How To Make Homemade Wine
Author: Chef Brian To make homemade wines with the recipes and ingredients here
all one needs is a gallon-size glass bottle, a saucepan and
a polyethylene pail. Make certain to use polyethylene as
some plastics are not suitable. Do not use aluminum,copper,
or enamel vessels to make your homemade wine with.
Sterilization is mandatory for all utensils, bottles and
corks, especially corks. One should use commercialy
available plastic corks until you know how to properly
sterilize natural corks.
Ordinarily, baker's yeast and white granulated sugar are
used by the average homemade wine maker. A special wine
yeast and invert sugar makes the best wine possible.
Wine yeast is capable of producing eighteen per centof
alcohol by volume (32 proof), against the fourteen percent
of bakers' yeast.
Starting what is called a 'nucleus ferment'or nutrient.A
small jar will do for this. About a 1/2 cup of water
and a teaspoonful of sugar are boiled together for a minute
and then allowed to cool. This is then put into a sterilized
jar and the yeast added in whatever form it is obtained.
Allow to set for 3 days covered with plastic wrap and rubber
band.
Preparing the fruit: Various types of wild yeast and
bacteria are on the fruit naturally and must be dealt with.
Our method, known as the 'sulphiting' method, does
this.
How to make homemade wine:
Crush the fruit by hand in the poly pail and pour on one
quart of distilled water. Mix well. Crush one campden tablet
and dissolve the power in 1/2 cup of warm water and
mix with pulp. Leave the mixture for 1 or 2 hours. A little
discoloring may happen. After this, take 1/3 of the sugar
to be used and boil this for 1 minute in 3 pints of
water. Allow this syrup to cool and then stir into the pulp.
Then add the yeast (or nutrient) and ferment for 7 days.
After 7 days, strain the pulp through fine cloth and wring
out as dry as you can. Put the strained homemade wine into a
gallon jar and discard pulp. Then boil another 1/3
of the sugar in one pint of water for 1 minute and when
cooled add it to the rest. Plug the neck of the jar with
cotton wool or fit a fermentation lock and continue to
ferment the homemade wine in a warm place for a further 10
days.
At this stage, pour the homemade wine into the poly pail
leaving as much deposit in the jar as you can. Clean
out the jar, sterilize it and return the homemade wine to
this. Boil the remaining 1/3 of the sugar for 1 minute
in 1 pint of water. When this has cooled, add it to the
rest. Refit the lock or plug the neck of the jar with
fresh cotton wool.
After this, the homemade wine should be left in a warm place
until all fermentation has ceased.
Clearing: it is usual to have a brilliantly clear homemade
wine a month before fermentation has ceased so
patience is required here. After all fermentation has
ceased, siphon the clear homemade wine (if not yet crystal
clear) into another jar leaving the deposit behind. Then
when the homemade wine is finally crystal clear it should be
siphoned into bottles and corked.
To get the maximum alcohol and to get total fermentation the
ideal temperature at which to keep a 'must' is
between 65-70 degrees F.
Fully ripe fruit is essential if we hope to make the best
homemade wine.
CHERRY WINE (A Delightful Sweet Wine):
8lb. black cherries, 7 pts. water, 3 1/2lb. sugar (or4lb.
invert), all-purpose wine yeast or Bordeaux yeast,nutrient.
PLUM WINE (Port Style):
Dark red, fully ripe fruits must be used. 10lb. plums,
7 pts. water, 3 1/2lb. sugar (or 4lb. invert), port yeast,
nutrient.
GRAPE WINE
Homemade grape wine is much more difficult and requires20
pounds of grapes so unless you own a vineyard it is
not cost effective to make homemade grape wine.
Summary:
A summary of the foregoing is this: after several batches
you will get the rythm of making homemade wine down to
a tee. With further knowledge you will be able to make
homemade wines with a strength, clarity, flavour and
bouquet of which you will be justly proud.
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