WineXpert Port-like experiment

[dusty1]

Hello to all here at finevinewines' forum. I just started making wine last month and I've enjoyed reading the posts here.
I've got a Yamhill Pinot Noir and an Italian Pinot Grigio in bulk aging (and tasting pretty good considering their age . I decided to experiment with half of my next batch.


I split my new Spanish Tempranillo/CabSav into two batches. One I'm making according to the directions (halved, of course). The other I'm trying to make into something resembling a port.


I used a bit less water than normal, ending up with a SG of 1.115 (a little worried about too much acid...but that's why it's an experiment). Also, I substituted a heartier yeast.


I am trying to decide how to finish up. Thus far my plans are:


Plan #1: Wait until the SG drops to something like 1.010, and taste it until it's the right amount of sweet. Then arrest the fermentation with a bottle(or so)of brandy.


Plan #2: Wait until the SG drops do ~1.030 and add somemore sugar. Repeat with smaller amounts of sugar (and lower SGs) until the yeast is toast.


If anyone has tried a similar experiment with kit juice I'd love to hear about it. I'll definately let you all know how it goes.


Cheers!

 

[Wade E]

Dusty, have you checked your acidity, if out of whack you could use
calcium carbonate to lower your acidity or tartaric or even an acid
blend to up it if needed. I have yet to make a port but either way
would be fine and youll probably have to add brandy or Everclear pure
grain alc to bring the abv. up. There are a few Port makers on this
forum that hopefully will chime in for further direction but it sounds
like you have it pretty much under control!

 

[pkcook]

Dusty,


I've attempted to make a "port like" wine on two occasions. The first was a blackberry that I fermented dry and added a clear Christian Bros brandy. The fruit was lacking in flavor at bottling, but after a few months its improved. I'm holding the last few bottles for a couple of years. The second was a Peach that I added peach brandy to. The peach flavor is intense, but the wine is missing something and I don't know what it is. On this wine I fermented dry, stablized, sweetened and added the brandy. This is tricky with peach brandy being very sweet already.

 

[PeterZ]

I recall from my first foray into winemaking 20+ years ago that most home winemakers "back in the day" who wanted port-type wines started with a must that would yield about 15% abv. Once the sg was below 1.050 they would add a little sugar (predissolved), nursing the yeast until it could no longer produce - exactly what dusty described. They seemed to get 18 - 20% abv. They would then sweeten to taste.

As I understand the port equation, ports need to be high in acid and tannin to balance the sweetness. Then again, having never made a port (but looking forward to), I may be all wet.

 

[dusty1]

An update...

When the SG hit 1.040 I added 96Oz of elderberry concentrate (and no water). Interestingly, this had no effect on the SG. I also added some sugar to bring the SG up to 1.056. I also added some yeast nutrient hoping to make sure the wine didn't end up too sweet if the yeast quit earlier than expected. To my surprise the SG was 1.000 a couple of days later (there goes arresting fermentation early).

So, I added 750ml of Brandy to get the alcohol level to 20% and added just under 4 TBSP of winexpert conditioner (sweetener). It tasted a bit under sweet to me, but I'm planning on bringing the sweetness level up slowly over time as it would be much harder to fix an over-sweet port. I think the elderberry concentrate upped the acid to the right levels (or so say my taste-buds). I might end up adding some tannin later on, but I'm going to give than some more time as well.

Thus far it tastes better than expected, which is always encouraging.

 

[Coaster]

I did something like this with my Black Currant. I split the 6gal batch into 2 3g batches (I used 2 cans of vintners harvest and 2 red grape concentrates, fermented to dry). I had already sweetened with 250ml of wine conditioner. One 3g batch was bottled as is, the other was fortified to 18% with 375ml of Everclear and 375 of brandy. It's young and you can definitely taste the higher alcohol but I think it tastes pretty good. Only been in the bottle a week so time will tell. Edited by: Coaster

 

[Wade E]

Sounds like some good experiments guys!