please help! white port fuzz!

[katposs]

my friends and i have bottled (at the local ubrew) some port. it's a white choc port, to which we did add a bottle of brandy just before we bottled. this was in jan. 2012. i pulled out a bottle and it has all these floaties in it. it eventually settles to the bottom; a brownish red, algae looking stuff. we've done this port, and several others in the same way (added brandy), but they have all remained clear. what is this stuff? and is it safe to drink? we phoned the place we bottled, and they didn't know what it was, but they weren't concerned, said it was fine to drink, just filter it......also, they said it couldn't be tested because we'd added the brandy.....could possibly be a reaction to the brandy, they thought.....

i'm concerned something is not right, because it is in all the rest of the bottles of the same port we did in jan. some of the bottles have just a tiny, almost indiscernible amount, and some bottles have, maybe a 1/2 teaspoon or so (hard to say how much, but some definately more than others). it looks like fuzz on the bottom of the bottle, sometimes a little swirly cloud, and if tipped, gazillions of floaties.....

any ideas out there? greatly appreciated! thanks so much.

[Alex Bridgeman]

I think it might help if you explain a little about what ubrew is (I've never heard of it!) and how you went about making the white choc port.

But I have very little experience in brewing, so probably won't be able to help - but I will try.

[RAYC]

I think it might help if you explain a little about what ubrew is (I've never heard of it!)

or indeed what "white choc port" is! sounds intriguing...

[katposs]

a 'ubrew' is a store where you check out a list of wines/beers/port, etc. and pay x amount of $$ for your choice....you put the yeast in the bottle, then in 6-8 weeks, it is ready to bottle (in the meantime, the store has done all that is required to it prior to bottlin) you are responsible for bringing in your bottles, then you saniitize them, and proceed to bottle, and label your wine.

we picked several different types of port. a white chocoate port, being one (another was apple tatin, which was delicious, a coffee port, and an orange chocolate port). prior to bottling, we were told to add a bottle of brandy if we wanted in increase the alcohol content. so we did. now, 6 months later, when i look at my bottles of white chocolate port, there is a strange sediment in the bottle; a murky brownish red cloud, that if tilted, breaks into a gazillion particles floating about. there are varying degrees of this sediment in all of the bottles. we've done this port before, and it was clear, as is all the other ports. it looks pretty gross, to be downright honest, and i don't particularly care to drink it, even filtered.....the shop where we bottle did not know what caused this and said since brandy was added, they could not test the contents, and basically were totally unconcerned.....i'm a little concerned, and want to know what this is, and what caused it. the wine (port) kits are by r.j. spagnols, and i phoned them, and they have no idea either.....i had hoped i could find some help somewhere. thanks for responding.

[g-man]

actually it could be a whole mix of things.

without knowing the actual yeast used and what level of brandy you brought the ABV up to I'd have no idea what you have.

If it's a little fuzzy, it's most likely mold. Usually caused by a bottle or anything else inthe line not being sanitary enough. You can not drink it if it's mold as you will get very sick.

If it's kind of lumpy or like when you mix marmite with some water, it's could be yeast. In that case, the ABV wasn't high enough to kill off the residual yeast causing them to continue their duty of converting sugars to alcohol.

Third, it could be the residuals in the wine just clumping and falling to the bottom as sediment.

I personally would not drink it if I didn't control the brewing process and knew what went in.

[Andy Velebil]

Highly doubt it's mold since you've added brandy which upped the alcohol and would kill it off and the odds of it being in all the bottles is very rare. Most likely the wine wasn't filtered or cold stabalized properly. But as mentioned, it could be a number of things that have caused this. From the yeast used, fermentation issues, what type of ingredients were added (white chocolate), how it was fined/filtered, etc.

Most likely it won't hurt you but may affect the overall taste. Open a bottle, filter it through some cheesecloth, and let us know how it tastes.

[g-man]

Highly doubt it's mold since you've added brandy which upped the alcohol and would kill it off and the odds of it being in all the bottles is very rare. Most likely the wine wasn't filtered or cold stabalized properly. But as mentioned, it could be a number of things that have caused this. From the yeast used, fermentation issues, what type of ingredients were added (white chocolate), how it was fined/filtered, etc.

Most likely it won't hurt you but may affect the overall taste. Open a bottle, filter it through some cheesecloth, and let us know how it tastes.

you don't know how much brandy was added though.

It's entirely possible that the mold took hold and already created toxins before teh brandy was administered too.

I personally wouldn't drink something I don't know how it's made

[katposs]

we added a whole 750 ltr. of brandy.....w/scare up some cheesecloth and run her thru....

[g-man]

ask ubrew what kind of yeast they use

I'd also ask just how much fortified wine you acutally made???

750 ltrs is NO joke.

if the wine you made was simply brandy with a touch of the above mentioned flavors, yes it's fine to drink.

[katposs]

the total # of bottles came to roughly 16 750 ml (not ltr, ml....oops on my last post). i w/contact them and ask what kind of yeast they used on it. anything else specifically i should ask? thanks, by the way.

[katposs]

and i meant we added a 750 ml (not ltr) bottle of brandly to the port.

[g-man]

ah so 1/16 of a bottle to each in essence?

assuming a base wine of 8% ABW (I'm making an assumption here because you say white chocolate)
and a 40% abw brandy

means you should have a

8 * 15/16 + 40 * 1/16 roughly a 10% ABW brew.

That's acutally not that high at all.

I ask what kind of yeast because some brewer's yeast will happily exist in anything < 14% ABW

that would naturally explain the sediment. The yeast are still probably working and what you have is a live culture still trying to convert the very likely possibility of residual sugars in your brew.

if that were the case, just filter and drink. You can even consume the yeast as it's high in vitamin c and carbs (think bread). Fair warning that it makes one very gassy!

[katposs]

THANKS FOR THE WARNING! HAHA! that does seem to make sense.

[Alex Bridgeman]

If the yeasts are still fermenting in the bottle, just be careful of those corks. You may well be making sparkling port!

[JacobH]

Highly doubt it's mold since you've added brandy which upped the alcohol and would kill it off and the odds of it being in all the bottles is very rare.

I used to think that, but after some, ahem, rigorous experimentation, managed to disprove that theorem:

mould.jpg (18.21 KiB) Viewed 7497 times

[g-man]

Highly doubt it's mold since you've added brandy which upped the alcohol and would kill it off and the odds of it being in all the bottles is very rare.

I used to think that, but after some, ahem, rigorous experimentation, managed to disprove that theorem:

mould.jpg

i too have had the same results

[katposs]

ok, pretty disgusting! BUT, how did this mold start out? swirling little cloud of reddish brown particles that settled eventually? or were they just white lumps of mold?

[katposs]

good point about whether it would be mold or not, as it is in all the bottles, and i could see POSSIBLY not sanitizing one bottle, but not all of them; we are pretty meticulous.

[JacobH]

ok, pretty disgusting! BUT, how did this mold start out? swirling little cloud of reddish brown particles that settled eventually? or were they just white lumps of mold?

No, it just grew on the surface of the Port in the glass which I’d forgotten about for a few days in some particularly hot weather we had last month. It looked like pretty normal penicillinium to me, but then I’m not much of a expert on these things.

When you say the Port is ‟white chocolate” does that mean it’s a white wine or a red wine with white chocolate added? Although I’m not an expert in wine-making, a cloud of particles wouldn’t be unusual if the wine is unfiltered, unfined and not cold-stabilised (as I assume it’s not). See some of the pictures on Wikipedia for an idea of what can get precipitated.

However, could you not take the bottle back to the u-brew store and ask them?

[katposs]

not positive, as the ubrew doesn all of that; we just basically bottle.........will have to bring it back i guess..

[g-man]

i checked out some of NY's local brew stuff

in NY, white chocolate port looks like a concord grape based wine blended with some white chocolate powder.