First go at a wow lack of grape juice

[Skye Piper]

Good evening from the Isle of Skye,
I have just joined but I have been reading and enjoying the various posts and discussions. I went through an enjoyable phase of wine brewing in 2008 trying Tc's, a few kits and some recipes from CJ berry's books. I tried a fair few but gave up after making 5 gallons of carrot wine which provided great laughs but tasted awfull! I had nurtured it for a over a year but most ended up down the sink. I was recently furloughed for 3 weeks and it rekindled my interest as it seems with the rest of the country! Most brew websites are struggling to keep up with orders but I have managed to restocked my out of date yeasts and ingredients. There isn't a hope in hell of buying grape juice here so have ordered concentrate from Ebay. 2 l of white have arrived and 2 l red still to come. Have a kendridge merlot kit going and planning to try fruit tea and a wow. I got 4 l apple juice and 4 l cranberry and plan to add a litre of the white grape concentrate which should be the equivalent of 4 l grape juice plus the usual wow bits. Hope to brew about 20 liters or so. does that sound like it would work ok? Was planning to add some red concentrate to back sweeten the merlot kit and plan to brew the tea wine using fancy tea pigs red berry and some ideas from Hedge row Pete's tea beginner thread. Any advice much appriciated. Now go and pour yourselves another one.

 

[gb0wers]

Good evening from the Isle of Skye,
I have just joined but I have been reading and enjoying the various posts and discussions. I went through an enjoyable phase of wine brewing in 2008 trying Tc's, a few kits and some recipes from CJ berry's books. I tried a fair few but gave up after making 5 gallons of carrot wine which provided great laughs but tasted awfull! I had nurtured it for a over a year but most ended up down the sink. I was recently furloughed for 3 weeks and it rekindled my interest as it seems with the rest of the country! Most brew websites are struggling to keep up with orders but I have managed to restocked my out of date yeasts and ingredients. There isn't a hope in hell of buying grape juice here so have ordered concentrate from Ebay. 2 l of white have arrived and 2 l red still to come. Have a kendridge merlot kit going and planning to try fruit tea and a wow. I got 4 l apple juice and 4 l cranberry and plan to add a litre of the white grape concentrate which should be the equivalent of 4 l grape juice plus the usual wow bits. Hope to brew about 20 liters or so. does that sound like it would work ok? Was planning to add some red concentrate to back sweeten the merlot kit and plan to brew the tea wine using fancy tea pigs red berry and some ideas from Hedge row Pete's tea beginner thread. Any advice much appriciated. Now go and pour yourselves another one.

Welcome. I'm a returnee too. Your message indicates you're familiar with the basics, so all I'd say is since your previous sink experiment was a 5 gallon jobbie, why not scale back a bit and make several smaller experiments in order to limit the risk until the craft is proven? I've been making variations on supermarket juice wines this past 6 weeks and even though they are immature, variation is perceptible.

 

[Skye Piper]

Thank you Gb. Sounds like a good plan. The 30 bottle wine kit should provide a small sensation while conducting the experiments! What has been your favourite concoction so far?

 

[Joe Fox]

Good evening from the Isle of Skye,
I have just joined but I have been reading and enjoying the various posts and discussions. I went through an enjoyable phase of wine brewing in 2008 trying Tc's, a few kits and some recipes from CJ berry's books. I tried a fair few but gave up after making 5 gallons of carrot wine which provided great laughs but tasted awfull! I had nurtured it for a over a year but most ended up down the sink. I was recently furloughed for 3 weeks and it rekindled my interest as it seems with the rest of the country! Most brew websites are struggling to keep up with orders but I have managed to restocked my out of date yeasts and ingredients. There isn't a hope in hell of buying grape juice here so have ordered concentrate from Ebay. 2 l of white have arrived and 2 l red still to come. Have a kendridge merlot kit going and planning to try fruit tea and a wow. I got 4 l apple juice and 4 l cranberry and plan to add a litre of the white grape concentrate which should be the equivalent of 4 l grape juice plus the usual wow bits. Hope to brew about 20 liters or so. does that sound like it would work ok? Was planning to add some red concentrate to back sweeten the merlot kit and plan to brew the tea wine using fancy tea pigs red berry and some ideas from Hedge row Pete's tea beginner thread. Any advice much appriciated. Now go and pour yourselves another one.

Hi Skye

ifvyouvcan get to a Tesco, Welches Purple Grape. If you can get to Asda, red grape juice

 

[Skye Piper]

Thanks Joe, we only have the coop here. The nearest Asda and tesco are over 100 miles away but they do deliver here. Delivery slots are as hard to find as hen's teeth at the moment. Luckily I drive petrol tankers and normally travel there often. Very little fuel needed just now so will stock up the next time i'm through

 

[gb0wers]

Thank you Gb. Sounds like a good plan. The 30 bottle wine kit should provide a small sensation while conducting the experiments! What has been your favourite concoction so far?

Too early to say really. I have 7 on the go, of which 5 are still fermenting.
Of the two I've sampled I have to say that the better was:
1 Litre Welch's 100% purple grape juice.
0.85 Litre (that was the carton size) Tropicana pineapple juice
0.7 Litre Tropicana apple juice
750g sugar
GV1 yeast, nutrient, pectolase, 3 teabag tea, citric acid.
It fermented out in 13 days at 20C
Racked and sampled, then stabilised with sorbate and campden tablet.
Left for a few days and still hazy so fined with Quick Clear. Now pretty bright.
I started another of these a couple of days ago.

Most have been based on the purple grape juice and apple, with various additional juices.

Growers harvest summer fruits. When I got it home I found it was primarily apple with some raspberry and something else I've forgotten. It was only 1021 SG so I used 2 Litres and adjusted the sugar to suit.

Just grape and apple, two of those.

Cranberry.

Ritchies white grape concentrate, pineapple, apple. This is a recipe I got from this forum.
Post 52 in this thread
https://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/...ine-wow-recipes-only.33606/page-3#post-399309I added the zest of the lemon too.

 

[Skye Piper]

I have ordered glass 5 l demi john's. I used to use better bottle pet ones and have lost most of the lids. Got a good deal on amazon for 6 at £38.99. Hope your wines turn out well. Will give some a try with what I can find in the local coop

 

[Joe Fox]

Thanks Joe, we only have the coop here. The nearest Asda and tesco are over 100 miles away but they do deliver here. Delivery slots are as hard to find as hen's teeth at the moment. Luckily I drive petrol tankers and normally travel there often. Very little fuel needed just now so will stock up the next time i'm through

Try 3 x Welches Grape, 2 x Tropicana mixed berry and 2 x Beet It Beetroot juice. Makes 15 Litres of a deep dark red wine with a hint of Beetroot. A family favourite. I also substitute 750 grms if the sugar for 750 no of honey

 

[kelper]

Don't forget to calculate how much sugar is in the juices you use and then make up to the right total for the strength you want. I use dextrose now but caster or granulated is fine - I dissolve in a little boiling water. I like to go for a total of about 1200g of sugars per gallon. My wines come out at about 15% ABV.

I tried drinking beetroot juice and felt as if I had been chewing razor blades - I think I'm sensitive to all those nitrites!

 

[Skye Piper]

That's great, plenty to try now! Thanks for the advice and suggestions.

 

[Skye Piper]

Don't forget to calculate how much sugar is in the juices you use and then make up to the right total for the strength you want. I use dextrose now but caster or granulated is fine - I dissolve in a little boiling water. I like to go for a total of about 1200g of sugars per gallon. My wines come out at about 15% ABV.

I tried drinking beetroot juice and felt as if I had been chewing razor blades - I think I'm sensitive to all those nitrites!

When calculating sugar content, will the hydrometer reading tell you the sugar amount or are you better to calculate what's in the juice by the label and add sugar to a calculated amount?

 

[gb0wers]

When calculating sugar content, will the hydrometer reading tell you the sugar amount or are you better to calculate what's in the juice by the label and add sugar to a calculated amount?

I can give you my take on this, although it isn't definitive.

Up to now I've based my sugar calculations based on hydrometer readings of each juice, then adding sugar to get to the desired value. Then checking the SG of the actual mixture of the full demijohn. I have had some surprises of the actual final SG being lower than the calculated amount.

Your question has prompted me to check the label contents as well.

For example:
Welch's 100% purple grape juice. SG measured with a hydrometer 1065 so 175g per litre. Label 16.5 g/100 ml so 165 g per Litre. Pretty close.
Tropicana pineapple. Hydrometer SG 1054 indicating 146 g per Litre sugar. Label 9.5g sugar / 100 mL so 95 g / Litre. Quite a difference. I imagine the discrepancy is due to other content shown on the label that is not fermentable sugar, e.g. fibre etc. Although I don't see how that would explain the discrepancy between measured final SG and the calculation based on measured SG's of the individual component liquids.

I imagine the real truth will come from fermenting experiments. I am going to buy a Vinometer, that infers alcohol content of the wine by surface tension effects.

Interesting, at least I think it is. But I haven't really got a baldy clue ;-)

 

[Skye Piper]

Intersting to see those readings so close to the labelled sugar contents. I don't suppose a hydrometer will give completely accurate results but what an amazing instument to keep you in the picture of how a brew is coming along. It seems that you can over sugar a batch too which can inhibit the yeasts effects. I suppose around about 13 percent would be worth aiming for. I certainly ruined my carrot wine by trying to make it as strong as I could but it certainly provided some great laughs! Thanks for sharing your observations thumb

 

[kelper]

I use the info on the label. But I do test the OG before adding yeast and I record it.