Fresh Grapes vs. 6 gal. Bucket of Juice

[Grancru]

I just received a flier from our local grape provider here in MI for fresh juice from Chile for $80 per 6 gal. pail.



Can anyone offer up an opinion on juice purchased in buckets vs. buying
the grapes themselves, crushing and pressing? I would like to start a
Merlot or Pinot Noir and if this is a quality option, becoming available
in May 2011, I would like to give it a shot. If it will be a lesser
quality I can hold off. I don't want a watered down taste.



The offer is for juice only, no grapes are available. I will wait for fall of 2011 rather than buying a fair juice.



All thoughts are appreciated.

 

[ibglowin]

Juice is just that, juice. The only difference between it and a regular kit is no Flash Pasteurization (its fresh juice) and no grape pack which come with many of the bigger kits these days. The juice is high quality but there is a limit to the amount of total dissolved solids in these buckets without fermenting on any actual grapes.

Frozen grapes will make better wine since your fermenting the wine on the grapes themselves. More skins = more solids = better mouthfeel = a higher quality wine.

That said they will cost you probably 2-3X what that bucket of frozen juice cost you to make the same amount of wine (6 gallons)

You could always throw in a grape pack in the fresh juice to bump up the solids and make a better quality wine (in theory anyway)

 

[Wade E]

Grapes produce a way better product IMO. The grapes they use to make these juice buckets are mostly the ones that didnt make the cut aesthetically ot be shipped as grapes to a certain ratio. Another factor is that you wont get a good tannin level like with grapes and fermenting them on the skins as alcohol does a much better job of extracting colors and tannins from the grapes. This mainly only applies to reds as with whites you dont ferment on the skins.

 

[scold]

Grapes produce a way better product IMO. The grapes they use to make these juice buckets are mostly the ones that didnt make the cut aesthetically ot be shipped as grapes to a certain ratio. Another factor is that you wont get a good tannin level like with grapes and fermenting them on the skins as alcohol does a much better job of extracting colors and tannins from the grapes. This mainly only applies to reds as with whites you dont ferment on the skins.  

Would it be safe to assume that you would get better results making whites from juice?

 

[Wade E]

I dont think so, I think grapes are always the best bet but require the equipment to do it.

 

[scold]

what I meant was referring to a comparison between red and white using the juice.
I like red wine more than white. I have some reds and was a little low on whites. If I understood your statement correctly I would get better results using white juice from chile as apposed to red because of color and tannin.
Thanks
Scott

 

[Wade E]

As compared to making reds from buckets then yes IMO. I still think you get a better product with grapes and kits though then a lot of buckets out there. There are some good ones but there are a lot of bad ones. Im just guess at that and hoping its true . I really havent tried a wine made from juice buckets that Ive liked or at least thought to myself that it was decent.

 

[Tom]

If doing whites another thing you can do is add some zest of the fruit thats in the wines profile. This will "wakeup" the whites when drinking.

 

[rrawhide]

To increase mouthfeel and body in juice you can always add 'booster rouge' and 'liquid or powder tannin' IMO


rrawhide