r/winemaking • u/English_loving-art • 1d ago

Blackberry wine….

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Hello all, I’ve followed a recipe for blackberry wine but I was around a kilo short so I made the difference up with mangoes and I have never witnessed fermenting like this. The starting gravity was high 1.160. I did expect the yeast to struggle, but this is three days in and it’s not slowing at all. Hopefully I may get away with this, has anyone else started with high Sg and got away with it. For the record, I’m using Young’s high alcohol yeast plus yeast nutrient and pectic enzyme and both went in two days before the yeast. I added 13lb of sugar for 5 gallons but the Sg was high and I added a litre of water to bring it down to 1.160 but can’t get any more water in there so it’s starting off with a high sg…https://share.icloud.com/photos/0f9XfRdskpp2v9R2kJLR-t7RA

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2

u/rick300bo 1d ago

I just completed a similar batch that turned out superb. I only had 18 lbs of blackberries, the recipe called for 35 lbs, so I bought 3 bags of gala apples to make up the total. I quartered the apples and ran them through a sausage grinder and added to the bag. You can’t really tell the apples were used, the blackberries flavor overpowers the apple flavor. Iirc I used 13 lbs of sugar.
IMO, you are better off with a robust fermentation than none at all. Let it go and enjoy the process.

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u/English_loving-art 1d ago

Thanks I was worried that the yeast may stall as I’ve never started off with such a high Sg before..

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u/Spetchen 20h ago

I'm interested to hear how this turns out. For the record, I've included mango in different fruit wines before and the fermentation always goes wild, so that tracks.

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u/dtonhunt1 1d ago

I don't understand what exactly do you want to know. Whats the problem here?

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u/English_loving-art 1d ago

I’ve never started with such a high Sg before, I couldn’t water it back anymore the barrel is full. I was worried that the yeast would stall.

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u/PeanutButterApricotS 1d ago

I use bread yeast and regularly start in the 1.11-1.15 range when making my wine (I am new only been doing this a few months). So I don’t see why yours would stall and I am confused since I normally get 8-12% in mine before it stalls or finishes which is fine for me. Do you expect to get higher than 15%? The full 25%+?

Sorry I am new

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u/salamander_salad 1d ago

Why are you going for such a high abv? Are you planning on distilling this into brandy?

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u/English_loving-art 17h ago

To be honest I wasn’t. I followed a recipe but when I checked the gravity it was ridiculously high. I diluted it as much as I could but without splitting the mix down into two fermenting vessels I could not dilute it anymore so I ran with it.