Organic pear wine with floating bits

[water_to_wine]

Hi,

I started a gallon mix of pear wine last week, it's my first go at making a fruit wine. I got some equipment from a local shop, i'm following a recipe from the shops website.

It's currently in a demijohn fermenting, there is a bubble in the airlock about every 4 seconds.

There are light coloured bits floating around the demijohn, is this normal? Are these floating bits the yeast?

[goldseal]

It is difficult to tell without seeing the recipe.

Can you post it up here please (or a link to the recipe online)?

A photo of your demijohn would be useful too.

Oh, and welcome to the forum

[water_to_wine]

Hi,

The recipe: 2 kg organic pears, cup of tea (no milk or sugar, the tannin), 1 1/4 tsps of wine yeast, 1 tsp pectolase, 1kg unrefined sugar, 1 tsp of juice from a lemon.

Some photos of the demijohn...

pear wine #1.jpgpear wine #2.jpg

[Duffbeer]

It looks absolutely fine to me, the floaty bits are probably just fruit particles or yeast, certainly nothing to worry about.

[water_to_wine]

Hi, OK thanks, i think it must be yeast as i sieved out the fruit pulp before it went into the demijohn

[goldseal]

Looks OK to me too.

[Cellar_Rat]

looks okay to me to, but it I very much doubt it is yeast.

I made an in-line filter for my siphon hoses that would clear about this sort of 'stuff' during ranking.

[water_to_wine]

Hi again, i've got another question,

The process for my wine goes something like this:

1. A few days in a large glass cylinder to start it off
2. Syphoned into a demijohn and left to ferment
3. Syphoned into a second demijohn and left to clear before bottling

The fermenting stage (2) is supposed to take between 3 days and a week according to my recipe. It's nearly seven days into the second stage and it's still bubbling away quite a bit and doesn't look like it's going to slow down.

Can you put to much yeast into a mix?

[lockwood1956]

When you add the yeast it grows massively before ferment starts by budding (reproducing) you would have to put an awful lot of yeast in to be too much. But as a matter of interest how much did you use?

(The stuff floating in the DJ in your first post is pear pulp by the way, and not yeast)

dont measure ferments in days, it all depends on many circumstances as to how long s ferment takes.

your hydrometer is your friend in this regard and will help you monitor ithe ferments progress.

regards
Bob

[water_to_wine]

Hi,

I put about 1 1/4 tsps of wine yeast in. I don't know what a hydrometer is, do you think i'll need one? I was just going to leave to ferment out.

[lockwood1956]

You can make wine without one........but........its easier with one....eliminates a lot of guesswork



my hydrometer is my friend

1 1/4 tsp yeast is about 7.5 grams thats perfectly fine

regards
bob

[mcblades]

I agree re the hydrometer, which you will find in any HBS or wilkos for a couple of quid. If you are as clumsy as me then I would buy 2. They are generally made of glass and have a habit of rolling off worktops just when you need them!