Brianna

[ffemt128]

Well I was just rinsing some bottles and I think, depending on what is going on this weekend, I may bottle my Brianna that has been sitting in the carboy since this time last year. I'll have to give it a taste and see where it's at SG wise. I believe I originally only sweetened it to 1.002 or 1.004. It wasn't real sweet.

 

[joeswine]

Briana

WHAT TYPE OF WINE IS THIS?

 

[ffemt128]

It's a white wine. Rob from Iowa was kind enough to provide us with the Juice last year when DJRockinSteve went out to assit with the harvest. Early sampling was very promising.

 

[Julie]

WHAT TYPE OF WINE IS THIS?

Rob could probably give you a better description than I but it is a cold hardy grape that was developed recently. It has characteristics of a reisling but not exactly a reisling.

 

[grapeman]

Brianna is one of Elmer Swenson's varieties he developed about 20-25 years ago but has not been extensively planted yet. It is a very cold hardy grape, a white as Julie says and has smallish size clusters of good sized grapes. The wine exhibits a lot of pineapple flavors and esters. We blented the Brianna and also ES-6-16-30 (Adalmiina)this year with an early harvest of St Pepin, also from Elmer and the mixture is astounding!

 

[Julie]

Actually, Grapeman, I remember you talking about the St. Pepin and I am very interest in that. Do you know if anyone is selling that juice?

 

[grapeman]

Julie, I don't know of anyone selling St Pepin in this area yet. It has not been grown a lot yet because it gets a bad rap of being pistillate or in other words all female instead of the normal hermaphroditic. It is seen therefore as having low set and yields. I have not seen that here as many flowers are complete and it pollinates fine. I get some of my highest yields out of that variety and have been increasing the acreage in recent years. Right now I can't get enough of it and have sold out of it for this year. I had expected a ton or so out of that vineyard block and only saved about 200 pounds from the bees and squirrels. I'm glad I have more of it to harvest that is still there.

 

[Julie]

Rich, can I buy the vines somewhere? I would be willing to plant some vines to give me a 5g batch of wine each year.

 

[grapeman]

Double A Vineyards and Northeast Vine Supply both sell them.
Check out this link and see if the picture looks familiar..............
http://www.doubleavineyards.com/p-795-st-pepin-es-282.aspx

Hint- check my avatar. They didn't have a picture for St Pepin so I sent them a few and this is the one they used.

 

[Julie]

Thanks, Mike and I decided to start a very small vineyard of the PA wines that we like instead of having a vegetable garden. I think we need to add the St. Pepin.

 

[hooverdlh]

My husband and I are growing both. We think both make pretty good wines.

Diana

 

[GreginND]

I am definitely going to plant Brianna in my vineyard. It's becoming one of my favorite cold hardy white varieties. And it SURVIVES our winters.

 

[ffemt128]

Well, I backsweetened the Brianna earlier in the week from 1.002 to 1.006. It's perfect IMHO at this level. I bottled today and I'm enjoying what did not fit in a bottle as we speak. Will take the edge off the meetings that are planned for this evening. LOL

 

[ffemt128]

Still need capsules.

 

[rob]

Femt

The Brianna looks very nice, how many bottles did you end up with?

 

[Julie]

Still need capsules.

View attachment 5537

LOL, I didn't put capsules on mine, I wasn't planning on sharing, I have no idea when I would get another batch.

 

[rob]

Julie,

Let's work on that for next year

 

[Julie]

Julie,

Let's work on that for next year

Thanks Rob that sounds like a good idea!

 

[ffemt128]

Femt

The Brianna looks very nice, how many bottles did you end up with?

Rob,

From a bucket I ended up with 23 - 750ml bottles and 4 - 375ml bottles. I would have had more but along the way we managed to sample away our 1/2 gallon container that was aging as well.

 

[ffemt128]

LOL, I didn't put capsules on mine, I wasn't planning on sharing, I have no idea when I would get another batch.

Who said I plan on sharing, I was trying to decide which one looked the best, I think we'll go with the green capsule.

Julie,

Let's work on that for next year

Thanks Rob that sounds like a good idea!

I would definately be interested in this for next year. Keep us in mind, I'd be willing to come our for a weekend to help harvest. It would be alot of work but I think it would be fun work.