I agree that adding sugar to a weak juice is a waste ( unless you are
making grappa!) I don't make my kits to more than 24 brix (1.100 S.G.)
The alcohol will stay in balance with the flavor. Kit wine is
balanced.

If you live in a warm place perhaps you can filter your wine or rack
it more often to get rid of harshness. My Italian friend racks his
monthly like they did in the old counrty. Get the wine off the
sediment to improve the flavour he says.

I think filtering and my cold basement helps the most.

Mike

On 16 Oct 2003 04:30:44 -0700, (Esteban) wrote:

>By not diluting the concentrate as recommended by the Kit's
>manufacturer, you may increase the quality of the wine, but you may
>run into some problems. You may increase the level of alcohol above of
>what was originally intended, making the wine more potent (if this is
>what you want you could just spike your wine with vodka), but you will
>also increase the wine's harshness and unbalance its flavor. If the
>yeast provided by the kit is not alcohol tolerant, you may not ferment
>all the fermentable sugars and the wine could end up sweeter than what
>was originally intended. In my experience, when I make 6 gallon (23,5
>L) wine kits in a 5 gallon (19.5 L) batch, I need to age the wine more
>than 1 year before it looses the harsh flavor, while kits made as
>recommended, they are drinkable 6-8 months after bottling.
>Unfortunately, I have not made the same kit, side-by-side using both
>methods. That would be the best way to compare both methods and sample
>the wine at various time points to determine which is best. However, I
>am afraid that this will change depending on the type of kit and class
>of the grape.
>
>
>> > Last year I was short my regular carboy so I made up a California
>> > Cabernet Sauvignon kit to 19.5 litres rather than the suggested 23.5
>> > litres. The results were incredible. The stuff tastes like $20+ a
>> > bottle wine and is only just over a year old.
>>
>> Our local oenology guru recommends making wine kits using just the
>> concentrate, with no water dilution at all. Much lower yield, much higher
>> quality.