On Jan 17, 4:00*am, Joe Sallustio > wrote:
> On Jan 12, 6:25*pm, Mike McGeough > wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > Joe,
>
> > Have you tried sodium benzoate? I gave up on sorbate too, as I didn't
> > like the taste that was always detectable at necessary levels. The
> > benzoate is as close to tasteless at 250 ppm as makes no nevermind. I've
> > used it for a couple of years now on back sweetened whites with no
> > problems and rave reviews.
>
> > Mike McGeough
>
> > Joe Sallustio wrote:
>
> > > Sorbate is evil. *It never seems to work out well for me. *I don't
> > > want to back sweeten because I don't make the sweets for myself,
> > > others like them. *I will come up with an alternative on way or
> > > another that I can afford, I don't want to build a sterile filter for
> > > 10 gallons a year.
>
> > > Joe
>
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>
> Mike,
> Is that the level you use, 250 PPM? *I assume this is like sorbate in
> that the amount of residual sugar has no bearing on quantity if
> benzoate used; is that correct?
>
> Joe- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

The info on using benzoate is rather sparse because it's not an
"official" agent like sorbate is, but I'd guess it's exactly like
sorbate in terms of sugar. Also, based on what I'd found online, I
tried to use a lower level - around 60-70ppm, but that wasn't enough.
As with sorbate, adding more after, when the wine started fermenting
(slowly) again, wasn't very productive. I'd still like to go under
250ppm, so I might do some more testing this year, but this time I'd
start with at least 150ppm.

Pp