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Hello Everyone, I've searched and searched and I can not find the answer to why my berry mash lost its flavor. I was trying to make wine. I am thinking that I may have made it to strong and used to much yeast and the wrong kind of yeast. I've looked for the answer, can't find it.

Here is some info. I wanted to make a strong wine. Used berries (blackberry, raspberries, strawberries, blueberries), 9lbs of sugar SG 1.10, Yeast redstar 18gms and nutrients. After fermentation SG of 0.98 (about 16% alcohol yield I believe, kind of high cant believe it myself). It seemed to ferment nice, but did not have a good taste at all. Help or point me in the right direction please! Oh yeah...also Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays!!!!

Red star far as I know is a bread yeast. Bread yeast doesn't play nice with fruit and they generally start to produce off esters above say 12%

Thanks...that is why it lost or it taste funny. Thank you very much!!! Love this site!!

+1 with what croweater said. a good wine yeast will make a big differance. if your gonna still it then more fruit less sugar.

Also, you can preserve a lot of flavor if you can reserve a small portion of fruit and add it later when the yeast are still active but less so. If you do a secondary ferment you can add some fruit then.

Also, in many fruit distillations a LOT of the flavor and nose s in the early heads. If you made conventional grain cuts the flavor is in the feints jar.
As far as yeast, many use EC-1118 as their "go to". It ferments slowly but very cleanly and is a very good choice for most fruits.

tp

Thanks guys!!!!

thecroweater wrote:Red star far as I know is a bread yeast. Bread yeast doesn't play nice with fruit and they generally start to produce off esters above say 12%

Can you use carbon wash to get rid of those esters?

Using bread yeast might add some off flavors, but it won't remove flavor.

How much flavor was in the must? You haven't said how much berries, or water you used.

What nutrients did you use? Berries shouldn't need any unless your must is nearly all water and sugar.

With my fruit washes I usually don't add sugar and very little if any yeast. Most fruits are natural in both, you will get a much lower abv but the flavor trade off is well worth it. I do a lot with apples and usually my washes come out to about 6%. I currently made grappa from the apple pommace added zero sugar and put almost no yeast just a light sprinkle to get it kickstarted and can't believe the flavor that came through.

I generally do add sugar to certain musts (not grapes or other berries). I did post a method up here somewhere for a plum brandy (Slivovich, Slivowitz ect.) in which I posted up Old Dogs rule of thumb to use no more than(but often less than) 5kg of fruit to 5kg of sugar to 25 ltrs of water so around 11lb to 11lb to 6 gal. This is about as far as you can push it with out adversely effecting the flavour but unless you are using some particularly dry fruit there is no need to go to this maxim. some of the plums I use are pretty sour and i get good results using a ratio of 2kgs of sugar to 5kgs of fruit, i have done side by sides of this and not sugar and found them to be virtually the same but obviously with a much increased yield with sugar added. tasting the fruit is the best way to know what sugar is needed and I also take into account how much fruit is available to me. For me musts are to much work to be content with a very low yield

Bushman wrote:With my fruit washes I usually don't add sugar and very little if any yeast. Most fruits are natural in both, you will get a much lower abv but the flavor trade off is well worth it. I do a lot with apples and usually my washes come out to about 6%. I currently made grappa from the apple pommace added zero sugar and put almost no yeast just a light sprinkle to get it kickstarted and can't believe the flavor that came through.

Read a fermentation article 4 hours ago....you are right , little to no sugar is necessary for fruit fermentation. I actually thought to make a mash of 8% next time.

NZChris wrote:Using bread yeast might add some off flavors, but it won't remove flavor.

How much flavor was in the must? You haven't said how much berries, or water you used.

What nutrients did you use? Berries shouldn't need any unless your must is nearly all water and sugar.

I actually over thought the process...berries sugar content was 4lbs and I added 7lbs of sugar. It gave a SG of 1.1.

Did you add water?

Yes I did.

Try removing some of the water by freeze jacking. Do a sample first in case you don't like it.

Freeze some in a plastic bottle. Don't overfill it.

Thaw it out through a paper or cloth filter, only keeping about the first third.

If it's too acidic for you, you might be able to fix it with baking soda or calcium carbonate. I've never tried that and don't know if it would give off flavors.

Yeah really as a wine I think its a lost cause, run it to brandy and be done with it

thecroweater wrote:Yeah really as a wine I think its a lost cause, run it to brandy and be done with it

Don't expect much flavor from that either. You would have to run twice, hard and deep with a pot still to get any berries in it. It would be good for berry steeps and next Xmas's rumtopf.

thecroweater wrote:Yeah really as a wine I think its a lost cause, run it to brandy and be done with it

Suggestion! Do a member search for Dnderhead he is in his 80's and is no longer visiting the site but if you go through his posts (I think there are over 13,000) and find the ones relating to your needs and read them you will learn more than from most including myself. He has probably forgotten more than most of us have learned on the subject. His spelling isn't the best but his information is golden.

NZChris wrote:

thecroweater wrote:Yeah really as a wine I think its a lost cause, run it to brandy and be done with it

Don't expect much flavor from that either. You would have to run twice, hard and deep with a pot still to get any berries in it. It would be good for berry steeps and next Xmas's rumtopf.

yes for sure run it twice and maybe even throw an icecream bowl of berries in the boiler for the spirit run or macerate with them with the finished spirit if your not happy with it. Either way you wont salvage it as far as wine goes, pretty darn sure of that