As some of you may now know, I'm in the first week of making 5 gallons
of blueberry wine from oregon puree. This weekend, I will do my first
racking process.

My question is, when I "top up", should I just use distilled water? I
don't want to throw the flavor off by adding some oddball wine. I do
have a bottle of blueberry wine that I haven't opened yet that I
bought. Should I just use that? Or would water be OK?

Your learning already and don't even know it. That's why it's so hard
to give advice Russ, you ALWAYS forget something. That something is,
always make enough wine to fill at least 1 thing to the top. If you
made exactly 5 gallons and your going to use a 5 gallon carboy to to
store it, you probably didn't make enough. Now, you could use the
blueberry wine you have BUT you could also use gallon jugs instead of a
5 gallon carboy and break up the last ( part of the 5th gallon) gallon
into magnums and wine bottle size increments. If your hell bent on the
carboy then use the blueberry wine to top up. Don't forget, next time
you rack you'll run into the same problem. It's always good to have
muliple increments of wine around to top up.

Bob

wrote:
> As some of you may now know, I'm in the first week of making 5
gallons
> of blueberry wine from oregon puree. This weekend, I will do my
first
> racking process.
>
> My question is, when I "top up", should I just use distilled water?
I
> don't want to throw the flavor off by adding some oddball wine. I do
> have a bottle of blueberry wine that I haven't opened yet that I
> bought. Should I just use that? Or would water be OK?

Bob is exactly right. The best way to top up is to not do it. Go to
smaller carboys. Another way, and I am not sure I like this one, is to make
it stronger than you want so you can cop up with water and end up at the
right place. In other words, use more fruit and more sugar for a higher
alcohol level. I would rather make it at the right level and then just use
the right size carboys. I have lots of carboys. 13, 6.5, 6, 5, 3, 2.8, 1,
4/5, and 1/2. Sometimes I have to top up the last one but it gets mixed
back in and that does not effect the whole batch very much.

Ray

> wrote in message
oups.com...
> Your learning already and don't even know it. That's why it's so hard
> to give advice Russ, you ALWAYS forget something. That something is,
> always make enough wine to fill at least 1 thing to the top. If you
> made exactly 5 gallons and your going to use a 5 gallon carboy to to
> store it, you probably didn't make enough. Now, you could use the
> blueberry wine you have BUT you could also use gallon jugs instead of a
> 5 gallon carboy and break up the last ( part of the 5th gallon) gallon
> into magnums and wine bottle size increments. If your hell bent on the
> carboy then use the blueberry wine to top up. Don't forget, next time
> you rack you'll run into the same problem. It's always good to have
> muliple increments of wine around to top up.
>
> Bob
>
> wrote:
>> As some of you may now know, I'm in the first week of making 5
> gallons
>> of blueberry wine from oregon puree. This weekend, I will do my
> first
>> racking process.
>>
>> My question is, when I "top up", should I just use distilled water?
> I
>> don't want to throw the flavor off by adding some oddball wine. I do
>> have a bottle of blueberry wine that I haven't opened yet that I
>> bought. Should I just use that? Or would water be OK?
>

I hesitate to give further advice -- but here goes.

If this is your first racking at the end of the first week then I would
expect that fermentation is by no means finished!

This being the case -- there is definitely NO NEED to top up at this stage.
Do not do it! Your new container will have a fermentation lock on it and
your must/wine will continue to bubble its product of CO2 through it and
maintain its blanket in the new container.

It is ONLY when all fermentation has STOPPED and you go into the process of
racking off the lees, degassing and stabilising that you need to ensure that
the air space ( because it is air then --no or little CO2) is minimal. The
level of the new wine should be to within 2 cms of the bung of your
fermentation lock.

At that stage you will have to use some method of topping up. I personally
would not recommend topping up with distilled water but it is one way of
doing it. You can use some similar wine ( which is what I do -- but then I
have an ongoing stock level of about 500 bottles of various wines, both
actually in bottles and also in bulk).

Lots of winemakers have a selection of different sized containers suitable
for wine storage which also helps. Another frequently used method is to lift
the level of your new wine by adding sanitised glass marbles until the
surface is to the require height although this does give a small problem
when you are eventually siphoning out of your carboy to bottle your wine.

I would recommend that you do a couple of things for your own benefit :-

1. Buy a good book on winemaking. I would recommend Terry Gareys' "Home
Winemaking. It is written for the US market in terms of the US volumetric
measures and so on and is full of very good information for beginners and
more experienced alike. It is also very readable and being a real book you
can put it on your beside table and read a bit each night before you nod off
to sleep or sit in a comfortable chair with a bottle of wine to hand and
leaf through its pages. Far better than sitting up at a pc and reading from
a screen. It is full of tips for winemakers and if you had had it you would
not be ducking and diving for information at this stage.


2. Visit Jack Kellers web site several times and have a look round. There is
just about every conceivable bit of information you could want there. But it
can be a bit overpowering there is so much. Which is why I recommended
buying the before mentioned book. http://winemaking.jackkeller.net/


--
Trevor A Panther
In South Yorkshire, England
Remove "PSANTISPAM" from my address line to reply.
All outgoing mail is scanned by Norton
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> wrote in message
oups.com...
> Your learning already and don't even know it. That's why it's so hard
> to give advice Russ, you ALWAYS forget something. That something is,
> always make enough wine to fill at least 1 thing to the top. If you
> made exactly 5 gallons and your going to use a 5 gallon carboy to to
> store it, you probably didn't make enough. Now, you could use the
> blueberry wine you have BUT you could also use gallon jugs instead of a
> 5 gallon carboy and break up the last ( part of the 5th gallon) gallon
> into magnums and wine bottle size increments. If your hell bent on the
> carboy then use the blueberry wine to top up. Don't forget, next time
> you rack you'll run into the same problem. It's always good to have
> muliple increments of wine around to top up.
>
> Bob
>
> wrote:
>> As some of you may now know, I'm in the first week of making 5
> gallons
>> of blueberry wine from oregon puree. This weekend, I will do my
> first
>> racking process.
>>
>> My question is, when I "top up", should I just use distilled water?
> I
>> don't want to throw the flavor off by adding some oddball wine. I do
>> have a bottle of blueberry wine that I haven't opened yet that I
>> bought. Should I just use that? Or would water be OK?
>

The book is "The Joy of Home Winemaking" Sorry for the error!

--
Trevor A Panther
In South Yorkshire, England
Remove "PSANTISPAM" from my address line to reply.
All outgoing mail is scanned by Norton
Anti Virus for your protection too!

Experienced winemakers often do many things to concentrate wine
characteristics such as flavors, aroma, etc. and diluting the must with
water is not a good idea unless, of course you're reconstituting a
concentrate.

As already mentioned you should start with enough must to fill a large
vessel (such as your carboy) and at least a few, smaller containers as well.
Obviously all vessels need fermentation locks and be kept topped up. It can
be a bit of a nuisance but investing in a few smaller containers, air locks
and appropriately sized bungs is a good investment. Most wines will require
2-3 rackings over a period of time and if you are bulk aging you will want
to taste it once in a while to make sure it is progressing well so topping
up from smaller containers is the only practical way of proceeding. At this
point your best option seems to be topping up with your bottle and if that
is more than required try to find a small container for the remainder for
future topping up.

Good luck,

Glen Duff
------------
> wrote in message
oups.com...
> As some of you may now know, I'm in the first week of making 5 gallons
> of blueberry wine from oregon puree. This weekend, I will do my first
> racking process.
>
> My question is, when I "top up", should I just use distilled water? I
> don't want to throw the flavor off by adding some oddball wine. I do
> have a bottle of blueberry wine that I haven't opened yet that I
> bought. Should I just use that? Or would water be OK?
>

wrote:
> As some of you may now know, I'm in the first week of making 5
gallons
> of blueberry wine from oregon puree. This weekend, I will do my
first
> racking process.
>
> My question is, when I "top up", should I just use distilled water?
I
> don't want to throw the flavor off by adding some oddball wine. I do
> have a bottle of blueberry wine that I haven't opened yet that I
> bought. Should I just use that? Or would water be OK?

I would just add to what was already mentioned that you can also use a
good commercial red wine to top up. I make raspberry "port" every year,
and the best batch I've ever produced had about 3 litres of different
red wines added to it for the same reason - I didn't have enough for a
full carboy. Often, the "mistakes" lead to pleasant surprises.

Pp