When To Strain?

[CWayman]

Hi All,

I have three primary 5 gallon fermentation vessels, one with a peach wine (cut up into very small cubes) making 3 gallons, one heavy bodied blackerry vessel and one medium bodied blackberry vessel both making two gallons, the backberries were mashed. They were in their vessels with a gallon of boiling water for 24 hours. Then I added the dry ingredients in except the yeast, campden tablets, pectolase, citric acid, sugar and yeast nutrient. I was then going to leave it 24 hours before adding the yeast.

However I've had a thought. Straining the must. These are my opposing thoughts.

a) Do I just add the yeast, wait until the gravity gets to about 1.05-1.09? then strain, this would involve pouring 2 gallons into another vessel which contains the straining bag, this would get a lot of air into the fermenting mixture which I think would be ok as yeast loves O2 right? This I would then leave for a further few days (depending on gravity) before syphoning into demijohns and adding airlocks.

or

b) Do the straining now pre-yeast then add the yeast so when I do the racking to the demijohns I will disturb the wine as little as possible? The added benefit of straining now is I will get a lot of air into the must which the yeast would like?

or

c) Just be careful with the initial racking because of the sediment and not strain?

Does it matter that I've already added the dry ingredients? They should all be dissolved so I'm guessing no.

What would/do you do?

Thanks.
Craig.

 

[jamesngalveston]

Not even sure what your asking:
I would do nothing but ferment, and the rack when it gets to 1.000 are let it go dry.
Stir it a couple times a day.....

 

[CWayman]

I suppose I'm just wondering whether it's worth filtering the fruit out of the must and when? if at all? I guess you're saying just do that at the first racking. One vote for option C

 

[FABulousWines]

It is generally preferred to ferment on the fruit as it brings out more flavors and tannins and such. If you are concerned about the amount of sediment, the fruit can be placed in a straining bag to minimize the sediment and ease removal. You can get cheap paint straining bags at your local home improvement store.

 

[sgx2]

Great question! I had the same one when I did my first fruit batches. I recommend doing what I did -- try all three and see which outcome you like best

What I learned, through research and experience, is that most folks tend to rack off the fruit when the SG hits ~1.010. If my fermentation has been slow I'll take it out at 1.010, but if it's been very rapid -- I've had some batches go from 1.100 to 0.998 in 4 days! -- I will leave the fruit in for the whole period. I'm sure others will have some thoughts on this.

In your case I suspect you'll find that racking off of the fruit will be much easier with your peach batch. For your next batch (and we know you're already thinking about your next batch), try putting the fruit in suitable bags (your LHBS will have them) so that you can pluck them out when you're ready! It will also make testing SG a little easier.

 

[CWayman]

Thanks for the rapid responses everyone.

Next time I will be using straining bags, especially if I've mashed the fruit, this time though I didn't have any and was way too eager to get started! But it's all part of the learning process. I agree that the peach will probably be easier to rack.

Next batch? I'm eyeing up my neighbours apple trees right now! I'm thinking about getting a cheap whole fruit juicer from ebay for this. Adding the pulp into the straining back so that I still get the extra fruit for the must but with the fruit juice and water I should be able to correctly judge the amount of liquid to get the best space in the demijohns. For the apple though I may try and find some 5 gallon glass carboys. Boys and their toys!

 

[JohnT]

Strain it when you go to the press.

 

[sgx2]

...Next batch? I'm eyeing up my neighbours apple trees right now! I'm thinking about getting a cheap whole fruit juicer from ebay for this. Adding the pulp into the straining back so that I still get the extra fruit for the must but with the fruit juice and water I should be able to correctly judge the amount of liquid to get the best space in the demijohns. For the apple though I may try and find some 5 gallon glass carboys. Boys and their toys!

Apple wine can be very nice, I hope you do get to give it a go!

I'm sure you'll find your toy, I mean carboy, collection is sure to grow quickly and overwhelmingly large...

 

[Arne]

After getting the fruit out of your ferments, you will see why we recomend using a ferment bag. When it comes time to get rid of the fruit, most all of it comes out with the bag, most of the rest will fall into the sediment at the bottom of the carboy. Bet you will wish the fruits were in a bag time you get them out. The paint strainer bags from paint stores are probably the least expensive. Remember, tho, if you wash them and clean them out they are reusable. The legs from panty hose work too and are really cheap. Good luck with it, Arne.