Doing something totally new this year with my muscadines, both bronze and purples. Instead of fermenting on the pulp I decided to just crush and press both the types of muscadines and use this juice to make all white wine. It is amazing how much different the juice of my Isons taste when there is no pulp and hulls with it. The ph of the juice was 4 and the BRIX was 18. I adjusted the ph down to 3.4 and adjusted the SG to where I wanted it. Yeast is EC-1118 and it is fermenting at 70 degrees. At transfer I will add more frozen juice to top up.
Try something new with my muscadines
- Thread starter toddrod
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Update - Bottled this wine up today. The wine made from the Ison pressed juice is exceptional. I find it has more of the muscadine aroma compared to the wine made from the juice of Sweet Jenny / Pam. I am glad I tried this.
garymc
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I tried crushing and pressing my bronze muscadines before fermenting, but went ahead and put the whole mess back in the primary. I only got about a gallon of juice out of a batch that I would expect 3 gallons out of when fermented. They seemed too tough to press the juice out of. Maybe I'll try again when my crop gets to the point where I have enough to experiment with. I think you're onto something. Did you crush them in a regular grape crusher?
I crushed 1st with my fruit crusher. The wooden one that EC Kraus sells. Then pressed with my fruit press.
Another thing that I liked about the wine from the Isons done this way was that the tannin levels were reduced alot. I have been giving away most of my Isons lately just because of that, alot of tannins in the wine even though I was only fermenting on the skins for 3 days.
You are right about the reduced juice extraction this way. What I did was leave the pulp, that was sulfited, after pressing, in a large container in my cooler for a couple of days and I was able to recover another couple of gallons of juice that continued to drain from the pulp. The pulp was in paint strainer bags.
Oh forgot to add that I freeze all my grapes 1st.
Another thing that I liked about the wine from the Isons done this way was that the tannin levels were reduced alot. I have been giving away most of my Isons lately just because of that, alot of tannins in the wine even though I was only fermenting on the skins for 3 days.
You are right about the reduced juice extraction this way. What I did was leave the pulp, that was sulfited, after pressing, in a large container in my cooler for a couple of days and I was able to recover another couple of gallons of juice that continued to drain from the pulp. The pulp was in paint strainer bags.
Oh forgot to add that I freeze all my grapes 1st.
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garymc
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" What I did was leave the pulp, that was sulfited, after pressing, in a large container in my cooler for a couple of days and I was able to recover another couple of gallons of juice that continued to drain from the pulp." - Was this treated with pectic enzyme?
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