How to make fortified wine at home – simple steps

Indeed, fastening has been used in the world practice of winemaking, probably since the first distillate was obtained. Since time immemorial, they have been fortifying, for example, port wine, Cahors (by the way, we have an article on how to make homemade fortified Cahors), sherry. But home winemakers have been using this technology for a long time and widely, especially for unstable wines from raw materials that are not ideal in composition, in which there are few acids, tannins, tannins that ensure the safety of the drink, for example, from cherries, raspberries, currants, chokeberries. Fixing is indispensable if you are making wine without a cellar or cellar with a consistently low temperature, or if you are going to age your homemade wines for several years.

• Stop the fermentation early to keep the flavor of the must and its natural sweetness without the addition of sugars.
• Accelerate the bleaching process at room conditions so as not to mess with gelatin, chicken egg or clay. Fortification kills the remaining yeast, they precipitate and the wine becomes lighter.
• Prevent re-infestation. For example, you received completely dry plum wine. But I wish the drink was sweeter. In this case, you simply add sugar or fructose to it, while increasing the strength, so that the yeast remaining in the wine does not start eating again, getting fresh food.
• Increase the shelf life of wine and prevent diseases. Alcohol is an excellent antiseptic. Homemade fortified wines are almost not susceptible to disease, they do not turn sour or moldy, and, unlike dry ones, they can be stored for many years.

This is where the fun begins. Of course, you can use a good vinometer, but it is only suitable for grape wines, and besides, for measurements, the wine must already be completely clarified and dry. The second way, the most reliable, in my opinion, is to measure the density with a refractometer. We measure the density of the must at the beginning of fermentation, then before fixing (here we need an AC-3 type hydrometer, since the refractometer will show incorrect data due to fermented alcohol), subtract the difference and calculate the degree according to a special table that should be attached to the measuring device. Another option is to calculate the degrees yourself, using wine-making tables for the fruit from which you make wine (they can be found on the Internet or on our website, in the relevant articles).

There is another interesting way – it is very laborious and costly, but very curious, so I will talk about it. We take part of the wine we received and distill it without separation into fractions, to dryness. We measure the degree with a conventional alcohol meter. For example, from 20 liters of wine we got 5 liters of 40-degree moonshine, which is equivalent to 2000 ml of absolute alcohol. That is, in one liter of wine there was 100 grams of alcohol, which corresponds to a strength of 10 °. You can fix the wine with the same distillate, only once again distill it fractionally.

In short, there are no absolute methods to find out how many degrees are in your homemade wine. From experience I can say that fruit wines with wild yeast rarely ferment more than 9-10°. You will have to focus on your own taste and use the trial and error method – fix the wine and wait. If fermented – fix it again. And so on until the result.

Update (from 10.2019). There is a very simple way to approximately determine the amount of alcohol of a given strength (we will determine the current strength of the wine material based on the indications of hydrometers at the beginning of fermentation and at the current moment), which is necessary for fortifying homemade wines. To do this, use the formula:

For example, we have 20 liters of wine material with a strength of 11%, for fastening we will use fruit brandy with a strength of 80%. Goal: get wine with a strength of 17%. Then:

A = 80; B = 11¹; C=17; D=6; E=63

D / E u6d 63/0.095238 u20d 1,90 * XNUMX liters of wine material uXNUMXd XNUMX liters of fruit brandy

¹ – to calculate the alcohol content of the wine material (B): calculate the potential alcohol (PA) before fermentation and PA with the current gravity. The resulting difference of these PA will be the approximate strength of the wine material at the moment. To calculate PA, use the formula:

PA = (0,6 *^oBx)-1

For example, the initial density was 28 ^oBx, now – 11 ^obx. Then:

Initial PA u0,6d (28 * 1) -15,8 uXNUMXd XNUMX%

Current PA = (0,6*11)-1=5,6%

Approximate current strength of wine material: 10,2%

Most often, this is done with affordable alcohol – rectified alcohol or vodka, but this method, of course, is far from the best. Poor-quality “kazenka” will be felt in wine for a long time, spoiling all the pleasure of drinking it. The best option is brandy from the fruit from which the wine itself is made, for example, for grape – chacha, for apple – calvados, for raspberry – framboise. This, of course, is cool, but economically it is not entirely justified. In principle, you can use any fruit moonshine, which is not a pity, but it will still convey some, possibly unpleasant, nuances of taste to the drink.

How to fix wine at home if you do not make brandy and there is nowhere to get them? Nothing remains – use alcohol, only very good. You can do this – the cake left after receiving the wort, put in a jar and pour alcohol. Infuse until the wine ferments, then drain and filter. Such tinctures, by the way, are very good on their own, and they are quite suitable for fortifying wines.

How to make wine from fortified grapes is understandable. When is the best time to do this is the question. Fermentation is interrupted almost from the very beginning, for example, when preparing port wine, strong alcohol is added to the must for 2-3 days. Early interruption of fermentation allows you to maximize the taste and aroma of grapes, the natural sugars contained in the berry. But it really takes a lot of alcohol, and its quality will critically affect the taste of the final drink – in short, you can’t get by with sugar moonshine, you need at least an excellent chacha.

The optimal period for fixing the wine is after the end of rapid fermentation, when the yeast has already gobbled up all the sugar. But in this case, the drink will have to be sweetened artificially. This method will allow the wine to clarify much faster, reduce the requirements for secondary fermentation conditions – it can be stored at room temperature, – allow the wine to be bottled earlier, put on the shelf and forget about it for at least a few years, without worrying that it will deteriorate from improper storage. .