Blueberry Wine #2

The first blueberry wine turned out great, and we need room in the freezer, so we’re doing a second batch of blueberry wine!  I wish I had enough for a 5 gallon batch!  Check out the first one here.  Like the second child, there are nearly no photos of the second batch of blueberry wine.

Blueberry Wine #2

4 lbs blueberries, frozen
1.5 quarts water
pinch k-meta

Mash blueberries with a potato masher in a primary fermenting bucket.

Day 2:
1 tsp yeast nutrient
1/2 packet Premier Cuvee
2 tsp pectinase

Brix tested at 6

Day 6: Boiled 2 lbs cane sugar plus 2 quarts water
1/2 cup black tea
1 Tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp yeast nutrient

Add to fermenter.  I’m calculating this as a light wine at about 10% abv.  This may be good for blending.

Day 8: Have been punching down last several days, fermentation slowing.

Day 11: Strained through sanitized strainer into 1 gallon glass carboy, plus 1 quart in the fridge.

Day 34: Tasted off, added pinch k-meta.

Day 45: Flavor good, seems to have corrected fault.  Time to age!

Day 64: The color and clarity of Blueberry #2 are both great…the color is a bright pink red.  Unfortunately, something is going on with the flavor.  It took me a while to figure out what it was…the flavor of blueberry is definitely strong on the aftertaste, but…it’s freezer burn.  Tastes like lightly freezerburnt berries.  I don’t know how I avoided it on Blueberry #1.  I’m surprised it didn’t show up until now.  Measured the acidity at 0.4%, which is low, but would have been similar to Blueberry #1, which was never tested.  Added 1 tsp tartaric acid.

Day 80: Same beautiful color, same freezer burned taste.  So sad.  Added about 1/4 cup of mixed French and American oak chips, and we’ll see if it masks the flavor at all.  I’m planning to bottle four bottles out of this and just use it for cooking.

Day 103: Bottled four 750 ml bottles, then put reserve into a swing top.  I can’t believe how much difference the oak chips made, it almost completely masked the freezer burned taste.