Cranberry Wine

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ericonthehill

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I started a small batch of Cranberry a couple of days ago. I used Ocean Spray (no preservatives) and used Jack Keller's recipe as a guide line. I'm shooting for a high ABV wine with this one since cranberry seems to mask alcohol fairly well. Only issue I've encountered so far is the starting Ph was through the roof. I got it around 4.0 now though.
 
You may get a better response if you post your entire recipe plus notes, ie what your initial readings were, what you did/when you did it, etc. Many people make cranberry wine but there are too many variables to even try to help you with anything based off of the very limited info we have.
 
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I've made Cranberry wine 2 yrs. in a row now, from Jack's recipe. Had the first bottles this past Thanksgiving, it was awesome at 1 yr. old. Never checked the PH, but it was 13.2 %abv. This year the week after Thanksgiving [berries 1/2 price] a made a 2 gal. batch for next year. I also use the lees to make Skeeter Pee, Cranberry/Lemon/Lime. Roy
 
I don't remember the ph, but I made some using the Ocean Spray juice, did not add any acid blend and back sweetened using two cans of concentrate in a 6-gallon batch that turndd out pretty good. I would have to check tonight on the ph in my log.
 
If the PH is at 4.0 it is going to need some acid. If already fermented just add some citric acid to bring in line.
 
I checked my logs for the last two batches that I made and both showed that the ph of the juice was 3.2. I also poured myself a glass for my first taste of my last batch from October, it's tasting pretty good.
 
I have been enjoying my wines since I started making them, of course they have improved since then. My daughter tends to like the sweeter wines and of course she is critical of my dry wines. I gave her some of my Ocean Spray cranberry wine tonight sweetened to 1.015 and she really liked it. The amazing part is that the first time I made the cranberry wine, I really was not very optimistic about it being a good wine after tasting it when fermentation was complete. I am really beginning to like it a lot and I guess that the next item on the to-do-list is to put some oak in a batch or partial batch to see if it kicks it up another notch.

Of the two batches I made in the fall, the first batch I back sweetened with 2 cans of concentrate (6-gallon batch), the second batch I did not back sweeten with concentrate and I think that it turned out to be the better batch. This was also the batch she said she really liked. It is definitely on my list to make a few batches of the cranberry wine this year. I am already thinking of the the holidays and the cranberry wine.
 
So far so good in the primary. I can already tell this is one I'll be wishing I had made a bigger batch, 6 gal or better. It tastes good off the spoon at this point. Might have to follow Old Whiskers lead and make a big batch of this for the holidays! ;)
 

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