RJ Spagnols blackberry merlot

[PeterZ]

A lot of us add sugar to the Mist kits to up the alcohol from 6-7% to 9-10%. Seems to go over well in my house. I add half the F-pack to the primary, so the final wine is stronger and not as sweet.

 

[Scott B]

Kelley,
I have made(Tweaked) this kit 3 times and they all turned out great. 4 pounds of sugar and half the f pack at the start.

 

[Wade E]

I tweak all these mist kits and adjust oak to higher quality kits also and add tannins to some also. The only thing about adjusting the abv on these kits is that it will void the warranty on these so if something happens to the kit you will be on your own. Ive done this to about 12 kits now with no problems at all but I only use sugar and not any part of the f pac like others do.

 

[kelley]

scott can you tell me about this F pack, I guess that it is located with the kit?
thanks kelley

 

[kelley]

hello john
I guess I would use my hydrometer and look at the balling part of the meter to figure all this out?
thanks kelley

 

[Wade E]

The f-pack is another smaller bag of liquid that is included in this kit and is the main source of flavor and also consists of inverted sugar which sweetens the kit. basically te big bag is just grape juice that yiu will ferment into wine and then you add the F (Flavor) pack to sweeten and flavor your wine. Your kit without this pack will just be a thin red wine that will ferment to dryness (no residual sweetness). Some people dont like the amount of sweetness that will occur from adding the whole bag (f-pac) so either adding some of this up front to turn it into more alcohol or just not adding all of this bag at the end may be the way to go for some. By not adding all of this at the end you may not get all the flavor you want or that this kit was designed to give. I myself add about 3 1/2 lbs of sugar up front to boost the abv of this wine into something that I feel balances this kit better with an abv of around 11% and then add the whole f-pack, others may add 1/2 the f pack and maybe 1 lb of sugar and then the rest of the f-pack at the end. The f-pack like I said contains inverted sugar which will ferment and turn into alc. and by doing so will also give the flavor from this pack so if you are not into sweeter wines this is the way to go to still get all the flavor but not all the sweetness. Upping the abv will also help this wine shelve longer as without doing so the abv of these mist style kits is only about 6 1/2 % which really limits its time as far as cellaring. Hope this helps you to understand why we do this stuff as far as tweaking kits. Doing either of these will void the warranty though but I cant recall anyone ever having any problems as far as either way goes.

 

[Runningwolf]

Kelly, this was the first kit I made and it was great and encouraged me to go on. I am so glad it wasn't a WE Twisted Mist kit as I just tasted a bottle of that and did not like it at all. I also add about 4-5 pounds of sugar to Island mist and half the f-pack up front.

 

[Wade E]

What is the starting sg with all that sugar and 1/2 the f-pack?

 

[kelley]

thank you for the advice wade, Im sorry you had to do all that typing to answer my question, I did learn something. i just hope It sinks In fast so i dont haft to keep bothering other people with my problems!
thank you again

 

[Wade E]

I love to type this stuff Kelley, it keeps me on my toes.

 

[grapeman]

I love to type this stuff Kelley, it keeps me on my toes.

Well that splains it Lucy. No wonder you have a typo now and again. Wade is working typing with his toes

 

[Wade E]

Yeah right, I can barely type with my fingers!