My father has told me that the best wine he ever made he started in the
primary, when it finished he racked the wine and added more sugar and more
yeast and nutrients. he did this 8 (once a month) times before bottling. has
anyone ever done this?

I have never seen a suggestion to add more nutrient and there is no reason
to add more yeast but adding sugar is common and termed FEEDING the wine.
It is used to get a high alcohol level. If you put all the sugar for an 18%
wine in at once you may shock the yeast and it will not start. Put in
enough to get 12-14% and every time it gets down to a SG of about 1.000, add
a little more sugar. Eventually the yeast will hit their tolerance and
quit. You can generally get 16-18% this way and sometimes higher.

Ray

"Stephen" wrote in message
news:nZGnb.52828$Fm2.29831@attbi_s04...
My father has told me that the best wine he ever made he started in the
primary, when it finished he racked the wine and added more sugar and more
yeast and nutrients. he did this 8 (once a month) times before bottling.
has
anyone ever done this?

I can only speak for what i have seen here, but i would have to say that
you can do it, but by doing that you basicaly go back to primary
fermentation. One thought that has crossed my mind is that you could
probably do a primary with one style of yeast, then kill that strain,
rack off, add sugar, new yeast (different type) and start the primary
all over again. This is however more of a random thought off the top of
my head, and would love to see someone comment on it.

Mark "Q" Tanner

"Stephen" wrote in
news:nZGnb.52828$Fm2.29831@attbi_s04:

My father has told me that the best wine he ever made he started in
the primary, when it finished he racked the wine and added more sugar
and more yeast and nutrients. he did this 8 (once a month) times
before bottling. has anyone ever done this?

The procedure doesn't make a lot of sense to me. This is not (normal)
sugar-feeding, which one does while the original yeast is still active. It's
very difficult for a (new) yeast colony to grow in a high-alcohol
environment, and it seems unlikely that adding sugar, yeast, and nutrients
after fermentation had ended would be consistently successful, especially 8
successive months. The most likely result of such a procedure would be an
extremely sweet wine --- which perhaps would be "the best wine he ever made"
if someone enjoyed sweet wines. The only way I could see this working would
be if the initial Brix was very low, and each successive sugar addition was
small. If that were the case, one could do 8 successive fermentations.

Reminds me of a friend who carefully followed the procedure in a book on
making vinegar, and ended up with "the best tasting vinegar he had ever
tasted." But what he had done was start with a pasteurized commercial
vinegar, and his end product was a little bit of vinegar with a lot of wine.
Thus it was "the best tasting vinegar..." because it was primarily wine, not
vinegar.

"quakeholio" wrote in message
. 77.206...
I can only speak for what i have seen here, but i would have to say that
you can do it, but by doing that you basicaly go back to primary
fermentation. One thought that has crossed my mind is that you could
probably do a primary with one style of yeast, then kill that strain,
rack off, add sugar, new yeast (different type) and start the primary
all over again. This is however more of a random thought off the top of
my head, and would love to see someone comment on it.

Mark "Q" Tanner

"Stephen" wrote in
news:nZGnb.52828$Fm2.29831@attbi_s04:

My father has told me that the best wine he ever made he started in
the primary, when it finished he racked the wine and added more sugar
and more yeast and nutrients. he did this 8 (once a month) times
before bottling. has anyone ever done this?

Slow feeding is something C.J.J. Berry describes in detail in one of his
favorite recipes, peach perfection. His procedure suggests keeping it going
for 7-8 months. I tried it the first time back in the 70's but in
unairconditioned S. Texas where the indoor temperatures were 100 deg. F. I
could not keep it going that long. It just went too fast. Now I am just
too lazy to feed it slowly. I dump it all in with 2 feedings.

Ray

"Negodki" wrote in message
...
The procedure doesn't make a lot of sense to me. This is not (normal)
sugar-feeding, which one does while the original yeast is still active.
It's
very difficult for a (new) yeast colony to grow in a high-alcohol
environment, and it seems unlikely that adding sugar, yeast, and nutrients
after fermentation had ended would be consistently successful, especially
8
successive months. The most likely result of such a procedure would be an
extremely sweet wine --- which perhaps would be "the best wine he ever
made"
if someone enjoyed sweet wines. The only way I could see this working
would
be if the initial Brix was very low, and each successive sugar addition
was
small. If that were the case, one could do 8 successive fermentations.

Reminds me of a friend who carefully followed the procedure in a book on
making vinegar, and ended up with "the best tasting vinegar he had ever
tasted." But what he had done was start with a pasteurized commercial
vinegar, and his end product was a little bit of vinegar with a lot of
wine.
Thus it was "the best tasting vinegar..." because it was primarily wine,
not
vinegar.

"quakeholio" wrote in message
. 77.206...
I can only speak for what i have seen here, but i would have to say that
you can do it, but by doing that you basicaly go back to primary
fermentation. One thought that has crossed my mind is that you could
probably do a primary with one style of yeast, then kill that strain,
rack off, add sugar, new yeast (different type) and start the primary
all over again. This is however more of a random thought off the top of
my head, and would love to see someone comment on it.

Mark "Q" Tanner

"Stephen" wrote in
news:nZGnb.52828$Fm2.29831@attbi_s04:

My father has told me that the best wine he ever made he started in
the primary, when it finished he racked the wine and added more sugar
and more yeast and nutrients. he did this 8 (once a month) times
before bottling. has anyone ever done this?

Thanks Ray. I just looked it up in "First Steps", and it is a very
interesting recipe and technique. I may try it this summer.

"Ray" wrote in message
.. .
Slow feeding is something C.J.J. Berry describes in detail in one of his
favorite recipes, peach perfection. His procedure suggests keeping it
going
for 7-8 months. I tried it the first time back in the 70's but in
unairconditioned S. Texas where the indoor temperatures were 100 deg. F.
I
could not keep it going that long. It just went too fast. Now I am just
too lazy to feed it slowly. I dump it all in with 2 feedings.

Ray

"Negodki" wrote in message
...
The procedure doesn't make a lot of sense to me. This is not (normal)
sugar-feeding, which one does while the original yeast is still active.
It's
very difficult for a (new) yeast colony to grow in a high-alcohol
environment, and it seems unlikely that adding sugar, yeast, and
nutrients
after fermentation had ended would be consistently successful,
especially
8
successive months. The most likely result of such a procedure would be
an
extremely sweet wine --- which perhaps would be "the best wine he ever
made"
if someone enjoyed sweet wines. The only way I could see this working
would
be if the initial Brix was very low, and each successive sugar addition
was
small. If that were the case, one could do 8 successive fermentations.

Reminds me of a friend who carefully followed the procedure in a book on
making vinegar, and ended up with "the best tasting vinegar he had ever
tasted." But what he had done was start with a pasteurized commercial
vinegar, and his end product was a little bit of vinegar with a lot of
wine.
Thus it was "the best tasting vinegar..." because it was primarily wine,
not
vinegar.

"quakeholio" wrote in message
. 77.206...
I can only speak for what i have seen here, but i would have to say
that
you can do it, but by doing that you basicaly go back to primary
fermentation. One thought that has crossed my mind is that you could
probably do a primary with one style of yeast, then kill that strain,
rack off, add sugar, new yeast (different type) and start the primary
all over again. This is however more of a random thought off the top
of
my head, and would love to see someone comment on it.

Mark "Q" Tanner

"Stephen" wrote in
news:nZGnb.52828$Fm2.29831@attbi_s04:

My father has told me that the best wine he ever made he started in
the primary, when it finished he racked the wine and added more
sugar
and more yeast and nutrients. he did this 8 (once a month) times
before bottling. has anyone ever done this?