A friend gave me some half-boiled sap to start some maple wine the
other day, but I think it was a bit more than half-boiled... the
starting SG was off the scale, and the scale stops at 1.170 SG. Too
much sugar for the yeast to handle? If so, what should I do? Dilute
into two carboys?

I'm interested in making a sweet, maply wine... what's the upper
threshhold for a "regular" yeast? I'm using Lavlin EC-1118, and that's
all the local store carries.

So: is 1.170+ a yeast-killer?
What's the highest SG I could expect a Lavlin EC-1118 yeast to handle?

Thanks!

we'ved used EC-1118 in our peach wines @ 1.165. after much massaging, the EC
dried out to 1.0 or less. one wine was bone dry (in a good way) and another
was fruity/sweet but not cloying. as i say, we had to work that yeast to
keep it going. the last batch stalled & needed a turbo yeast jumpstart. so
i guess my answer is: maybe/probably and that's soley based on our limited
experience. HTH rregards, bobdrob


wrote in message
oups.com...
A friend gave me some half-boiled sap to start some maple wine the
other day, but I think it was a bit more than half-boiled... the
starting SG was off the scale, and the scale stops at 1.170 SG. Too
much sugar for the yeast to handle? If so, what should I do? Dilute
into two carboys?

I'm interested in making a sweet, maply wine... what's the upper
threshhold for a "regular" yeast? I'm using Lavlin EC-1118, and that's
all the local store carries.

So: is 1.170+ a yeast-killer?
What's the highest SG I could expect a Lavlin EC-1118 yeast to handle?

Thanks!

bobdrob wrote:
we'ved used EC-1118 in our peach wines @ 1.165. after much massaging, the EC
dried out to 1.0 or less. one wine was bone dry (in a good way) and another
was fruity/sweet but not cloying. as i say, we had to work that yeast to
keep it going. the last batch stalled & needed a turbo yeast jumpstart. so
i guess my answer is: maybe/probably and that's soley based on our limited
experience. HTH rregards, bobdrob

I'm a quasi-newbie (been doing this for a while but not "deeply," if
you know what I mean)... what do you mean by "work that yeast?"

My plan at the moment is to dilute down to 1.5 (?) and get a good
starter with some of the maple must, a tablespoon of nutrient and some
warm water. Post-insertion, other than keeping the carboy warmish, how
can I help the yeast along?

I'd like a sweet, maply finished product. Last year's attempt, starting
at 1.078 SG, turned out to be a pretty bland, characterless "white"
wine with a bit of maple aftertaste. I don't mind making an apéritif,
as long as it has maple at the front in a big way. I've got about two
litres of "pure" syrup to add to the stable final product before
bottling, too.

On 4/21/2006 11:06 AM, wrote:
bobdrob wrote:

we'ved used EC-1118 in our peach wines @ 1.165. after much massaging, the EC
dried out to 1.0 or less. one wine was bone dry (in a good way) and another
was fruity/sweet but not cloying. as i say, we had to work that yeast to
keep it going. the last batch stalled & needed a turbo yeast jumpstart. so
i guess my answer is: maybe/probably and that's soley based on our limited
experience. HTH rregards, bobdrob


I'm a quasi-newbie (been doing this for a while but not "deeply," if
you know what I mean)... what do you mean by "work that yeast?"

My plan at the moment is to dilute down to 1.5 (?) and get a good
starter with some of the maple must, a tablespoon of nutrient and some
warm water. Post-insertion, other than keeping the carboy warmish, how
can I help the yeast along?

I'd like a sweet, maply finished product. Last year's attempt, starting
at 1.078 SG, turned out to be a pretty bland, characterless "white"
wine with a bit of maple aftertaste. I don't mind making an apéritif,
as long as it has maple at the front in a big way. I've got about two
litres of "pure" syrup to add to the stable final product before
bottling, too.


Matt,

Did you mean dilute down to 1.15? That is still high, but most yeast
should be able to work in that environment. For your starter, I'd hold
off on the nutrient, or if you use it, use just a pinch (1/4 tsp), not a
tablespoon. And add it after the ferment starts, not before pitching
the yeast into the starter.

Good luck!

Cheers,
Ken Taborek

mail box wrote:


Did you mean dilute down to 1.15? That is still high, but most yeast
should be able to work in that environment. For your starter, I'd hold
off on the nutrient, or if you use it, use just a pinch (1/4 tsp), not a
tablespoon. And add it after the ferment starts, not before pitching
the yeast into the starter.

Sorry -- yes, I meant 1.15.

Should I add more nutrient to the bulk of the must? I'm worried the
yeast won't have enough to "eat" in the maple sap.

Also... would you recommend tannins in this?

we'd add yeast energizers & nutrients like Carlson ammonium phoshate w/
food grade urea, Crosby & Baker Fermax, these little English tablets made
of thiaimn, hcl & lactose, and an unspecified proprietary nutrient from the
LHBWS. we'd pitch the above separately & as a party mix of no specific blend
.... we also dragged the primary up into the kitchen ( much to my wife's
consternation & bewilderment) to goose up & stabilize a warmer temp. we're
not great note takers & book keepers so we don't really know which measure
had the best affect , but we try to replicate from memory & slog forward,
tasting all the way!
wrote in message
oups.com...

bobdrob wrote:
we'ved used EC-1118 in our peach wines @ 1.165. after much massaging, the
EC
dried out to 1.0 or less. one wine was bone dry (in a good way) and
another
was fruity/sweet but not cloying. as i say, we had to work that yeast to
keep it going. the last batch stalled & needed a turbo yeast jumpstart.
so
i guess my answer is: maybe/probably and that's soley based on our limited
experience. HTH rregards, bobdrob

I'm a quasi-newbie (been doing this for a while but not "deeply," if
you know what I mean)... what do you mean by "work that yeast?"

My plan at the moment is to dilute down to 1.5 (?) and get a good
starter with some of the maple must, a tablespoon of nutrient and some
warm water. Post-insertion, other than keeping the carboy warmish, how
can I help the yeast along?

I'd like a sweet, maply finished product. Last year's attempt, starting
at 1.078 SG, turned out to be a pretty bland, characterless "white"
wine with a bit of maple aftertaste. I don't mind making an apéritif,
as long as it has maple at the front in a big way. I've got about two
litres of "pure" syrup to add to the stable final product before
bottling, too.

On 4/21/2006 11:59 AM, wrote:
mail box wrote:


Did you mean dilute down to 1.15? That is still high, but most yeast
should be able to work in that environment. For your starter, I'd hold
off on the nutrient, or if you use it, use just a pinch (1/4 tsp), not a
tablespoon. And add it after the ferment starts, not before pitching
the yeast into the starter.


Sorry -- yes, I meant 1.15.

Should I add more nutrient to the bulk of the must? I'm worried the
yeast won't have enough to "eat" in the maple sap.

Also... would you recommend tannins in this?


Matt,

Nutrient in the must is a good idea. Add per the manufacturer's
instructions. Aeration is a good idea for any mead, and especially a
high gravity must.

Tannins are a matter of taste. I add oak to many of my meads, which
contributes some tannin, and I've also used tannin powder on occasion.
If you enjoy a tannic red wine, you'll probably enjoy a tannic mead.
The tannin can also help to balance the residual sweetness.


Cheers,
Ken Taborek

A friend gave me some half-boiled sap to start some maple wine.

Ok, Let's start at the beginning. Finished maple syrup is about 67%
sugar.

I use a 1:1 ratio with water giving me 33-34% sugar . SG is 1.125

Use a malic acid tolerant yeast , I use Lavin 71-B .Use a nutrient.

I've found the best way is to heat the whole thing up so it's giving
off a bit of steam , Take a bowl of the must and when it's cooled to
90-100F cast in some yeast. Pour the rest of the must into a carboy and
sprinkle in some yeast. Don't shake it, don't move it any more than you
have to. Let the yeast float on top. Once the bowl of yeast is going
gently pour it in and airlock it.

I only make 1 imperial gallon at a time , larger quanities might be
harder to work with,

The heat from the must will help the yeast . Don't shake or stir .

I use a dark syrup and after a day or two a distinct line will form,
dark on the bottom, straw coloured on the top and the line , over maybe
a week , will move down the carboy.

Let it finish on it's own, around 14% will kill off the yeast , Mine
takes about 3 months . Super sweet straw coloured dessert wine,

..

You said you wanted to make a sweet mead but that is only part of what you
need to decide. You need to decide what you want in terms of alcohol. Do
you want to make a mead that will blow the top of your head off after one
glass or do you want to have a typical wine level of 11 to 13% or do you
want an easy drinking 8-9%. This will definitely effect how you should
approach making the mead.

Ray

wrote in message
oups.com...
A friend gave me some half-boiled sap to start some maple wine the
other day, but I think it was a bit more than half-boiled... the
starting SG was off the scale, and the scale stops at 1.170 SG. Too
much sugar for the yeast to handle? If so, what should I do? Dilute
into two carboys?

I'm interested in making a sweet, maply wine... what's the upper
threshhold for a "regular" yeast? I'm using Lavlin EC-1118, and that's
all the local store carries.

So: is 1.170+ a yeast-killer?
What's the highest SG I could expect a Lavlin EC-1118 yeast to handle?

Thanks!

Ray Calvert wrote:
You said you wanted to make a sweet mead but that is only part of what you
need to decide. You need to decide what you want in terms of alcohol. Do
you want to make a mead that will blow the top of your head off after one
glass or do you want to have a typical wine level of 11 to 13% or do you
want an easy drinking 8-9%. This will definitely effect how you should
approach making the mead.

Ray

The yeast'll die off at about 13-14% anyway, no?

I'll keep an eye on it with the hydrometer... if the alcohol content
starts wandering higher than 14%, I'll start thinking about killing the
yeast. But I have some time to think about it first, right?

Okay: I diluted ridiculously strong (almost syrup) maple sap down to
1.140 SG, added some primed yeast, a bit of yeast nutrient (according
to instructions on the container) and things started fermenting.
Because the sap was so thick, and I had so much of it, I wound up
putting about 20 L of must in a primary, and another 20 L or so in a
carboy with lots of head room. Put both next to a oil-filled room
heater, so they both are at about 20 degrees Celsius.

This was about eight days ago.

The second or third day after re-starting the maple wine at 1.140 SG,
the fermentation was obvious: a yeasty foam was forming on the surface.
I'd stir once a day to keep a bit of oxygen in the mix.

Both are still fermenting (I put an airlock on the carboy this morning,
just as an experiment), but starting three days ago, on top of both
musts there is a thick layer of ... slime. It's the only way I can
describe it. It' sort of a rich brown foam on the top, but when I put
the stirring spoon in, it goes through a few millimetres of a viscous
clear (beige, translucent, not opaque) goo that has the same texture
and consistency as what I imagine frog eggs are like. If I stir, it
sort of clings to the spoon and "balls up" in the centre on top of of
the must, but its natural elasticity spread it right back out again.

It's... uh... gross. But is it bad? Harmful? I've never seen anything
like it before, but a quick check of SG showed a drop down to about
1.120, and a quick taste of the sample (taken from sub-slime levels)
showed it to be tasty, if somewhat syrupy/slimy. And with a bit of
evident alcohol kick already.

What's the slime? Should I be worried?

I don't know what you got but I never stir mine. Just airlock it asap
and ignore it.

since the sap was only 1/2 boiled, could it be residual unboiled sugar
content with sap impurities forming a cap? just guessing... i know that
when we boil sugar for candymaking in school, cheap noname brand x sugars
foam considerably more in the process than does domino... aagain, wild
speculation on my part. any green mountain state vintners out there with 2
cents to put in?


wrote in message
ups.com...
Okay: I diluted ridiculously strong (almost syrup) maple sap down to
1.140 SG, added some primed yeast, a bit of yeast nutrient (according
to instructions on the container) and things started fermenting.
Because the sap was so thick, and I had so much of it, I wound up
putting about 20 L of must in a primary, and another 20 L or so in a
carboy with lots of head room. Put both next to a oil-filled room
heater, so they both are at about 20 degrees Celsius.

This was about eight days ago.

The second or third day after re-starting the maple wine at 1.140 SG,
the fermentation was obvious: a yeasty foam was forming on the surface.
I'd stir once a day to keep a bit of oxygen in the mix.

Both are still fermenting (I put an airlock on the carboy this morning,
just as an experiment), but starting three days ago, on top of both
musts there is a thick layer of ... slime. It's the only way I can
describe it. It' sort of a rich brown foam on the top, but when I put
the stirring spoon in, it goes through a few millimetres of a viscous
clear (beige, translucent, not opaque) goo that has the same texture
and consistency as what I imagine frog eggs are like. If I stir, it
sort of clings to the spoon and "balls up" in the centre on top of of
the must, but its natural elasticity spread it right back out again.

It's... uh... gross. But is it bad? Harmful? I've never seen anything
like it before, but a quick check of SG showed a drop down to about
1.120, and a quick taste of the sample (taken from sub-slime levels)
showed it to be tasty, if somewhat syrupy/slimy. And with a bit of
evident alcohol kick already.

What's the slime? Should I be worried?

bobdrob wrote:
since the sap was only 1/2 boiled, could it be residual unboiled sugar
content with sap impurities forming a cap? just guessing... i know that
when we boil sugar for candymaking in school, cheap noname brand x sugars
foam considerably more in the process than does domino... aagain, wild
speculation on my part. any green mountain state vintners out there with 2
cents to put in?

That's a leading theory at the moment -- I airlocked the one in the
carboy (I need another carboy for the one in the primary, but when your
main mode of transporation is a bicycle, and the winemaking shops close
when you get off work, getting a 23 L glass jar home is a tricky
proposition... working on it this week), and when the airlock "boiled
over" the slime in it was sticky and sweet. I think it's sediment from
the sap (impurities, as you said) "boiling up" to the top of the must
and bonding to excess sugar.

Gross, but hopefully not harmful. The carboy version keeps "boiling
over" the airlock, but I'm going to carboy the primary one anyway just
to keep too many microbes from jumping in. I'm keeping the carboy in
the bathtub for easy daily cleanups of the resulting messes.

If I decide to stop fermentation, would an ice bath in the bathtub for
a day followed by some sodium biphosphate do the job?

- Matt

if "boiling over is a concern, instead of an airlock, why not use a blow off
hose like homebrewers use? A short piece of rigid tube, like a piece of
racking cane quality, pushed through an appropriate 1 hole stopper, fit the
rigid with a length of flexible tubing, and place the end of the tube into a
5 gal pail with enough H2O to keep the end of the tube completely submerged.
the over-spooge will blow into the pail & the H2O acts as a cootie backflow
preventer. supplies except the pail can be bicycled with ease!
i'd say let the fermentation carry on just for shits & giggles if not to
see the experiment through; you're into it now, ride it out! i'm interested
to learn what happens...the blow off hose & pail will curtail the mess & the
operation can exit the tub to just about any other temperate place...


wrote in message
oups.com...

bobdrob wrote:
since the sap was only 1/2 boiled, could it be residual unboiled sugar
content with sap impurities forming a cap? just guessing... i know
that
when we boil sugar for candymaking in school, cheap noname brand x sugars
foam considerably more in the process than does domino... aagain, wild
speculation on my part. any green mountain state vintners out there with
2
cents to put in?

That's a leading theory at the moment -- I airlocked the one in the
carboy (I need another carboy for the one in the primary, but when your
main mode of transporation is a bicycle, and the winemaking shops close
when you get off work, getting a 23 L glass jar home is a tricky
proposition... working on it this week), and when the airlock "boiled
over" the slime in it was sticky and sweet. I think it's sediment from
the sap (impurities, as you said) "boiling up" to the top of the must
and bonding to excess sugar.

Gross, but hopefully not harmful. The carboy version keeps "boiling
over" the airlock, but I'm going to carboy the primary one anyway just
to keep too many microbes from jumping in. I'm keeping the carboy in
the bathtub for easy daily cleanups of the resulting messes.

If I decide to stop fermentation, would an ice bath in the bathtub for
a day followed by some sodium biphosphate do the job?

- Matt