not enough juice from pressing?

[Squid]

Hi - my recipe from the home Winemakers Companion called for 30 lbs. of apples, cut into little bits and put into a 5 gal. bucket for fermentation. the recipe said after the apples were in the bucket, fill the rest of the bucket with water, up to the 5 gallon mark, so we did this by adding about 2 gallons of water. We have now removed the must and pressed it. We now have a total volume of 3 1/2 gallons. So am I supposed to add 1 1/2 gallons of water to bring the volume up for my 5 gallon carboy? This seems like a lot of water. Won't that dilute it? The recipe says to 'top off' with water... but 1 1/2 gallons seems like a big 'top off'. I tried re-pressing, but I think we did a pretty good job and got all we could...
Thanks!

 

[abefroman]

Hi - my recipe from the home Winemakers Companion called for 30 lbs. of apples, cut into little bits and put into a 5 gal. bucket for fermentation. the recipe said after the apples were in the bucket, fill the rest of the bucket with water, up to the 5 gallon mark, so we did this by adding about 2 gallons of water. We have now removed the must and pressed it. We now have a total volume of 3 1/2 gallons. So am I supposed to add 1 1/2 gallons of water to bring the volume up for my 5 gallon carboy? This seems like a lot of water. Won't that dilute it? The recipe says to 'top off' with water... but 1 1/2 gallons seems like a big 'top off'. I tried re-pressing, but I think we did a pretty good job and got all we could...
Thanks!

Why don't you add some store bought apple juice to it?

 

[Wade E]

Was the rest of the recipe close like sg readings or did you have to add or subtract sugar? the problem with lots of recipes is that they dont specify that some apples or whatever your using ay not have as much juice as another apple or whatever your using and this can create problems like this and thats why i ask the question above.

 

[djrockinsteve]

Apples have different amounts of juice in them. Usually those from someones back yard tend to be drier because they don't tend to them like the nurseries do.

In the beginning I added sugar water to make up the difference not realizing I could get more juice and add sugar to that. Yes adding water will dilute your wine. It would probably be justokay. As mentioned earlier add 100% pure apple cider to fill the extra needed. Add inverted sugar to give you the desired gravity reading.

I always add some pears to my cider to add some extra sweetness.