Former brewer in england

[WilliamFromEngland]

Hi everyone.

I spent 12 years making English ales commercially up til 2020 and now I'm trying to get into making my own fruit wines like the older generation used to do at home.

As a brewer I used to get questions from home brewers, often about slow fermentations which were causing infections, my advice was always, aerate your wort immediately before pitching yeast and the yeast will dominate the environment before anything wild gets the chance. It seems like it's different in wine making.

My first fermentation (of wild rhubarb wine) is going alarmingly slowly (to my mind. I got an OG of about 1.1 and a week later it's 1.052 and losing about .007 a day, still in the primary fermenter.

My beer fermentations were pretty much all over in 4 days whereupon I'd chill the beer and rack it off the top of the sediment into closed, chilled tanks with low pressure CO2 on top then allow to settle for a week before packaging.


So the first thing I need guidance on is, at what gravity should I be racking this stuff into demijohns.


Also: what's in a campden tablet and why and when should I be adding that and whatever other additives you would recommend?

Any advice to an absolute novice winemaker, would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

 

[WilliamFromEngland]

Hi everyone.

I spent 12 years making English ales commercially up til 2020 and now I'm trying to get into making my own fruit wines like the older generation used to do at home.

As a brewer I used to get questions from home brewers, often about slow fermentations which were causing infections, my advice was always, aerate your wort immediately before pitching yeast and the yeast will dominate the environment before anything wild gets the chance. It seems like it's different in wine making.

My first fermentation (of wild rhubarb wine) is going alarmingly slowly (to my mind. I got an OG of about 1.1 and a week later it's 1.052 and losing about .007 a day, still in the primary fermenter.

My beer fermentations were pretty much all over in 4 days whereupon I'd chill the beer and rack it off the top of the sediment into closed, chilled tanks with low pressure CO2 on top then allow to settle for a week before packaging.


So the first thing I need guidance on is, at what gravity should I be racking this stuff into demijohns.


Also: what's in a campden tablet and why and when should I be adding that and whatever other additives you would recommend?

Any advice to an absolute novice winemaker, would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

Sent twice. Lol. Sorry.

 

[ChuckD]

It is not different in wine making… yeast need oxygen so aerate the must during the first third of fermentation, while the yeast are reproducing.

I have had fermentations finish in four days and 40 days! Are you providing extra nutrients? What was your initial pH. Rhubarb can be very acidic.

 

[WilliamFromEngland]

It is not different in wine making… yeast need oxygen so aerate the must during the first third of fermentation, while the yeast are reproducing.

I have had fermentations finish in four days and 40 days! Are you providing extra nutrients? What was your initial pH. Rhubarb can be very acidic.

Thanks Chuck

I didn't check pH but I will do today when I take a sample. I think in future I'll use a duck's foot to aerate before pitching. I didn't provide any nutrients. Maybe next time. This is just a 1gal batch to get a feel for it. I'll make another as soon as my fermenter is empty, using whatever fruit the greengrocer is throwing out.