What to do With a Stalled Wine Fermentation...

[Nobilis]

Hello everyone! I wanted to share something with all of you. So I had a stalled wine fermentation. After pitching more yeast, and getting no response from the batch, I went ahead and distilled all two gallons of wine to brandy. OMG, is it good! I had a white wine batch, and the product from that is mellow, smooth on the throat, and funny smelling. The second batch from the red wine is WOW! I used Kedem (red; Concord), and Welch's (white; unknown). I yielded 0.50 qts., and 20 ozs. (respectively), from both batches. I started out with a gallon of each. So I would say it's not a bad yield. On top of that I double filtered each batch over wood charcoal. It added a smoothness to the finished product. Still the brandy derived from the red wine fermentation was...WOW! . Recipe is below:

White wine:
1 container Welcher's white grape frozen juice concentrate
Watermelon
2 cups each white/ brown sugar ( I am convinced that brown sugar provides added nutrients to the yeast.)
Water up to the amount specified by the Welcher's container.
1 packet Fleischmann's Highly Active Yeast
Banana peels (amylase)

First, I know there's better stuff out there in terms of yeast, and fairly cheap too {probably why fermentation stalled}, but it's inexpensive and gives consistent results. Now onto the instructions...take the watermelon and blend the chunks to pulp. Add the sugar. Add a portion of the water that will be used with the concentrate. Add this to a container, and add the yeast. Make sure you clean everything thoroughly to avoid contamination. Set the mixture aside while you hydrate your yeast. After 15-20 mins., combine the concentrate, water, peels, and yeast/sugar/fruit mixture to a clean container. Red Star champagne yeast can be used on this, but I didn't use it and I got really good results from the resulting brandy.

Red wine:
Kedem 64 oz. Concord Grape juice (You can use blush too! It's like the color of a zinfandel).
2 cups each white/brown sugar
Banana peels (amylase)
1 packet Fleischmann's Highly Active Yeast
A small bunch of Pinot Noir grapes

Run the grapes through a blender, add to your fermentation container. You can toss in the juice as well at this point. I used a sterilized 1 gallon milk container. The sugar and yeast mixture from the top applies here. Overall it's better to re-hydrate your yeast. I have a coffee liqueur going that hasn't stalled (thanks to a heater). I contribute this in part to re-hydrating the yeast.

I recommend you filter the resulting brandy at least twice, and drink this chilled. The red is rough, harsh, yet sweet. The white as I said is mellow, easy on the throat. At least mine's is. I would love to hear from those of you who try this. That way I can know if this is typical of the recipe. I am kinda flaky about visiting the forum, admittedly, but I troll occasionally because I miss it. I hope all who try this recipe enjoy the results as much as I have . I just couldn't keep this recipe to myself! Have a good one all.

[multipazz]

first thing to do with a stuck wine fermentation is add nutrients

but use a complete nutrient feed like fermax or tronozymol

not a pure DAP nutrient

the complete nutrient feeds have other ingredients that the yeast need later in fermentation

DAP is most beneficial at the start of frrmentation and will not restart a stuck ferment

[Nobilis]

Yeah, I guess. It stalled because I'm on the east coast and fall rolled in. I had hoped to rack and start the second fermentation. But, since it didn't work I looked at my options. I had none of that stuff on hand you mentioned, but I had a distiller. To be honest, I don't use any of the stuff you mentioned when wine making, or fermenting for distilling anyhow. I use yeast nutrients like tomato paste and oranges (vitamin c), and ginger and banana peels for amylase, etc. I get really good results, and so I have not explored other avenues. It's a personal choice.

Even with cheese making I don't use many of the ingredients I've seen others recommend. In this way I get the high quality of store bought (if not higher), without the preservatives, additives, etc. This is not to say it's bad, in my purview, but it goes against the purpose of making the stuff at home as opposed to buying it at the store. In the spirit of that philosophy I turned my wine into brandy as opposed to pitching in a whole bunch of ingredients I never intended to add. But, thanks for your input. Others can now choose to make brandy or use the stuff you mentioned in your post. Two choices instead of one!

[shadylane]

I don't think banana peels will supply amylase. It probably is useful for a nutrient.
Also, If there is no starch to convert then amylase isn't going to do any good.

[Nobilis]

Hi again all! In response to Shadylane...

Actually bananas do supply amylase. Just Google it, but here's some links to get you started: [http://www.enzymeessentials.com/HTML/amylase.html]; [http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... =39&t=3737]; and [http://www.ajebs.com/vol6/13.pdf].

There's a number of other sources of amylase including saliva, cassava, and ginger, as you will read. All living organisms process carbohydrates which may or may not be converted to sugar, but the amylase generated by the banana peels break all of these down. This includes grapes, and inherently grape juice. Since carbohydrates convert to both sugar and starch, alpha-amylase is ideal for these conversions, hence the reason I use banana peels in my wine production & alcohol production. Banana peels are rich in amylase, especially when the skins are turning, or have turned black. These allow me to break down all the carbs including the ones that convert to sugar to yield maximum alcohol content from my mashes and musts. This results in happy and active yeast in my mixes. That said, I hope that provided some insight into the methods of my madness. Cheers!

[Prairiepiss]

I would have to disagree with this statement.

first thing to do with a stuck wine fermentation is add nutrients

The first thing to do is check that the temps are where they should be. For the yeast used.
Then check with a hydrometer. That it has indeed stalled. Bubbles in an air lock or lack of. Don't always mean stalled ferment.
Then recipe evaluation.
Making sure the sugar content wasn't to much for the yeast used. or just plain to much.
Also to see if the recipe did in fact include enough nutrients. To sustain the yeast through the ferment.
Then Ph test.

All that is assuming fermentation actually started. When the yeast was pitched.

Adding stuff Willy nilly to a ferment. Isn't the answer. And adding stuff to a started ferment. Should be the last option. After all other options have been exhausted.

Now. Brown sugar doesn't add enough nutrients to do squat. That is if you are talking regular refined brown sugar. If you are talking about a brown sugar like panela. That's a different story.

If the banana skins did anything at all. It would be so little I wouldn't consider even adding them.

Raisins would have been a better choice for added nutrients.

[multipazz]

sorry yes you are right

I just assumed that the temps were correct ect ect

there are indeed many factors to take into consideration before adding nutrients

and taking SG readings over a few days to confirm it is stuck is the first thing to do

[Ayay]

Run whatever the ferment managed to do. You will recover more by extracting (stripping) all the alc that was fermented, and starting a new ferment, than by trying to get a failed ferment to deliver what was expected.

Cut your losses, and that means making the cuts in the spirit run after the strip! A new ferment can incorporate the sugar remaining in the backset of the failed ferment that you ran. The backset will contain the unfermented sugars all sterilized and already hot for dissolving more sugar.

[Nobilis]

Cut your losses, and that means making the cuts in the spirit run after the strip! A new ferment can incorporate the sugar remaining in the backset of the failed ferment that you ran. The backset will contain the unfermented sugars all sterilized and already hot for dissolving more sugar.

What kind of flavor would you get from this method? And are you proposing a wine fermentation using the backset, or brandy fermentation? Either way it's damn interesting, and funny that you mention this. I noticed after I distilled I had lots of sugar left over in the backset from the wine. The alcohol was gone obviously, and I was thinking of pitching yeast but thought this would produce sub-par results. Can you expound a bit further on the quality (taste, potency, etc.) derived from this method? I would love to try this actually, and I missed my chance (sadly). But, all-in-all thanks for your input Ayay!

[Ayay]

I go for the cleanest alc. Taste is all about no bad in the taste. Good taste is a bonus and bad taste must be eliminated.
So...if there are no bad tastes it's good, If the taste is good then it's better

Yes tastes do come through in a single reflux run, and also in a strip followed by a reflux run. Nothing like the tastes that come through in a pot spirit run, but the pot run will need a few months of ageing to settle down while a good reflux run will settle down in a few days...in either case provided the cuts are done right.

A stuck ferment will have produced some alc. My philosophy is to extract that alc as cleanly as possible, and then to recycle the now sterilized un-fermented sugars into another ferment that will eat those sugars.
This may be the only use of turbo yeasts that I can think of.

[Nobilis]

Thanks Ayay. Come this time next season I may put some wine aside just to try it your way. I have drunk Christian Brothers, and E&J. I have to say I did not enjoy either experience. I was reticent to attempt a brandy because of those experiences. This happened completely by accident, but because of it I have a different perspective on what brandy can be. I will experiment a bit further now. Thanks to everyone for your suggestions, and especially to Ayay for your insight. Cheers everyone! Drink up.