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I have some merlot aging in carboys. These are from whole grapes back in Sept 2020, and have been bulk aging on a bit of oak since Dec 2020. I want to send some 100mL sampler bottles to a friend across country when the wine is ready. I was planning to bottle in a few months and then let it age...

I have a 6 gallon batch of pinot noir made from fresh grapes. MLF finished a month ago. I split the batch into 6 1-gallon carboys and put a different oak in each one. I looked at my Heavy toasted American oak one today, and saw what looked like a film on top. Smells and tastes fine as far as I...

I have a batch of pinot noir (from grapes). I pitched yeast on 9/30and co-inoculated with ML bacteria on 10/1. I've since pressed off the skins/seeds, SG is below 1.000, and the wine is still sitting on the gross lees. Question: can I rack off those lees now or will that mess with the MLF? Do...

A question I've had but never really found a good answer for: what happens to yeast when they reach their alcohol tolerance? Do they start dying off? Or do they just go dormant? For example, say I had a wine where the yeast reached their tolerance and stopped fermenting even though there was...

I'm venturing into grape-land with some pinot noir grapes from a local winery. Looking to do a few gallons only this year to see how it turns out before taking a bigger plunge. I have a few questions: 1) Typically, I go for bigger reds (cab sauv, merlot, zin, etc) because I often find the...

I scored a good deal on a clearance Island Mist Raspberry Dragon Fruit kit from my LHBS. Figure I would make some easy porch sippers. Added a gallon of Raspberry juice and white sugar to OG 1.074, and pitched QA23. My plan is to ferment to dry, and then split the 6 gallon batch into several 1...

A few years ago, I made a cab sauv kit where I didn't use the included oak cubes and instead used a M+ toasted french oak spiral from my LHBS. The package said 1 spiral for 3 gallons, so I used 1 spiral in about 5.5 gallons in secondary for a milder flavor and left it for 6 weeks per the...

Last year, I attempted my first bochet in the typical way: caramelizing some honey on the stovetop. I was fairly disappointed in the result which tasted like a slightly richer mead, but there were no caramel or toffee or marshmallow flavors. Posts on this forum mentioned that it's not about the...

I'm looking at some options for a really special traditional mead, and I came across Tasmanian Leatherwood honey. Has anyone ever tried this honey or a mead made from it? The tasting notes are a bit odd, so I want to know if I'm gonna spend a lot of money to make something with too weird of a...

So I added about 8 fl oz of hibiscus water (i.e. soaked 0.75oz of dried hibiscus flowers in hot water for 20min, then cooled it to probably 80F) to about 100 fl oz of lingonberry mead, and immediately it looks like something started congealing or something. The mead was already cloudy, SG of...

I'm curious as to people's thoughts about whether to add dried flowers directly to the wine in primary/secondary or make a "tea" and add that. I have a 12% abv lingonberry mead just finishing primary now, and I want to add some hibiscus flowers (0.75oz based on a recipe called Aztec Blood I...

I picked up some Mango Nectar and a bag of blood oranges today for winemaking. I'm debating on how best to add the blood oranges. My typical MO would be to zest 2 oranges and steep in hot water, then add that "tea" to primary along with the fresh juice. But I'm wondering if it would be better...

I made cider with fresh apple juice (UV pasteurized, no preservatives) from my local market. Pitched EC1118 on 9/22, fermented dry, cleared with superkleer. I then added a can of apple juice concentrate and bottled in flip-tops. I also filled a 20oz plastic pop bottle as a tester that I can use...

I have a batch of cider that's almost ready for bottling, and I'm going to carbonate it naturally by adding some apple juice concentrate right before filling the bottles. Do I add kmeta as well for protection or do I skip it to keep the yeast active?

I got a gallon of fresh pressed cider from my local orchard (UV pasteurized, but otherwise completely natural). I'm making a hard cider with it and was going to follow the TOSNA-3 schedule to add nutrients since I read cider wouldn't have all the nutrients needed for yeast (EC-1118). My OG was...

I got a bag of LD Carlson cacao nibs ( https://images.app.goo.gl/Uw7ihzK3djqjCv1y9) from my LHBS. I made a tincture with about 1 cup of brandy and 1.5oz nibs, soaking for 4 days. However, it tastes nasty. Really bitter and not much chocolate flavor. Does anyone know if these nibs are raw or...

I have some bottles of mead aging in my cellar since May, and yesterday I noticed a few bottles have an amber-colored sap-like substance on the exterior of the cork (see photo). The substance is highly viscous (like the sap of a pine tree) and lacks any distinguishable smell or taste. The corks...

Once I free up some carboys, I want to make a 2 gallon batch of traditional mead as best as I can. I realize this will be subjective, but I'm looking for interesting suggestions. I like my meads semi-sweet to sweet, so I need suggestions for the fermentation honey as well as the backsweetening...

I wanted to run an idea by the mead experts on here for what I'm calling a "staggered bochet." Full disclosure, I'm ripping the base recipe from https://www.winemakingtalk.com/threads/orange-bochet-recipe-please-comment.68692/ with credit to @Mazaruni. I've also read about a few people trying...

This may seem a bit odd, but I was in Trader Joe's today and saw bottles of "artisan glacier water" from Norway. It got me thinking about what effect the water used in mead making has on the final flavor profile, since pretty much everyone focuses on the honey flavor profile. So if I were to...