I'm making a wine with some pretty green tasting sangiovese grapes. I did a MLF to help soften the taste but it's still pretty sharp to my palette. How will that sharpness change as the wine ages? Will it get more intense or less? Or will it stay exactly the same? I'm trying to decide if I need some acidity intervention at this point or of I should just see how it's going to turn out. This is only my …

I have an oak leaf and burdock wine that has gotten stuck at a SG of 1.024. The pH reads 2.76, so I suspect that the high acidity has caused it to get stuck. I understand that dissolved CO2 can cause a wine to be too acidic, so I'm wondering if I might be able to restart the fermentation by degassing the wine at this point, thus increasing the pH? I do however recall reading somewhere that degassing a wine …

I'm making a batch of ice cider, from apples from my own trees (not shop-bought juice). No preservatives. The constituent apples are early this year, and most of this batch is windfalls; 55% green and 45% red. These have been frozen in a chest freezer, and then shredded and pressed. The batch is ~21 litres, primary in a plastic bucket. The freshly pressed juice tastes great, not too sour at all (back to this later). I added campden tablets at …

Precipitated chalk can be used to increase the pH of a wine (reduce acidity). Precipitated chalk typically comes with an instruction such as (example): "Add 1g per gallon to reduce the acidity (increase pH) by 1.5 ppt" I don't understand this instruction. The term 'ppt' is ambiguous. Does this refer to 'parts per thousand' or 'parts per trillion'? In any case, how does this relate to pH? pH is a logarithmic scale. If I want to increase pH from 2.5 …

So I was planning to make some white wine, I started with some green grapes and after checking the pH it was too low so I added some citric acid which made the juice became too acidic, to bring down the acidity I added some Sodium Bicarbonate (Baking soda) and the pH was balanced out. Now my fermentation is complete and after cold crashing I realized the wine tastes like soap water, is there anything I can do to fix …

I'm trying to brew "non-alcoholic" (<0.5% abv) beer using the BIAB method by using a smaller amount of grain than is typical. I'm happy with the resulting beer except that I believe the final pH is too high and the bottled beer is potentially unsafe. I've tried using acidulated malt but the final pH is still too high, so I'm now planning to use lactic acid to reduce the pH. I've been unable to find answers to the following questions, …

I have been experimenting with sugar wash fermentations. I've tried sucrose (cane sugar) as well as dextrose (corn sugar) and observed stalled fermentations in both, in spite of sufficient yeast nutrients, DO and yeast alcohol tolerance. I'm suspecting that the pH of the wash may be the culprit. As other already have noted (but something I had yet to learn when I started) the pH of a fermenting sugar wash can crash to 3 or even 2.5 or so. Unsurprisingly, …

I only recently started making hard cider at home. My problem is that it causes a uncomfortable burning sensation in my stomach after two or so drinks. I am using about 5g of yeast and 1.5kg sugar on 5 litres of cider (approx. 1.3 gallon) and it ferments for about 7 to 10 days. I then add about 100 grams sugar before bottling to give it some fizz. After about a day or so I cold crash and then consume. …

I've always disagreed with the idea that dry hopping or late hopping added 0 IBUs to your end product. If I ever brewed a kit or recipe and followed the hop schedule exactly, it would pretty much always end up too bitter. I found out that my local water pH was high (8.0) when running into some astringency issues and wondered if that had anything to do with it. At first I thought it was the high sulfate content in …

I’m currently creating a batch of mead. I’ve watched a lot of videos about the process. I’ve seen some people do it because they said you need to have it between 3.6 and 3.9 ph. And some just don’t bother and it turns out great. In the first batch i’m making right now i’ve made no changes to the ph level. And of course made sure to sterilize everything beforehand. The biggest part i’m sort of concerned about is, do …

I did a little bit of a fermentation experiment by adding water to a large jar half full of fruit (nectarines). I did not add any sugar or yeast. The final product is very sour, which I'm assuming is acetic acid but I'm quite sure there is some ethanol in there as well. My 'burping' process may have added too much oxygen which is why I'm assuming vinegar. Seeing as ethanol has an SG of <1.00 and acetic acid has …

My homebrewer friends recommend the StarSan acid sanitizer, hands-down. I tried it once and it foamed everywhere and left a bunch of rings in the carboy and the bottles. It made me paranoid that it would ruin my batch, but the beer tasted fine. Ever since, I have been wary of using it because of all the foam. Is there any risk associated with leftover acid sanitizer in your beer? What happens to the phosphoric acid and dodecylbenzenesulfonic acid? Are …

I've brewed some cider from cooking apple juice. The apples were unusually sweet for cookers so there was enough sugar and I added teabags to add tannin. This gave me cider at ~6.3% which tastes OK except it is very tart, like someone poured lemon juice into it. I gather this may reduce slightly as the cider matures but I doubt it will enough. What is commonly added to this type of drink to make it less acidic? Wine-makers tend …

I have a recipe for a false cider that requires the addition of lemon juice after secondary fermentation prior to bottling/kegging. I've done this before in the bottle with good success but I'm wondering -- should I be concerned about the corrosion potential of citric acid against the stainless steel of the keg? I'm expecting to use the juice from about 4-5 lemons. Basic Understanding Stainless steel is not immune from corrosion. Corrosion and stainless steel? It's stainless, so it …

I have a mead that I think has too high of an acid level. I am looking for ways to raise the pH or lower the acidity1. Roughly 7 months ago, I made a 5 gal batch of mead. The original fermentation got stuck, so I added some FermaidK based upon the local brew shop's recommendation. Initial OG was 1.116, and I added FermaidK at 1.088 and again at 1.042. I can't find the measurement prior to racking, but I …

I'm fermenting wine from juice. I forgot to rack into the glass bottle after fermentation begun. So I achieved the whole fermentation in the plastic bucket. Then I racked into the glass bottle with the valve. I found the wine acid but I did not detect a vinegar flavor. It is possible to lower the acidity of a wine after/during second fermentation?

It's hard to find tannin powder as there is no wine making supplies in my country. There, I'd rather use raisin as tannin substitute in my wine making process. However, I'm not sure how the conversion of those thing. Anyone could give me some advice? The recipe needs 1/4 tsp of tannin and 1-1/2 tsp of acid blend.

I am having trouble getting a batch of wine off the ground. Its a three gallon batch of Lemon wine and fermentation just wont start. My SG is 1.09, temp is stable at 75, acidity is at 3.0 using those color changing test strips. Using RedStar champagne yeast My guess is that my acidity is to high for the yeast What are the best ways to lower acidity of my must?

From the things I've read apples don't contain tartaric acid and some websites say to use malic acid and I've found 1 that says to use tartaric and not malic. Tartaric is more readily available to me, is there any good reasons I shouldn't use Tartaric acid?

For my next brew, I'm brewing this Deschutes Chainbreaker White IPA clone recipe using LME as described at the bottom of the page. I'm unfamiliar with the use of lactic acid and dextrose in brewing and I'd like to understand what's going on a little more with these new ingredients. For 5 gallons (18.93 L) 5.25 lb (2.38 kg) | pale LME 2.5 lb (1.13 kg) wheat LME 5 ml | lactic acid 0.75 oz (21 g) | Bravo pellets, …