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Homemade Country Wine Production
I did warn Slab be careful what you wish for concerning these personal Blogs. LOL.
Here is my 2023 Production year wines. All are Bulk Aging right now, some fermentation is still taking place but the Specific Gravity is all of these is stable. Wine ages better in Bulk.
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I'm already into them this evening so my pictures are a little substandard but I'm posting anyway. That's what Country Wines do to you and for you.
We have Peach, Satsuma, Lemon, Raz-A-Rita (my own creation Raspberry-Ripe Key Lime), Blueberry, Mayhaw-Fuji Apple, Triple-Tail (my own creation again Blueberry-Plum-Meyer Lemon)
Numerous, well some steps are left before consumption so I will be back on this Blog when I start Filtering & Polishing.
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The Best Wine Conditioner I've found
Backing up a bit, Fruit wines are susceptible to flavor changes and you scratch your head "What Happened?". Your wine fermented thru the Primary stage just fine, the necessary precautions were taken when racking to prevent contamination, Secondary fermentation went off without a hitch. Time to think about bottling your batch so you give it a taste, yuck! The Blueberries you crushed perfectly, the Yeast Starter was foaming well, your Sugar/Water was perfectly clear when everything went together, even bought nice new bottles to rack your wine into. But Yuck? Here is what I discovered, while the Yeasts were munching away on everything you fermented they did a very good job of it so all the available sugars were turned into Alcohol. Our taste buds do not know what a Blueberry tastes like totally devoid of any Sugars. Now you know, Yuck! Enter the Wine Conditioner.
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I had this on order for a while and just picked it up at our local Brewing / Winemaking retailer. Peaches, Apples, Blueberries, Muscadines, etc taste totally different without their original sugars. Many new Wine Makers just add a 2:1 Sugar/Water syrup to Backsweeten. But it never really tastes right, somethings off. This is a job for the Inverted Sugars in the Wine Conditioner. You still must Stabilize your product when using this additive but just a small amount and your back tasting your wine exactly like the Blueberries that went into it. I made this mistake in the past but discovering this product has totally changed the quality of my final, bottled, product. I thought I would get it out to any who are interested in making their own Homemade Wine or are already doing so but using a Sugar Syrup for backsweetening. Soon the citrus wines here will be filtered, stabilized, conditioned, and bottled. Posts will show every step. Wine Conditioner is hard to find and mostly ordered Online. You want some on hand and a little goes a very long way.
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Muscadines are starting to Ripen........
With the very late freeze we had this spring (only 6 times in the last 100 years) killing almost all our fruit crop for 2023 and killing 4 of our California imported Fruit trees, fruit harvest is very slim at best. We have one Muscadine Vine that survived Hurricane Katrina but has not bared fruit for years now (drops crop every year) is ripening the first crop since 2005. If I can get 3 gallons of Muscadines it will be enough to make a batch of Muscadine Wine.
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I hope we do so I can show how easy it is to make a good Country Wine at home.
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Opened the Last Bottle Today
The last bottle of Santa Rosa Plum wine. This was bottled March 2021. I really thought is was a miss as the ABV was 20% (40 proof) and the skins really made a tart aftertaste. Dust on the Bottle, we have all heard the song. I would drink a bottle every now and then but left this last bottle and the last bottle of Meyer Lemon till last week and this week. What a extra year in the bottle has done. Really mellowed, blended, crisp, clean taste, just like biting into a ripe Santa Rosa Plum. Looks like when the bottling starts here in a month almost all will get a extra year aging in the bottle. The Lemon was just a surprise as this Plum.
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Good corks for everything this year.
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Although a Amalgamated cork, this brand cork every one had a great seal. You can see in the photo no leakage past the bottom of the cork. Very good sign of a great seal.
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Keeping Wine Making Casual at Times
The most important rule in Country Wine making next to Sanitizing everything is to harvest and process fruit in it's Prime. I allow my Key Limes (ingredient in the Raz-A-Rita wine) to ripen a bit before harvesting. I need 4 cups of juice to the 3 gallon batch on wine. So as the fruit is ripening I harvest the prime fruit and refrigerate asap. When I have enough to squeeze I process the fruit at one time then freeze the juice in a 4 cup container. When ready to use all I have to do is thaw and pour.
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Last year I had to mix in some Persian Lime juice to get my 12 cups (45 bottle batch) but this year I will have more than I need the tree is still loaded with fruit and setting more.
Doing a little at a time like this makes wine making days go much smoother and you have the absolute best quality fruit - flavor.
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Preparing to Filter, Stabilize, Condition, and Bottle 6 Gallons of Wine
It's time to bottle the Raz-A-Rita. Since there is 3 Carboys and my new 6.5 Gal Glass Big Mouth Bubbler will only hold 2 the last batch will be done after the first two. I get this Email with the 6.5gal Bubbler on sale for $35 right when I was looking for one. I had to scoop it up. Sanitizing everything is how you start. I had 3 cases of bottles that I sanitized 2 years ago. Not taking a chance of having my wine turn to Vinegar I started with the table and worked my way up. I'm doing this in my shop because I'm prone to spills and the Sanitizer eats the finish on our counters if left on to dry. My S-10 will be moved to the big building soon and I'm building out a wine room in here.
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The drying equipment had to be sanitized too then all the bottles were pulled out of the boxes and stood on the table. Also the new Fermenter was unboxed.
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The Wine Filter system has filters good for 5 gallons of wine but mine has been racked several times more than required so I think I'm running all 6 gallons on one set of filter pads. I will fill the Fermenter receiving the filtered wine with Argon so no oxygen comes in contact with my wine.
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After the wine is filtered Stabilizer will be added then wine conditioner. Once this is finished a couple of days resting before bottling is recommended. I'm not a big fan of Tannins so my wines need to be consumed within 3 years. Just terrible, I have to have a glass of wine regularly.
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Filtering the First 6 Gallons of my new recipe Raz-A-Rita Wine
I bought a Buon Vino Mini Jet to filter and polish the 2022-2023 wines I made. I had no idea how well it would work. I was extra slow with this first batch and probably took too many pictures.
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First everything had to be washed but washing alone is not enough. Everything that would touch the wine was sanitized using Star-San. Star-San is a very popular sanitizer with wine makers and available at any beer making supplier. After that the set of wine filters had to be soaked first before installing. The filter unit is small and easy to assemble.
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There are numerous videos on YouTube on how to assemble and prepare your filter unit for use so I won't try to write a set of directions here. I will say that after a little use I had to tighten the hand nobs a bit more to reduce the wine leaking into the catch tray.
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Oxygen is terrible for wine except in Primary Fermentation where the yeast needs it. Since I weld I have Argon bottles around the shop. Here I'm using Argon gas to displace the oxygen in the Fermenter to prevent my wine from coming in contact with any oxygen while filtering. Argon is heavier than air so it will stay where I need it.
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Here is a picture of the wine to filter. You can see its clear already but this filtering is to "Polish" the wine, provide a brilliance to the wine in the glass. It does not change the taste that I can tell but dramatically changes the appearance.
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You have to run a gallon of water thru the filters to flush them of small paper particles before running your wine.
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In person the shine of the wine after filtering is really noticeable. A little wine drips out of the edge of the filter pads caught by the tray and it drains thru the lower hose into a sanitized catch can. I drank some of that wine, you just get warmth all the way down! The filter is self priming and really easy to use.
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I tried to get a shot of the filtered wine to show the clarity this was the best I got. I'm looking forward to pulling the cork on a bottle next Summer, maybe another Crappie.com Member will be around to join in. We could have a Wine Tasting on Ross Barnett at the Campground, everyone could walk home. :biggrin
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Stabilizing Before Bottling
First to address Slab's comment, I don't drink much beer and don't know how to make it but I do like the Corn Fermented stuff but it does not like my joints (developing a allergy to the stuff) which wine doesn't have the compounds that cause the problem. I don't like grape wines either which is why I started making my own hooch. We can't help what we like passing over our taste buds right.
So this wine finished at 12.3% ABV, I'm happy its that low but also I do not need to Back Sweeten. the Final Specific Gravity is quite high, it has almost the body of a Brandy so Sorbate (preservative) is being added to ensure no spoilage down the road. If it was drier wine I would not need Sorbate.
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The Metabisulfite is quite strong, a 1/4tsp treats 6 gallons. You mix both in a glass to completely dissolve before gently stirring into your wine. Then it needs to rest a few day before Bottling can happen.
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Got a bit of Bottling Done Today
So after filtering, stabilizing, & preserving you need to let the wine rest a bit. Minimum 12 hours, a day or two is better before bottling. I was super rushed this morning so pictures of the bottling operation will be taken next time but I did take a couple of pictures for everyone.
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This is my new recipe Raz-a-Rita. A ripe Key lime based wine infused with pure Raspberry puree. 12.3% ABV. Well balanced acid and on the sweet side with a final specific gravity of 1.038.
