Blackcurrant wine

[daft eddy]

Hi
Just about to bottle some blackcurrant wine, from frozen berries, it's tasting a little tart. Will this mature out or should I sweeten prior to bottling.
Dave

[Emeraldclaire]

Blackcurrant on its own does not, I have read, make a great wine because of its high acidity. The wine can be lacking in body, and actually makes a better dessert wine. It might be better to blend it with another wine if you have one - elderberry, apple perhaps. I've used blackcurrants in fruit wines, but never on their own. If i did I would use sultanas/raisins and a banana instead of concentrated grape juice to add body and flavour. I'd store it a bit longer in bulk I think. If you want to sweeten it, there's a danger it could re-ferment, so you could use saccharin, but personally I don't like to add this to wine.

[Cellar_Rat]

I used to make it up thinner as of rose. xylitol is a good alternative to saccharin. As Claire says ordinary sugar will re-ferment. Saccharin can have a bit of an aftertaste. Canderel powder/tabs tends to drop out fine sediment.

[Cellar_Rat]

you could always refrigerated to about zero for a couple of weeks - if the acid is tartaric it will precipitate out. Rack off while still cold. Bingo

[lockwood1956]

you could always refrigerated to about zero for a couple of weeks - if the acid is tartaric it will precipitate out. Rack off while still cold. Bingo

the acid is Citric so will not drop out through cold stabilisation.

Blackcurrant on its own does not, I have read, make a great wine because of its high acidity. The wine can be lacking in body, and actually makes a better dessert wine..

Sorry to disagree but a wine without body will not make a dessert wine. you can sweeten it to make a red sweet, but not a dessert. It is very difficult to add body to a finished wine, you can use glycerin, but not too much or it becomes cloying and sickly. Blending is an option though

It is a good base for a dessert wine as you rightly state, as it has the acidity to balance the sweetness and higher alc content of a dessert, but desserts are made at the start of ferment (or is that what you meant?)

By far the best ingredient for adding body is grape, either resh or concentrate.

Sultanas and raisins are dried grapes

Banana can indeed be used for body, and I have found the best way to do that is to boil the bananas in water and add the syrup, but no solids, makes a much cleaner wine.


you could always stabilise the wine and sweeten with natural sugar, or sweeten it by the bottle as you drink it, or even by the glass!
hope that helps

regards
bob

[lockwood1956]

For anyone not sure what the acidity (and sugar levels) of common fruit....

see here

http://www.winesathome.co.uk/downloads/sugarandacid.pdf

hope that helps

regards

bob

[daft eddy]

Thanks for the feedback folks.
Maybe leave the blackcurrants for a cheescake or two this year.

[Emeraldclaire]

It is a good base for a dessert wine as you rightly state, as it has the acidity to balance the sweetness and higher alc content of a dessert, but desserts are made at the start of ferment (or is that what you meant?)
By far the best ingredient for adding body is grape, either resh or concentrate.

Sorry, I didn't make that very clear - yes, I meant that you make a dessert wine from the start, not that you can make one later.
The raisins/sultanas are my preference, although I realise that I am probably in the minority here. I did elderberry one year; as an experiment I used the same recipe but made one with grape juice concentrate and one with raisins/bananas, and much preferred the latter. Thanks for the link to acidity and sugar levels.

[lockwood1956]

I did elderberry one year; as an experiment I used the same recipe but made one with grape juice concentrate and one with raisins/bananas, and much preferred the latter

Thats what this hobby is about really isnt it....making stuff you like to drink

regards
bob

[Leon]

For anyone not sure what the acidity (and sugar levels) of common fruit....

see here

http://www.winesathome.co.uk/downloads/sugarandacid.pdf

Please, pass me the dunce cap . I've read that and I'm still not sure on the sugar levels. Is it brix? Is that some sort of measure for sugar? If so, how does it work? In all the books I've read on winemaking, ok, in both the books I have read on winemaking, brix has never been mentioned. Is there some way of converting it into grammes, as they have on the label of packaged food and drinks we use; 1 lb of apples = ....g of sugar. I appreciate it would have to be an approximate figure.

[Sasquatch]

Thats what this hobby is about really isnt it....making stuff you like to drink

regards
bob

And if you don't like it .......you still drink it!

[Duffbeer]

Brix is a sugar measurement mainly used in the States or commercial vinyards, you need a refractometer to take brix readings. This is a superb way of checking fruit sugar content prior to ferment as often the refractometer will have a potential alcohol grading at the side.
We as amatuer winemakers in the UK tend to use hydrometer readings for sugar density which works well, however it does struggle to test fruit sugars of hard fruits such as apples/pears etc.

A simple guide I use is 1lb of sugar will create 6% alcohol in the gallon & use the refractometer as a starting guide for the fruit sugar, also remember the sugar content of fruit will generally change from season to season.

[mcblades]

To add a little. Brix is % sugar (sucrose) by weight. in other words a brix of 5 is 5% sugar or 5g sugar per 100ml solvent (water). So if your supermarket grape juice has 150g / l sugar then it will have 15g / 100ml or 15 brix.

At least that is my understanding of it.

[Cellar_Rat]

To add a little. Brix is % sugar (sucrose) by weight. in other words a brix of 5 is 5% sugar or 5g sugar per 100ml solvent (water). So if your supermarket grape juice has 150g / l sugar then it will have 15g / 100ml or 15 brix.

At least that is my understanding of it.

Sure is.

I like to think of it as: 1˚ Brix = 1% sugar (ie 10 grams of sugar per litre) and I find that makes adding any sugar very easy maths. For those who haven't seen one this is what the scale in the eyepice look like...

refractometer scale.jpg