Destemming

[RegionRat]

I am getting ready to make wine from fresh grapes for the first time. I have a grape crusher I picked up from Craig's list a while ago. I understand that red grapes need to be destemmed after crushing and whites do not. Correct?

The guy in this video runs the grape through the crusher then reaches in and gets out the stems. Is this how I should do it. Or should I build the destemmer illustrated in this book.

How do you deal with stems , shy of spending mega $ on fancy machine?

RR

 

[Rocky]

RR, How many pounds of grapes are you processing? If it is not too many and you have some help, I would hand strip the grapes (both red and white) before crushing. There may also be other debris like leaves, for example, that I would remove. Actually, this is how I got my start making wine! When I was about 8 years old I was part of the stripping crew that stripped the clusters into a pot before crushing. We had lots of help (brothers, cousins, neighbors, etc.) and we usually made about 200 gallons of wine. It was an all weekend job. One caution, wear surgical gloves (not powdered) to avoid the dreaded "purple hands."

 

[RegionRat]

RR, How many pounds of grapes are you processing? If it is not too many and you have some help, I would hand strip the grapes (both red and white) before crushing. There may also be other debris like leaves, for example, that I would remove. Actually, this is how I got my start making wine! When I was about 8 years old I was part of the stripping crew that stripped the clusters into a pot before crushing. We had lots of help (brothers, cousins, neighbors, etc.) and we usually made about 200 gallons of wine. It was an all weekend job. One caution, wear surgical gloves (not powdered) to avoid the dreaded "purple hands."

As for the pounds I will be doing I dont know yet. What would be a good ratio of #of grapes to gallons of wine? I did pick up 6 more 6 gal carboys. I will be using the Brute primaries I got from Craig's List.

The local place in Chicago to get grapes is a place called Sante Fe Grapes. I called them today and he said he has lots of varieties in now. I asked about the Brix and he said to wait a few weeks and the sugar will be a little better. I am going to drive there tomorrow and just do a little scouting. I think he said the crates of grapes were 24# each. He also said he has 5 1/2 gal buckets of juice.

RR

When I was young my grandfather also made wine. That was so long ago I really dont remember the whole process he used. I do remember turning the crank on the wooden crusher he had.

 

[JohnT]

RR,

Figure that a lug (36 pounds) will yeild 2.5 gallons of wine.

A suggestion would be to place some chicken wire beneith your crusher. This should catch most of the stems while allowing the grapes to fall through.

 

[cmason1957]

Here is a time point of reference. My wife and I just hand destemmed and crushed about 300 pounds of chambourcin grapes. I helped her for about 2 hours, then had a previous appt. to go pick up some white grape juice from a local winery. I was gone for about 3 hours, she completed during that time.
We put the crushed result into a 32 gallon and a 20 gallon plastic trashcan. After pressing, we got about 27 gallons of wine. We will lose a bit more of that, once we take it off the remaining lees.

But that gives you a frame of reference.