A neighbor has asked me to help him in rescuing his Sour Cherry wine.

He made it with about 8lbs per gallon of water.
I've sampled it, and it's got a funky aftertaste, I'd call it SOUR.

I tested it to be Ph 4.05 and TA of 9g/L. (yuck)

I bench tested by adding sugar and water, but the sour taste keeps coming through.
Do I ameliorate 1st by adding water, then work to resolve the Ph/TA levels?
How about the sour tase and smell ? I doubt it's Hydrogen Sulphide, if it is, I could try Copper.

Any suggestions ?

The poor guy has about 36 gallons in his basement. Hope it's salvageable.


Roger

On May 25, 12:15 pm, roger > wrote:
> A neighbor has asked me to help him in rescuing his Sour Cherry wine.
>
> He made it with about 8lbs per gallon of water.
> I've sampled it, and it's got a funky aftertaste, I'd call it SOUR.
>
> I tested it to be Ph 4.05 and TA of 9g/L. (yuck)
>
> I bench tested by adding sugar and water, but the sour taste keeps coming through.
> Do I ameliorate 1st by adding water, then work to resolve the Ph/TA levels?
> How about the sour tase and smell ? I doubt it's Hydrogen Sulphide, if it is, I could try Copper.
>
> Any suggestions ?
>
> The poor guy has about 36 gallons in his basement. Hope it's salvageable.
>
> Roger

If it smells OK forget about hydrogen sulfide, you smell issues with
that not tastes them. The pH doesn't make a lot of sense but the TA
seems in line with your tartness perception. If the pH is right he is
going to have a hard time keeping this for any length of time.

Do you have any idea how much alcohol is in this? Higher alcohol
tastes sweeter. If it's low alcohol, say 7% you could add sugar and
Lalvin 71B; it eats malic acid and cherries are malic. You could pull
the acid down by blending, chemically sounds iffy at that pH. Make
sure of the pH value. Another option is to make a cheap white kit at
lower acids by adding too much water and blending that in to reduce
the acid.

At 36 gallons you have room to experiment. Take a gallon and reduce
the acid to 7.5g/l and see if it improves. You can try calcium
carbonate or potassium bicarbonate.


Another experiment might be to add 100 proof cheap vodka to increase
the alcohol because it is perceived as sweetness. You could
experiment with that in small quantities.

Honey as a sweetener may taste better because it's not one
dimensional.

Those are some ideas, just don't quit until it works out. It's almost
impossible to not salvage a wine that is not spoiled. That is a whole
lot of cherry wine....

Joe