Im presuming this is the right page to air my query - afterall wine is a way of preserving fruit!
Ive been making fruit wines for 3-4 years now, last year one of my three batches of feijoa wine became quite gluggy, jelly like. Ive just bottled one of my four batches from this year and its the same. Taste is absolutely lovely, but very cloudy and thick. The recipes Ive used are basically the same as each other. I do add a number of lemons into the brew as I really like feijoa and lemon together. Apart from those fruit, the ingrediants are just normal winemaking ones - yeast, campden tablets etc.
Why would my wine turn into alcoholic jelly?
Replies
A bit late in replying I know, but better late than never :) I would be thinking this could possibly be caused by too much pectin in the must - This is the agent in fruit/veges that helps it to set (The best jam fruits etc such as berries have lots of it). Feijoas make quite good jelly/jam etc so would have a reasonable amont in them. The lemon will have some too, particularly if you are using the whole fruit and not just the juice. If you are force-straining the must before fermenting then this will force pectin-rich material into the brew.
Do you add a pectin destroying enzyme at all? If not, you should be able to get some from your local brewing shop. If you are not keen on using a commercial product then green papaya peelings will apparently do the same thing - substitute the peel of half a papaya for 1 teaspoon of pectic enzyme. I have not used the papaya option so would be interested to know how well it works if you give it a go.
I will see if our local homebrew stockists keep the enzyme. Whilst thick feijoa wine still tastes great, it is a little weird to drink!