Sweetness Intensifies in the Bottle

[rjholtmus2]

I don't think this is my imagination, because my son has noticed this also. When I make a "sweet" or "off dry" wine I am pretty careful about not over-sweetening it because I do not like the really sweet wines. However, I am noticing that the wines I do sweeten, the sweetness tends to intensify in the bottle. I have double checked this with the refractometer and it is really happening. Here are a couple of examples. In 2011 I made a cranberry wine which I seetened to a 1.01 s/g before I bottled it. A couple of nights ago, I opened a bottled and it was almost like syrup to my taste. I checked the s/g and it showed 1.06. This has also happened with a couple batches of strawberry one of which I made on 2010 and also some Muscato. I stabilize and degas before bottling. Am I doing something wrong or is just the nature of the wines?

Thanks for any assistance.
Roy

 

[BernardSmith]

Roy, Here's my one cent:
You say that you measured the sugar content with a refractomer. I wonder if you meant an hydrometer. I don't know that you can get anything like a reasonable reading of sugar content with a refractomer once you have pitched the yeast. A refractometer can tell you how much sugar is in the juice in the fruit but once the sugar is mixed with alcohol all bets are off - I think.
But assuming that you measured the gravity with an hydrometer I wonder if it is possible that you took a reading after backsweetening that was from an atypical sample. If you added the sugar but did not mix the sugar thoroughly before sampling then you could have drawn the wine from an area that had less sugar than might be expected.

I know that when I backsweeten I measure the gravity, taste the wine and then determine the amount of sugar I want to add to create the sweetness I am looking for by bench testing. From the bench tests I get the gravity I need to aim for and then I calculate the amount of sugar I need to add to reach that gravity and so that level of sweetness. (my rule of thumb is that 2 oz of sugar(or about 50 g) in a gallon of wine will raise the gravity by .005

I know that aged in the bottle the wine will often taste sweeter than I would have thought and so I know to aim to add that quantity of sugar on the lighter side rather than on the heavier side, but I have never found the gravity changing significantly in the bottle.

But that said, gravity is a measure of density and not simply the sugar in the wine, and so there COULD be chemical changes that affect proteins, acids, tannins etc which if these are in significant measures in your wine do affect the density. Also I assume that you are measuring the gravity in a room that is close to the temperature at which your hydrometer (if it is an hydrometer) is calibrated...

 

[Runningwolf]

Bernard is right on. Don't use the refractometer after the start of fermentation unless you are using spreadsheet designed to do so. There is no way the sugar increased in the bottle but the perception of sweetness does after bottle shock. Another thing that might have happened is your carboy was not mixed well enough and you had a sugar syrup hanging out in the bottom of your carboy, meaning different bottles will have different sweetness's.

 

[GreginND]

I actually find the opposite to be true. Wines I made rather sweet tend to taste less sweet after a year in the bottle. I wonder if you had all the sugar mixed up well when you first measured your gravity? And, maybe your taste buds have changed?

 

[seth8530]

My bet is that if you were using a refractometer you were getting a bad reading, either that or you have some serious irregularities in the sugar content of your bottles.

 

[vernsgal]

I have to agree with Greg. I find the sweetness mellows out with age not intensifies.

 

[BernardSmith]

I think it depends. My apple wines seem to lose a great deal of their sharp edges after a year and so the sweetness -acid balance changes. And that has been my experience with elderflower wine too. On the other hand my cranberry seemed to become more astringent after 12 months in the bottle and the sugar-acid balance changed in the opposite direction, but I don't pretend to have a well educated palate and my taste memory may be poor and indeed, I may be tasting these wines without adequately "calibrating" my taste buds