Lessons learned from a new guy

[ditchbanker]

I've been making fruit wines since last winter. Only one of my final bottled wines was bad. Not spoiled, just bad (white welche's wine... no flavor). So, last spring when my mom mentioned that she had a grape vine growing decoratively in her yard and they'd never done anything with the grapes, I told her I'd be happy to try some wine out of it, to see how it turned out.

Picked the grapes today.

I told her the grapes would need to be pruned to get ultimate sunlight. It's already growing against a fence, so I knew it'd be an issue. Apparently she didn't quite understand.

Lesson 1) make sure a grower knows what they're doing to make good wine.

Tied directly to lesson 2) I know now what people mean when they use the term "herbacious". My wife and I smelled the primary before anything was crushed, and both quickly gained an understanding.

3) I understand now the need for a destemer/crusher. Even though I knew better, part of my brain was still working in terms of grocery store grapes. About 20 lbs of grapes destemmed by hand, and I'm about to look up prices online. Ugh.

4) If you're spending hours making a wine you feel, deep in your gut, will not be that good, opening up a good bottle of sangiovese from a local winery helps pass the time. It's also responsible for most of the typos present here. Same point as with the wine... I just don't care.

5) It was good to get a "practice" run before I pick up my real wine grapes from a local grower later this week.

Still, my first real wine, and I was still excited to see the must after I crusehd it with a cleansed potato masher.

 

[JohnT]

Questions:

1) Did you measure the sugar? How did you know that the grapes were ripe?
2) How much did you make (volume)?
3) Was it red? was it white? If red, did you let the must ferment on the skins?

johnT.

 

[winemaker_3352]

Good questions - also do you happen to know what varietal the grapes were?

 

[ditchbanker]

Questions:

1) Did you measure the sugar? How did you know that the grapes were ripe?
2) How much did you make (volume)?
3) Was it red? was it white? If red, did you let the must ferment on the skins?

johnT.

I haven't taken the SG yet. I haven't made a batch in several months and my hydrometer has gone MIA. I haven't added yeast yet, so I'll pick up a new hydrometer today and measure. If it's too low I'll add sugar. I guessed they were ready by sweetness and lack of bitter flavor. I could very well have been wrong. If I get more serious, I know I'll need a refractometer.

I've got about 2 gallons sitting in primary now, but that includes the skins because it is red, and in answer to question 3, yes, they will ferment on the skins.

Unfortunately, my mother had no idea what it was she planted a few years ago. They were small berries with a dark purple color. I know that doesn't narrow it down that much. They also weren't pruned like they should have been and I got about 20 lbs from one plant. I'm sure that'll be detrimental, as well.

All in all, I'm treating this batch much like a fruit wine, but was my first attempt with grapes. I'm glad I got this small batch to practice on. Tomorrow I get to go to a local college w/ a strong agricultural department and get 100-120 lbs of syrah, brix currently at about 24, so ready to go. Lesson 1 is that it's going to be well worth paying a little money to rent a destemmer at a local shop.