Optimal Sequence to Balance and Finish Wine

[NDengineer]

What is the best order to balance and finish a wine before bottling? Attributes like acidity, bitterness, and residual sugar all interact to some degree. What's the way to balance each item just once, and not have to rebalance it once the other components are balanced?

I typically make meads and non-grape fruit wines, so they often need a bit of help from additives to round out all the flavors and characteristics. Once fermentation has completed and bulk aging is done (~ 6 months, wine has cleared by this point), it's time to balance and finish the wine. First, I tweak any flavor issues by adding a bit of juice or spices, sometimes letting this age for a further few months before continuing. Second, I like to set the residual sugar, making the wine dry, semi-dry, sweet, or somewhere in between. Once I'm happy with the sugar, I'll tweak and adjust the acidity so that it tastes right and balances with the sugar. Finally, I try the bitterness and add more tannin if needed.

To accomplish all of this balancing, I setup a small tasting panel. I'll prepare about 6 different concentrations/compositions of the attribute in question (flavor, sugar, acid, bitterness), varying from the base wine up to a strong concentration of additive. I try each one and get my wife and others (if possible) to try them and we pick the best and move forward. I generally adjust the sugar, acid, and bitterness all in one night.

After the wine is balanced, I let it age another month to let any final sediment drop out before bottling (lesson learned on this key step!).

What steps do you take to balance/finish your wine, and how do you go about doing them?

 

[salcoco]

It seems to me that what you are doing is spot on. In one regard I am surprised that you have to adjust all parameters. I have found that usually one at most two require balance., sugar and acidity being the predominate. I try to achieve balance without regard to residual sugar labels ie dry, semi dry etc. Instead I try to achieve fruit balance and taste. sometimes I start with acidity to get a flat wine some character and then balance with sugar. Based on your experience and obvious set up I would try changing the order and see if any one method is better than another. Otherwise why fix something that is not broke?