Not sure where to go next

[davew]

I've got a welch's raspberry concentrate that I just racked for the second time. The SG is at .995. The beginning SG was 1.085.

I tasted and I got a good raspberry flavor but it was very dry. I'm going to want to sweeten this up a tad I think, so I have a few quesitons.

At this point I should add sorbate and some kind of clarifier right? When you all talk of clarifiers, are you talking about Isinglass, or some other wine clarifying additive?

Should I sweet prior to this? When I sweeten should I just make a simple syrup or should I get some more raspberry concentrate?

I thought it would be smart to make a gallon to test this out, but none of my tools fit inside the bottles! And when if I take samples I loose so much that I've just taken to taking SG levels in the bottle! I've learned my lesson with making 1 gallon batches. Too much work for very little wine!

 

[St Allie]

use a siphoning hose to take samples, sterilise everything.. take the sample and then pour the sample back in..

Sulphate ( campden tab) and sorbate (potassium sorbate) the wine now.. then backsweeten it.. make a simple syrup of 2 parts sugar to 1 part water to sweeten. You can make an f pac if you want more raspberry flavour. Then you can clarify it, or let it do that itself naturally, by leaving it in a cool place for the solids to drop out and compact down.

I have used kwikcleer, a two step chemical process in the past.. but I don't bother now.. and let things clear naturally. Isinglass is another popular one.. egg white will do the same thing also.

Allie

 

[TheTooth]

Have you tried using a refractometer?

You only need a few drops to test your gravity with a refractometer.

 

[Sacalait]

You only need a few drops to test your gravity with a refractometer.

True, but you would need a conversion table to compensate for the alcohol.

 

[Luc]

About clearing: I would just sit it out.
Time will clear it, just be patient.

And you are indeed right that making 1 gallon batches
is really not worth the effort.

Luc

 

[TheTooth]

True, but you would need a conversion table to compensate for the alcohol.

True... I forgot about that. I use a spreadsheet that morebeer.com/morewinemaking.com had available for download a while back. I just enter the readings and it tells me my adjusted gravity numbers.

 

[davew]

So I finally got around to adding sorbate and k-meta. Do I need to sweeten immediately after adding or do I wait.

Is time on my side during the wine making process? Does it hurt to sit in secondary fermentation for a few extra weeks without adding kmeta and sorbate?

 

[Sacalait]

Give it a few days after adding the K-meta and sorbate before sweetening. Time is on your side, you could bulk age before or after sweetening.

 

[Wade E]

Its best to add the sulfite and sorbate right when fermemtation is done to protect your investment but if its still got lots of C02 in it then it will be fine as thats protecting it.