How much sugar do I add??

[agdodge4x4]

Having a little brain fart here. I have 5 gallons of wine that is ready for back sweetening. Let's assume it's at 1000 and let's assume I want it to be at 1035.

Using winecalc, I get 1878 Grams of sugar. But, is that actually correct? It seems like the last time I did this, I ended up over sweetening, not a big deal, we like sweet wine.

CJJ Berry makes a distinction between sugar IN the gallon and sugar TO the gallon. So, is the calculation above correct?

 

[Runningwolf]

I came up with about the same number.

 

[rob]

My question is are you sure you want that much sugar, usually going from 1.000 to 1.005 is very sweet

 

[Runningwolf]

Rob, I have to agree with you as that would be 8.8% residual sugar. Although if this was an east coast wine and high in acid this would help balance it out.

 

[agdodge4x4]

This is a wild grape wine. Its VERY acidic. However, my 1000 number was a guess and an assumption for the sake of making the calculation. Usually, my wines are in the 990-995 range. Im going to measure of course. I don't like my wine this sweet either, but my wife does. I can tolerate sweet wines, but she cannot tolerate dry ones. I usually do around 1015, but even that is a little tart for her taste. I just make it how she likes it, she allows me to leave a 5 gallon carboy of fermenting wine on her kitchen counter....

 

[Pumpkinman]

I would back sweeten to 1.010 and let it sit for a week or so and then taste it, you can always add more.

 

[botigol]

My wife also prefers sweet wines. Depending on the level of sweetness I find them tolerable. So I asked her to participate in bench testing. By letting her taste a range of sweetness levels I not only allowed her to find her sweetness point on the wine, but as it turns out that point was significantly lower than the level she would have stated beforehand. So just in round numbers for conversation: she thought that she only liked sweetness levels 8-10, but in reality, depending on the grape, she likes 3-10. The point that I am heading toward, and hopefully made, is that picking a number ahead of time may get you something good, but maybe not the best that it could be for your taste with this particular wine.

 

[agdodge4x4]

Thats essentially what we did. I started one day with 1015. Didn't say anything, she said it needed more sugar. The next time, I did a little more. When I finally got at one she liked, I measured it.

 

[botigol]

Cool; just wanted to make sure. Then back to your questions, as RunningWolf verified your calculation is at least close enough...I came up with 1,821 grams. Adding that much sugar will result in a total volume of roughly 5.3 gallons. You would have to remove roughly 0.28 gallons and add 1,719 grams of sugar in order to hit the same SG and have total volume of 5 gallons. I use FermCalc.

 

[agdodge4x4]

I went ahead and got it all bottled, just as you said, I had some left over, not enough to bottle. I drank a glass or two...or three? I dunno, and put the rest in a bottle to nurse the rest of the week. With 26 bottles, I can drink it as it ages. Its pretty tasty, although a bit stiff in the ABV.


BTW...just downloaded FermCalc...its pretty handy. I thought I liked WineCalc, which is really nice too, but fermcalc has more stuff and the ability to trial and error.