Considering purchasing grapes, not sure if it makes sense.

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gibbylet

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I just bottled the first fruit wine I made today, just started my 4th kit (one ready to drink), and have made gallons of welch's, dole, and tea/flower wine (none ready to bottle yet) to play around with what would be fun or good to make.

I had not planned on doing fresh grapes because I don't have a press and it seems like it could be trickier with the calculations of MATH and SCIENCE *shudder*, but I just saw a craigslist ad (from where a number of wineries are in western WA) that says they will have extra grapes for home wine makers in October.

Says the grapes should be between 1-1.75/pound.
Types include: Barberra, tempernillo, cab sav, cab franc, petit sirah, merlot, syrah, chard, rousanne, and viognier.
Price inculdes crush/destem on reds, and press on the whites."

I'm not sure if the price depends on the type of grape or how much they end up with for sale, and haven't researched if that's a good or smart deal. It sure is a bonus for me that they'll crush them.
I THINK I need 16-18 lbs per gallon of wine from my recipe book, which means at $1 a lb it's probably a great deal, but that it could be $140+ at the higher end. So far the most expensive kit I've gotten is $110 and it is more likely to guarantee consistent results, so it'd be hard to pony up that much money when I haven't even seen the difference between a $80 and a $140 kit yet.

Think I am just looking for advice, not sure if I should wait for more experience under my belt before I delve in!
 
You need approximately 108 lbs per 6 gallon and thats a lot of grapes to process without a crusher/destemmer and a press! I know I wouldnt and didnt do grapes until I had or could use these tools.
 
i paid 50 cents per pound for the chardonnel that i did by hand:d
if i had the chance to do this, i would...
 
if the price was low enough for it to be a real bargain, i might go for it. but it sounds like a pretty standard market price, so it's not like you're missing out on a huge opportunity if you wait until you have a press and have a better idea of how to do grapes.

all things considered, i'd probably pass it up for this year.
 
Thank you for the advice, I just got so excited at all the varieties! I will wait til next year, i am thinking now it might be easier to find fresh grapes locally than I thought it would be with all the wineries up north.
Probably still won't buy a press due to space limitations if I can avoid it, but at least there's a better chance next year I won't screw up 100# worth of grapes once I'm more practiced!
 
I bought 10 gallons of Frontenac grapes at $10/gallon, which is pretty close to your price. They had, however, just been put through the destemmer/crusher. I wouldn't want to have had to destem and crush all of those grapes myself. Pressing, however, was not such a huge deal. Sure, using a pasta pot and insert wasn't ideal, but given the quantity of grapes, it was a heckuva lot cheaper than buying a press. It might have taken us an hour or two, but hey, we got into this for the fun of it, not to do things like the proverbial microwave generation.
 

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