocolate Orange Port.

I was worried about it being a little sweet and low in alcohol. So after stabilization, and clearing, I removed a bottle of the port and replaced it with some inexpensive brandy. Original ABV was about 15%

From playing with the Pearson square just mentioned above, I see I had very little impact on the ABV, by adding the brandy

The brandy flavor was however very prominent, just after adding and stiring.

I will need to give it another month in bulk, bottle, and give it a month in the bottle, before I can judge if I did more harm than good.

I do love the cherries my wife soaks in brandy for a few months then dips in hard chocolate, I also like the left over , now cherry flavored brandy as well, so I do think sweet ( Fpak kit) and Brandy will go together.

 

[Wade E]

What was your starting and finished sg on the W.E.???? Thats very unusual as that kit almost always gets stuck early!

 

[roblloyd]

My WE kit went like this:
Starting SG: 1.13
Down to 1.001
Added Chap pack - 1.022
Final: 1.000

So I have 1.13-1.001 = .129
1.022-1.000 = .022
.129+.022 = .151
.151*131= 19.78%

The Diamanti was 1.115 down to .996 = 15.60%

Any suggestions to make these better? I'm not a brandy drinker so I don't want to open these bottles to test if it's not needed or recommended by the knowledgeable members here.

 

[roblloyd]

I added about 3/4 bottle of brandy to the Diamanti kit. Really filled out the flavor profile. I didn't think it was necessary with the Raspberry one.
I'm glad I bulk aged these so I could see how they were progressing so I was able to make them better. If I followed the directions I'm sure they would have still been good, but not as good.