How to sweeten homemade grape wine: cooking features, a classic recipe

When making homemade wine, there are many nuances. Starting from the technology itself and ending with the fact that as a result, alcohol does not taste as good as we would like. Very often, the drink has to be additionally sweetened. How to sweeten homemade grape wine so that it does not turn out sour.

Which wine is considered sweet?

There are several varieties of wine depending on the sugar content. The drink is dry, semi-dry, semi-sweet and sweet. It is possible to determine which of the species it belongs to by the content of sugar in the composition. Sweet wines contain at least 45 g/L of sugar.

Cooking Features

Homemade wine can be made from any variety of grapes. Varieties can even be mixed together or additional berries and fruits can be added. Clusters are harvested in late September or early October, when the frost hits. Frozen grapes have a higher sugar content. The main thing is that during the collection there should be dry and sunny weather.

After the bunches have been collected, they are sorted out, the fruits with mold are thrown out. Then immediately start cooking. The main thing is not to wash the raw materials used before starting the process. The skins of grapes, fruits and berries contain wild yeasts, thanks to which the fermentation process occurs.

The containers in which the drink will ferment must be perfectly clean. You can use wooden barrels or large glass bottles.

Ingredient Selection Rules

For the preparation of alcohol, you can use any fruits and berries of any variety. Varieties can even be combined. Thanks to this, you can get unusual tastes of the drink.

You can use overripe fruits, but not underripe ones. When using unripe fruit, fermentation will not be as active.

In addition to fruits and berries, sugar, water, raisins are required for cooking. In some cases, you have to use wine yeast if fermentation does not start for a long time.

Classic dessert wine recipe

It only takes two ingredients to make it.

Ingredients required:

grapes of any variety (or other berries);
granulated sugar.

How to cook at home:

In order for the fermentation process to take place, the berries are not washed.
Place the bunches in a large enameled bowl, crush them with your hands or a masher to release a lot of juice.
Then the container should be covered with gauze and put in a warm dark room for 4-5 days. Twice a day, the mass should be mixed with a wooden spatula.
After the grapes begin to rise, the juice is squeezed through cheesecloth. Pour it into jars and add granulated sugar to make the wine sweeter.
After a while, the liquid should become lighter, and the bubbles will stop appearing, you can carefully filter the drink and close it tightly with a cork. The main thing is that the yeast does not get into clean bottles.
Stay the bottles in a cool place for about 1 month. During this month, the drink must be poured three times into clean bottles to separate it from the sediment.

When the wine is ready, it is recommended to store it in a cool place, for example, in the refrigerator, or you can lower the bottles into the cellar.

How to sweeten the finished drink if it turned out sour?

Quite often, if the proportions were not calculated correctly, the drink turns out to be sour and additional sugar has to be added to it. In order to make sweet wine, you need to add a sweetener at one of the stages of its preparation. It is best to do this when the wine stops fermenting and the stage of separation of the drink from the sediment begins. You can try, and if it turned out sour, sweeten it. Mix well and leave to infuse for a few more weeks.

How to sweeten dry wine

If the drink turned out to be very sour, the question immediately arises how to make it sweeter and more palatable. The drink may turn out to be too sour, not only due to non-compliance with proportions, but also due to the characteristics of the variety of grapes used.If a low-sugar variety is used, the drink will not be sweet either.

Some believe that if the drink is left to infuse for a longer time, then over time it will acquire a sweet taste. But it can only become more transparent or lighter, but it still will not acquire sweetness. In this case, you will have to resort to additional measures.

You can add sugar already at the stage when the alcohol is completely ready and it is planned to bottle the drink. Then it must be thoroughly mixed and left for another few weeks. This will make the wine sweet enough, but not very strong.

It should be borne in mind that dry wine tastes and should be sour. This is within the normal range, so you should not pour as much sugar as possible into it, just to make the drink sweet. So you can only spoil it.