Back sweetening with Hydrometer

Winemaking Talk - Winemaking Forum

Help Support Winemaking Talk - Winemaking Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Woodbee

Senior Member
Joined
Feb 2, 2009
Messages
274
Reaction score
1
Greetings from the prairie. I have an experiment going right now in a one gallon wide mouth jug. It is too wierd to admit its compisition right now. If it turns out well, I will share later. I am going to need to back sweeten it before it is all said and done. And sense this is all experimental I was wondering about using my hydrometer to regulate my level of sweetness. I know about what SG I like in a finished wine and this one will be quite sweet. I know everyone here just tells you to sweeten a small amount to taste and then do up the rest of the bulk. I was just wondering if anyone here has ever used hydro reading for thier finished product. It seems to me that my sweet tooth change during the day and from day to day. This way I could always guage more acurately without trusting an old changing tounge. What do you think?
 
Personally I think using the hydrometer to gauge sweetness is a great idea, especially if you have data on wines that you liked.

I believe that there is a calculator that will tell you how much sugar to add, but I don't know where it is.

Steve
 
I agree, it is quite acceptable. I have done the same myself before. I determine the amount of sugar to add, make a syrup from that amount and add it to the wine.
 
Yes, I do that mainly on wines Ive made before and use it as a guage when sweetening a wine I havent and just go lighty and then finish by taste.
 
I like to think I have a pretty wide range when it comes to the various levels of sweeteness in wines, except I can't do completely dry wines. Anything below 3% RS and it starts to go down hill for me.

I use my hydrometer all the time when sweetening. I know my sweet spot is around 5% RS so unless I'm making a dessert style wine or a fruit wine and I want it right there in that range I keep sweetening until I hit 5 Brix according to my hydrometer.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top