RHUBARB WINE

This is my first attempt at making wine, I’ve read the book and I am familiarising myself with the new language, like pitch and aeration, simply means stir and add a ingredient along with hydrometer and measuring the specific gravity, well it’s a good thing that I love science as specific and final gravity measurements are a indication of the amount of sugar in your must (a wine prior to fermentation), it’s not complicated once you understand the mathematical formula, however user error can change all that.  The hydrometer is calibrated to Be used at 20C / 68F when measuring the specific gravity, if used a degree above or below you will record misleading results leading to a incorrect alcohol content measurement.

On this occasion I am being very Kristi and I have decided to wing it and not to test the specific gravity due to not having a hydrometer and being way to impatient to wait for one to arrive in the post...But I have read the book and know what I’m supposed to do and will do on the next batch.

Family History...

It is at this point I am laughing to myself with the memory of my Grandad Seaford who always made his own wines and beers, his parsnip wine which turned out to be almost a whisky rendered my grandad and dad completely and utterly inebriated to such a level it was never drunk again!  But that’s not the funniest part, my grandad Seaford who was retired occasionally took night work to buff up the coffers, on this occasion grandad was working for The Bank Of England as a security guard, he and his work colleagues set up a still in the loft of the building and started making their own personal alcohol, but on one fateful night the still exploded, I absolutely love my families history and can do attitude.

I will find out in a years time the alcohol content the old fashioned way the wine will either blow me off my feet or become day wine!

Rhubarb Wine Fermenting

Stage One

I’m fermenting 2 batches of 5 litres rhubarb syrup water with 1.125 kg of wine sugar.

A specific gravity calculation will give you your approximate alcohol content in the finished wine.  Most must’s, a wine before fermentation, specific gravity will be around 1098, knowing how much sugar is in your must will give you a fair indication of how much alcohol will be in your finished wine.  So I should end up once fermented (in 2 months time), with a specific gravity around 990.  This is known as the Final Gravity.

Science Maths Bit...

To achieve a approximate alcohol content you just use the specific gravity and final gravity figures then x 0.13

(SG) 1098 - (FG) 990 x 0.13 = 14.4% Ye-har !!!

Adding more sugar will not make a stronger alcohol content because yeast can only consume a certain amount of sugar, this will leave a residual amount of sugar in the finished wine, making a sweet wine.

Cleanliness Is Key To Success

I cannot stress this enough there is no point going to all the effort of making your wine and then ruining the whole batch due to contamination from micro-organisms.  Now yes, yeast is a micro-organism but it’s the organism that you have chosen to grow, a good organism that will produce a beautiful wine, not the other type which will spoil your hard work.  In order to avoid the unwanted organism sterilisation is require IN ALL STAGES.

Sterilising Your Equipment

I have used a sterilisation solution called Milton, it is what us mums used for our babies bottles.  Following the instructions I make a water solution and leave my Demi Johns to soak along with the bungs, air locks, siphons, caps, bottles, brewing buckets and anything else that is going to touch your wine.

Equipment 

1 bottle sterilisation fluid

2 x 10 litre fermenting buckets

4 x 5 litre demi johns with bung and airlock 

1 fine mesh sieve 

1 x 2 litre measuring jug

1 siphon 

12 x 75cl bottles with caps or corks

Rhubarb Wine Recipe

Makes 12 bottles

2.8kg rhubarb stalks

2.25kg wine sugar

500ml bottle white grape juice concentrate 

2 x 5g sachets Sauternes yeast

2 tsp yeast nutrient 

2 tsp pectic enzyme

2 Campden tablets crushed

Wash the rhubarb throughly and using a food processor with a thin slicing plate slice all the rhubarb, placing in to your sterilised fermenting bucket along with the sugar, stir well, place the lid on and leave for 3 days, stirring every day.

Strain the rhubarb syrup in to a second fermenting bucket through the fine meshed sieve, return the sliced rhubarb back to the original fermenting bucket and add 4 litres of cold water, stir well and place the lid back on, leave for a couple of hours then strain again.  Repeat this one more time. 

To the rhubarb syrup bucket add the grape concentrate and top up the total volume with 1.5 litres to 10 litres.  This is the point you will check the specific gravity.  You don’t have to do this it just means you will not know your alcohol content until it either blows you off your feet or is a day wine!

Adjusting Specific Gravity

1092 - 1098

This you do by adding more sugar to increase or dilution with water to lower.

To your rhubarb syrup add the yeast nutrient, crushed Campden tablets, pectic enzyme, stir in, pop on the lid and leave for 24 hours.

Stir in the yeast, pop the lid on and leave for 5 days, stirring once every day.  On day 5 siphon in to your demi-johns and fit the bung and airlock.

Leave at room temperature for 6 - 8 weeks until fermentation has ceased.

How Do I Know Fermentation Has Ceased?

One way is to watch the air lock, once bubbles cease is a most probable sign that fermentation has ceased this can be anywhere from 3 - 8 weeks.  If your yeast runs out of food (sugar) then fermentation will cease.

Using your hydrometer measure the specific gravity of your wine, for a dry wine like this one you want a reading of 0990 - 0995, a reading of 0995 would indicate a 0.2% sugar content which is considered dry.  A sugar reading of 1 % + would indicated a sweet wine, and if fermentation has not stopped you run a high risk of fermentation continuing in the sealed bottle which would most possibly lead to bottles exploding!

Once fermentation appears to have ceased siphon off in to your second demi-johns and leave at room temperature until your cloudy pink rhubarb wine is clear, it is now ready to be siphoned off in to your 12 sterilised wine bottles.  Date and label your bottles, place in your wine store or rack and leave for one year before enjoying the fruits of your labour.

Why is there a carpet of dead yeast cells at the bottom of my Demi John?

This is dead yeast cells that have falling to the bottom of the Demi John and will rot there!  This is called autolysis.  Now this is an important part of champagne making and a good thing as it helps achieve a subtler flavour in your wine, but you can have too much of a good thing!  Rack the wine off in to fresh sterile demi johns leaving the sediment behind.

This in its self will now cause a problem, this is a rookie error I have made and if I’m honest I think my first batch is going to fail!  But I have learnt a lot from this experience and am now on my second batch with zero errors so far.  You want the most minimum air gap left in your racked off demi John, as air is the destroyer of wine by encouraging the wrong bacteria.

This was my fermenting demi john and as you can see my original recipe came up about 250ml short in liquid, at this point I was unaware that having a gap was not ok, it would increase the chance of failure due to possibly allowing the wrong bacteria to grow.

Not enough sugar to feed the yeast can result in early fermentation.  Again I wanted a really dry wine as my husband is diabetic and sugar is a absolute NO!  So I lowered the sugar content by 10% to ensure that the yeast would eat all the sugar turning it into alcohol and resulting in a very dry wine.  This I now know 4 weeks on that my fermentation stopped at the end of week 3, not unusual but I expected 6 weeks.  

I have racked off into 2 fresh demi johns leaving the carpet of dead yeast which then left my bottles with a deficit of 500ml, so I topped up the must with a sugar water of 3 parts water to one part sugar.

This re started my fermentation again, which is how I know I my yeast run out of food.  I have no idea what this will do to the wine or vinegar ! Until next year but the must smelt like a sharp rhubarb wine, so we’ll have to wait and see.

Fermentation has finished and must racked off in to 2nd demi johns waiting to go clear before racking off in to bottles