How do you make wine?!
How do you make wine?
Additional Details
2 months ago
It doesn't matter what kind
Answers:
2 months ago
It doesn't matter what kind
Fruit, sugar, yeast
Get the 5 Gallon / 23 liter plastic bucket from your above experiment.
Find 15-20 pounds of something resembling fruit or vegetables.
Remove stems & seeds if possible. If not possible, crush or mash the fruit without damaging the seeds. Seeds do not help the wine and often contain stuff like cyanide or was it arsenic which might be good for your skin but neither help in the taste department. Squishing with your fingers works well, or a potato masher. A continuous juicer also works. If you can remove the stems and seeds you can use a blender to mush the stuff, with a bit of water to keep from burning out the motor.
Dump the ugly mess, called "must", into the plastic bucket.
Simmer around 10 pounds of sugar in water until it's a nice clear syrup and stir it into the fruit. Add some water to almost fill the bucket and mix it all up. Leave 4-6 inches of space for the foam and "cap" to rise under the lid, or you might have a mess on the floor.
Take a cup or two of your must, with enough water, that it's not too thick, make it nice and warm, not hot, pour in an envelope of wine yeast and stir it up. Keep it warm, perhaps in a bucket of hot water, until you need it. I like to do this when I start to mush or juice the fruit, then, by the time I am finished, there's a healthy slug of foaming yeast to give the bucket a running start.
Once a day, for a week or so, stir up the mess with a stick, to break up the "cap".
When the ugly bubbling has slowed down, use sives, collanders or rags to strain the ugly mess. Try to squeeze as much juice as you can out of the pulp before you trash it. This is the worst part of the process. Don't expect clear juice. The stuff should settle to the bottom eventually. Best strainer I've found so far is panty hose. You can put one leg in the other and have a fine, strong mesh that you can hang over a bucket, fill with gallons of goop, and later squeeze
Pour this murky liquid into a new container, add enough water to almost fill the bucket again and put a lid on it. Anything tight enough to keep flies out, is fine. As long as your juice is bubbling, you don't have to worry about bad bacteria, as the bubbles are CO2 which lies like a blanket over the liquid, protecting it. A sheet of plastic wrapped over the bucket is good. If that's really tight, just put a pinhole or two in the sheet, so pressure doesn't build up.
Let it sit undisturbed for a month. A dark and warm place is good. Siphon off the contents leaving the sediment on the bottom, and drink or bottle it. If you're in no rush, siphon it into another large container (this is called "racking") and let it sit for another month or 3. It should get better and gather potency with age.
The basic steps to making a drinkable alcoholic beverage:
The easy way:
Buy a 5 gallon / 23 liter bucket of grape juice. ($25.- to $50.-)
Do not open.
Leave it in a spot between 70°F / 20°C and 80°F / 30°C for a month or two.
The warmer the faster she goes.
Open it without shaking it.
Siphon off the contents, into gallon jugs with screw-lids or 2 liter coke bottles, leaving most of the sediment on the bottom of the bucket.
Drink the stuff.
Optionally you can siphon the bucket into another almost airtight container and let it sit for another month or three before "bottling". This is especially a good idea if the juice is still murky.
This process is best suited for soonest enjoyment.
If you really gotta get fancy and just have to "bottle" with real corks, make sure you store the bottles in a place cooler than 60°F / 15°C or you may find the corks everywhere except in the bottles when next you thirst for a cool glass.
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Applicable hints: Those plastic buckets can be harder to open than Fort Knox unless you have a special tool. If you cut a hole in the lid with a knife, it's hard to see what you're doing when you're siphoning, but it works, without shaking up all the sediment. Of course you ruin the lid but maybe you know a supermarket or a restaurant where you can get an endless supply of those buckets. Duct tape or packing tape may also make the lid of some use again.
Concord Grape Wine
Ingredients
6 cups concord grapes
4 cups granulated sugar
1 campden tablet
1 teaspoon nutrients
4 teaspoons lemon juice
1 package wine yeast
water
Method
Crush grapes. The goal here is the break the skin of every fruit to help the juice leach into the water, but not to damage the seeds. Place them in the primary fermentor. Add 12 cups water. Stir in all other ingredients EXCEPT yeast. Let sit for overnight.
Check the specific gravity. It should be between 1.090 and 1.100. Add yeast and mix in well. Cover primary fermentor. Stir daily for five to seven days, until frothing ceases.
Strain into secondary fermentor, squeezing out as much liquid as possible from the grapes, and attach airlock. Finish as for dry wine or sweet wine below.
Finishing
For a dry wine, Rack in two weeks and return to secondary fermentor. Rack again in one month, and then every month until 6 months old. Bottle.
For a sweet wine, rack at two weeks. Add 1/2 cup sugar dissolved in 1 cup wine. Stir gently, and place back into secondary fermentor. Repeat process every four weeks until fermentation does not restart with the addition of sugar. Rack every month until clear. Bottle.
This wine will be ready to drink in 6 to 8 months. Use it all before it is 2 years old.
I hope this was helpful...Good Luck!!! :)