Fermenting Question

[BumArmBob]

I hope I choose the correct area for this question.....

Ok, I have seen the Grape Juice Concentrate recipe in the Tried and True recipes and the ones that are all over the internet. They all appear to be the same and say that fermentation is 30 days.....

Can this be true? Why so long when other mashes are ready in 4-7 days?
Are there other things that I am not seeing just yet that take that long to ferment?

Thanks for any input you can give.
BumArmBob

[Shine0n]

If it's in the tried and true then there is a reason for that.
Cranky is the man for fruity things, from reading his posts and talking back and forth he likes to ferment as long as needed to get the job done.
Some things to consider are which type of yeast is being used, some work off fast and some slower.

Also the settling of the wort, the longer it sits the more solids fall and makes a nice clear wort, then you get into racking to other fermenters to further clear, the more you rack the longer the process.

I'm not the man to answer all the technical questions but this is just what I've gathered from reading here on HD and not looking at YouTube vids, (they can get you in some deep shit) not all are wrong but there are so many it's too hard to tell the good from the junk. Stick to HD and learn from the best.
If you look at the the rank of the person posting and it says MASTER DISTILLER ya might think about learning from them. That's what I've done and even someone with a bit less experience can help by having made a mistake and learning from it and sharing their experience.

Hope someone with the skills can help at what I've missed or just forgot to mention.

Shine0n

[der wo]

Temperature has a huge impact on fermentation speed.
And OG, yeast, yeast amount, nutrients...
Generally it's recommended to ferment fruits slow -> low temperature
And when fermenting long it's more important to use a sealed fermenter with airlock than when fast fermenting.

[bitter]

Most wine kits I have made have taken about 4-5 weeks to ferment dry and they another week to clear (Normally fermented at about 68f for a cleaner wine).

It will depend on the yeast you use and the SG of the juice also. Most wine kits are int he 1.080 to 1.090 and ferment dry to about .990 so about 12% alchol + or - if your planning to distill things you would be better off dropping the sg to about 1.055 with water before fermenting.

For yeast I typically use EC-1118 or K1V-1116 for wine making. At a lower SG of 1.055 the fermentation should not take as long as if the sg is higher like requred for a wine to keep but still give it time.

I hope cranky kicks in and answer he will know more. My grape fermentation's have only been for wine making.

B

[BumArmBob]

Thanks Guys....

I will try and get in touch with Cranky

[cranky]

Not sure I really know as much as you guys seem to think.

I am not a fan of bread yeast for anything to begin with but it tends to be a much bigger deal with fruit. Yeast need to be right for the ferment, so wine yeast for fruit with the possible exception of ale yeast for apple. I do prefer a long slow cold ferment. Temperature needs to match the yeast and vice versa. Ferments also take as long as they take, I don't think it's a good thing to try to force yeast to finish on our time schedule, they will finish on their own. Cooler temperatures of course tend to stress the yeast less and happy yeast make happy booze. I believe that on a long ferment with a rest the yeast tend to clean up after themselves and get rid of things that would otherwise give off flavors. In my experience somewhere around the 2 month point something magical happens. I really can't explain it any other way, it's a strange thing to say but the wine becomes happy and gives you a euphoric type of feeling when you drink it. I attempt to capture this happy alcohol by waiting at least 2-3 months, racking after the first month and sometimes monthly. I feel my distilled products benefits from this. I also try to replicate the process the french use when making Calvadose where the apple cider is allowed to rest for up to a year before distilling. The French swear this adds flavor back to the final product.

[Shine0n]

And now the master has spoken! Lol

[cranky]

I'd hardly call me a master I just mess around with fruit... a lot

[Pikey]

Well that gives us rather more information than the OP asked for !

There's a lot of food for thought in that post cranky, especially for an old winemaker relatively new to this art. It's a shame really that it will get lost in the general "history" of posts in a few days time.

Where I live, we can grow grapes and I do, but they don't ripen every year. If it's a year when they don't, I pick them anyway and add water and enough sugar to give a potential 13% abv and ferment them that way. I often think the flavour is actually better than using ripened grapes.

The flavour tends to be a bit "German" (my favorite wines are German) and I highly recommend this way to anyone whose grapes do not properly ripen. Gooseberries can be treated the same way and make a remarkably good wine of the same character, which is preferred to "proper" grape wine by many of those who taste it.

I was intending to distil some this year and look towards making a brandy, but had thought to treat it like a rum or whisky wash and cook it as soon as the ferment finished. Now, having read your post, I'm not so sure !

[Edit - I'd like to see some input from NZ Chris on this too. He seems to make a lot of brandy ]