Homemade wine

[Earslaps]

DH has just finished a batch of home brew beer, so I quite fancy getting in on the act and making some wine.

Has anyone made a wine kit wine? Are they nice or will I make a lot of vinegar?

We've got the equipment for making beer (buckets with taps, a siphon tube, steriliser, hydrometer), will I need much else for an average kit wine? I was thinking we'd need maybe a bottling stick and a machine to insert corks into bottles.

Or am I better off attempting some sort of fruit wine? I've seen one with frozen raspberries that could be a practice run for if I can pick enough blackberries in the autumn.

I've only made hedgerow wines but I found it quite easy. You'll need to get a demijohn and airlock I think, they're less than a tenner tho. The only thing is that it takes ages compared to homebrew beer!

I have made my own wine off and on for years .
If you have all the beer brewing kit I reckon the only other things you will need are wine bottles , screw top ones are fine , ask friends to save there empties .
Decisions
Air locks
Wine hydrometer
You need to remember you need somewhere warm to ferment the wine an airing cupboard or you can buy specially made heated blankets but I don't bother with them.
It takes much longer than beer to brew on average a year or two .
You can use of any fruit or vegetables to make wine with, frozen fruit is fine , you can even use cartons of fruit juice .
I pick wild berries and rose hips for most of mine .
Wilkos is a great place to buy the equipment and chemicals and it wont cost you a fortune

Same as AlCalavicci have brewed on and off for years (must be a Mediterranean gene DF has managed to grow grapes in London and is happily making - very dry - wine).

I'd start with kits - maybe 6 bottle ones - and see if you like it before going too crazy. I was put of for years because I messed up a 30 bottle kit and it came out too sweet (not at all undrinkable. Just we don't like sweet wines). Now with experience I would have kept it and then used it to blend.

Never once come close to vinegar (it's apparently quite hard to make). If you decide to go for it, look out for forums for advice etc.

www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/

are quite a friendly bunch.

Just to add to the list of kit, a filter is handy -

www.lovebrewing.co.uk/vinbrite-filter-kit/

I've used that store, so am happy to link to it. Amazon have also got a [access to] a good range of homebrew stuff.

It takes much longer than beer to brew on average a year or two
???????

Most fermentation completes in no more than 2- 3 weeks. Your hydrometer is your friend here.

The quality is certainly on a par with a shop bought wine, once you've got it right. Which considering you are looking a c. £2 per bottle (from a kit) vs. £6 is not a bad deal.

Personally I like the Beaverdale 6-bottle "Barolla" which is the Nebblio grape used in proper Barollo wine. If you've seen the prices of a decent bottle of Barollo, you'll know why.

I've often though it's a shame UK vineyards don't supply homebrewers. But there just isn't enough to go around and they have to make their own (excellent !) wine. Frustrating since we live a half hours drive from 3 vineyards.

Good luck.

@DGRossetti
Hmm sorry should of clarified it does only take a few weeks to ferment but some should be left bottled for a year or two ( not that mine ever are greedy )

Make sure it has stopped fermenting befor you bottle it , on one occasion when I was using corked bottles I made some rocket fuel ginger wine it blew some of it's corks out resulting in a sticky mess in my spare room

Hmm sorry should of clarified it does only take a few weeks to ferment but some should be left bottled for a year or two

There are of course competing schools of though about whether bottle ageing is a thing. Glass being pretty inert and all that. (I could happily believe cask ageing can happen, as with whiskies ...).

That said, if someone is happy to brew their own wine and leave it 2 years to drink ... well it's a free country. I don't think any I made lasted 2 weeks .

Make sure it has stopped fermenting before you bottle it

That's what the potassium sorbate is for (unless you want a live wine ... ).

When I made beer, I added sugar to the brew as I bottled it for a secondary fermentation. But I like more larger-type beers.

The cheapest wine is 1L of pure grape juice, red or white (NOT juice drink) 1L of any pure fruit juice you fancy, 700 or 800g of granulated sugar, 1 teaspoon of dried winemaking yeast, and water to 1 gallon/4.5 litres. Ferment until it stops bubbling and the sediment settles. Rack off into a clean demijohn and bottle. You can buy the yeast from Wilko's, or Amazon. DON'T use brewers yeast for beer-making, it doesn't work the same for wine. It's usually ready to drink 4 weeks after bottling-it's not for long-term storage.

You can buy the yeast from Wilko's, or Amazon.

Somewhere I have a catalogue with 100s of types of yeast in it. If you want to disappear down a rabbit hole hobby, winemaking has all you'd need . Makes cycling and golf look positively pedestrian.

Making your own gin is even easier.

Bottle of cheap vodka - decant into mason jar. Add 10-20g juniper berries (supermarket spice aisle). Leave for 2-3 days, shaking jar every day.

Add flavouring - lemon sherbet sweets or a punnet of fresh raspberries are lush. Leave another week, shaking jar every day.

Strain through a coffee filter back into the vodka bottle. Drink.

You can leave it longer for more flavour if you like.

Making your own gin is even easier.

Especially if you have a still

@DGRossetti - I really want one of those wee copper jobs

I really want one of those wee copper jobs

Alembic ? Copper is bloody expensive ...

A decent pot still can be had for £ if you can slum it with stainless steel. You'd hardly think it was "frowned upon" given how many places sell them and distilling accessories ...

Just one of these ones - not an industrial one (well, that would be nice)

Pretty, but doesn't look too functional. And 500ml ? Won't get much from that with a c. 16% a.b.v. wash you might get ... a double vodka ?

(don't try this at home, kids ...)

I'm starting small so The Man doesn't cotton on

all I can think of is Tom and Barbara in the good life, their peabody was legendary!!

Thank you all! Last time I checked there were no replies and now I have a rabbit hole of types of yeast and talk about distilling

I quite fancy the idea of making some hedgerow wines- I've spotted that Wilko's have a great range of things (I know back in the day boots did all the brewing bits- DH used to work there in his teens and often had to point people to the home brew section!).

I think, as per the suggestion I'll try a small kit to start with. I love the idea of getting geeky in future and experimenting with aging different types of wines in demijohns with different types of oak chips to see how it turns out.

At least if I start small I can build up the equipment bit by bit. Lots of the things I'll buy will be able to work for dh's beer making too.

Since we seem to be going back to the 70s a bit, I'm sure there'll be a resurgence in home brewing soon!

pea body margot?