Maple Wine 1.0
Ingredients (Per Gallon)
- 1 quart Maple Syrup
- 1 Packet of Mangrove Jacks Mead Yeast
- 1 TSP Yeast Nutrient
- 1 Camden Tablet
- 1 Cup of maple syrup (to Back-Sweeten)
Fermentation Timeline
- End of Primary: Day 22
- End of Secondary: Day 30
- Ready to Drink: Day 180
Making Wine from Maple Syrup
I became obsessed with Maple trees this year. It’s not a healthy obsession by any means, and it will eventually lead me to attempt making maple syrup over the winter. However, since there is plenty of time yet to wait for that, I planned out a Maple Wine made from store bought maple syrup.
Maple wine is surprisingly quick and easy to make, even more so than Mead in my opinion. It ferments from 1.10SG, to .990SG in about three weeks, and clears nearly completely within 20 days of the first racking. If I can stomach that timeline, any reasonably patient person will think this is a breeze.
On brew day, I started by taking one quart of store bought maple syrup, and adding it to my fermenter. Next I filled up my fermenter two thirds of the way up, with the intention of shaking it to aerate and mix in the maple syrup. Then I remembered how poorly this had gone while I was sanitizing the fermenter. I had given myself a splash while shaking the sanitizer filled jar (lid attached), and so as to not repeat the process with sticky syrup water, I decided to use a whisk instead. I topped off my fermenter with a bit more water and realized that I had created a beautiful dark golden brown elixir, with great potential (alcohol).
The next step was to take a gravity reading, which was 1.100sg, i.e. a 13% potential alcohol content. This was most satisfactory. I then made a quick rehydration jacuzzi for the yeast using the gravity sample. I then added half a packet of Mangrove Jacks Mead yeast. A few minutes after the first signs of life, the yeast slurry was poured into the fermenter along with one teaspoon of yeast nutrient. I gave it another quick stir, put the lid and airlock on, and put it away to ferment. Like I said earlier, this is SUPER easy.
I started to see signs of activity the next morning, as bubbles came plopping out of the air lock. One by one, with each adorable little thump, I knew the yeast were hard at work lowering the gravity of the Maple wine must. They continued on, I was able to monitor the first three days of the fermentation before going to work for several days. When I came back there was significantly less activity. I continued to let it sit for a total of 22 days before I decided to check the gravity. The lack of activity in the air lock did not lie, there was no sugar left in the must. The gravity had dropped to 0.990! I then racked the already semi clear wine into a clean fermenter so that it could age and clear.
Clearing occurred much more quickly than I had anticipated, lasting a total of 20 days (not 15). There was not much more than a light dusting of sediment at the bottom of the jar, and you could see right through the jug, like an amber magnifying glass. I once again racked the wine but this time I collected a small sample in my favorite whiskey glass to try out. Before I tasted my sample, I added a campden tablet to the freshly racked wine and re covered it with the lid and airlock.
I had a pretty good idea what to expect from the sample in terms of flavor and experience, just based on the gravity. Shure enough, there was far more heat than flavor. I believe I described it as “drinking dragons fire.” Mind you, it had been nearly two years since my last sip of anything alcoholic. It is possible that I could have just forgotten what it felt like to drink. However, I am mostly certain, that the maple wine was really just far too dry at this point to enjoy. Luckily, I knew how to fix that.
After waiting the required 24 hours since adding my Camden tablet, I grabbed a new bottle of maple syrup and started to adjust the sweetness of the wine. This process is called back sweetening. In the video I claimed that i was adding 1/4 cup at a time, but this was incorrect. I discovered while doing dishes that night, I had actually been using a 1/3 cup measuring cup (oops). Not to worry, the result was all the same, however the correct unit of measurement should be noted so you can all have a similar result to mine. I took a couple samples and was satisfied once I had added one cup of maple syrup. After back sweetening the gravity was 1.010.
I decided to wait a week before bottling to make sure there was no evidence of fermentation, and luckily there was none! I then saddled up the auto siphon and a few bottles and corks. After all was said and done, I ended up with 4 and a half bottles of crystal clear maple wine!
This project was a great way to get back into home brewing after taking a three year break! I would highly recommend this as a project for anyone just getting started as well. If you liked what you read here, please go check out the video on You Tube so you can observe my mistakes in 4k! Thanks for reading!
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