Michael,
You can't go wrong with Jack's site. My 2 citrus wines threw a lot of
sediment, but then again I didn't strain. You have a lot of options in
Florida, so good luck. I live in Wisconsin, so the winter months get slow,
but I do freeze fruits and vegeas for use in the winter. I have about 10
(or 11)1 gallon batches going right now - mainly fruit wines and Welch's
grape juice wines with a mix of flower and vegea wines. I too, started with
1 gallon, then two, then...well...I think you get the picture.
Darlene
"Michael Thompson" > wrote in message
. com...
> Thank you all for your suggestions. I'm glad to see that a group like this
> can come together and queue great ideas for making great wine.
>
> I'll attempt to reply to everyone's coments and questions in this one post
> so please bear with me.
>
> >? Please check out Jack's homemade
> >.wine site. He goes through how to deal with a stuck ferment, plus a lot
> of
> >other helpful info. http://winemaking.jackkeller.net/index.asp
>
> Darlene, I oringally got the idea of dealing with a stuck fermentation
from
> Jack's site. In fact it was his site and personal advice that got me
through
> my first batch of wine (The mulberry wine). Looks as if his website is a
> popular resource.
>
> >Glad you skipped the toast part, but that
> >should probably tell you something about the recipe in general.
>
> Andy, The recipe was an old one, some of them dating back several hundred
> years. I obtained it in a book about wine and fokelore. The book was
> actually printed sometime in the early 60's. I read up on it a bit and
then
> looked at a similar recipe on Jack Keller's site to make sure the basic
> ingredients were the same and they seemed to be minus the toast of course.
> IMHO the only toast that should be associeted with wine is one with a
glass
> in the air 
>
> >The potential alcohol is a but pretty low. Is there a reason the
> >recipe called for 4 pounds of sugar but you only used 2?
>
> Once again I refer back to Jack's wonderful site. In my original mulberry
> wine recipe I added half the sugar during primary fermentation. Let the
> yeast chew on that the entire primary period of four days. Before I racked
> into the secondary I added the remaining sugar. I plan to do the same
thing
> with the orange wine.
>
> I'm certainly no expert on the matter but in my mind's eye I pictured the
> yeast eating up as much sugar as it could in the primary period, so I
> figured I would save the second half of the sugar for the fermentation
that
> makes alcohol. Also with being new to all this I read somewhere that its
> possible for yeast to get stuck when the sugar levels are too high. Not
> knowing what this level was for the strain of yeast I was using I tasted
the
> must and decided it too sweet for me to bear and figured the yeast would
> feel the same way.
>
> >If it has already started to ferment, just add 6 ounces of sugar *per
> >US gallon* to make this adjustment. HTH
>
> Frederick, As stated above I plan to add the remaining sugar at racking to
> the secondary. As for the fermentation being stuck. Well I must admit my
> alarmism was a bit premature. When I came home from work tonight the
mixture
> was fizzing heavily and there was a distinct yeastie smell much stronger
> then before. So I think everything is working fine.
>
> My primary concern with things being "off" so to speak, was that I seen no
> heavy layer on top of the fermenting must. Pondering this after a good
> nite's sleep I relized that there would very likely not be one seeing as I
> filtered the must so well.
>
> I was used to thinking in terms of fermentation of heavy fruit pulp like
in
> the mulberry wine.
>
> >My grandparents had 8 huge mulberry trees, 14-18 in. in diameter whose
> limbs
> >all grew together. Us kids would climb from tree to tree eating the
mellow
> >fruit. I wish I had access to them now. ;o(
>
> Ray, you certainly bring back memories from my own childhood. Where I grew
> up in New Jersey our house was built on an area that used to be an orchard
> for various types of fruits. One of them being mulberries. We had many
trees
> on our little 1/4 acre lot and like you I can remember climbing those
trees
> being filled with birds and sharing the fruit with them. Many a Bobwhite
and
> Robin would often join me in a little mid-day snack.
>
> When I ended up buying a home here in Osteen Florida there were alot of
> fruit trees on the land. One of which was this little mulberry tree I
> beleive its a Japaniese variety since it grows more like a bush then a
tall
> tree that you and I are used to seeing.
>
> To get back to the point though. I believe everything is fermenting
> correctly. It seems with every batch of wine, I start to learn a little
> more. Right now I have a batch finishing up in the fridge that I started
> last year made from Welches frozen concentrate. (Again a visit to Jack
> Keller's site provided a gold mine for this one). Next to the current
batch
> of orange wine I have a 1 gallon batch of Mulberry Mead(Morat?) I started
a
> day before the orange wine. In another month or two I'm going to get
another
> batch of Mulberry wine going when they all get ripe and then hopefully a
> shot at fig wine if the squirles don't get them all first
>
> Thanks Again All, and I hope to read many other fine posts in here in the
> future.
> Mike T.
>
>
>
>
>