new to the craft

[deadhead]

hi im new to the whole wine making hobby and am looking for any good advice on starting on the right foot. i know there are kits that can be purchased but can u use those kits to make what i would consider exotic wines such as banana, mint, apricot, etc. or do u have to keep buying the ingredients that are prepackaged online?

 

[St Allie]

hello deadhead and welcome to the forum,

Kits are a great introduction to winemaking and very easy to follow instructions are included.

Some of the winecooler type kits have extra flavours such as 'green apple riesling' or 'peach chardonnay" for example.

If you are keen to try your hand at a mint wine or an apricot wine.. we can help you with recipes and advice.. now you are here .. choose what you'd like to try and post us a message..

We'll do our best to get you on the right track..

Allie

 

[Tom]

Welcome deadhead,
If you want to get into winemaking I woiuld start with a kit. Fruit wine making is alot different and I would suggest to get the basic winemaking down 1st.
There are plenty here that make fruit wines to help you once you have the basic knowledge in making wine.

 

[deadhead]

thanx for being friendly sum ppl on other forums are very rude but im sure u already kno. im a little on the poor side at the moment and dont have much extra money is there a way to make wine without all the acid blend and ingredient kits? i guess what im saying is id really like to get into wine making the old fashioned way i dont really care how much i mess up at first for with practice comes perfection. i understand how the kits will get me aquainted with the whole wine making process but i dont relly like the whole idea of kits i want to make it from scratch and not from wat seems to me as a pre built puzzle that requires minimum skill (not to put down any of u kit lovers out there)

 

[jtstar]

Welcome aboard
these folks have an awsome recipe site you can check out.
I am new at wine making also but you might check out Jack Kellers wine blog also he has a ton of recipes that would be easy to follow with out a lot of cost. Tom is right you might be better off starting with a kit I started with a Welchs frozen juice concentrate and I know I made mistakes that I have learned from by reading a lot of the different articals in this forum
Jack

 

[Tom]

Yes good site. But, if you plan on making any fruit wines we find that "his" (alot were sent in) recipies are high in alcohol and low in flavor. So if making fruit wine shoot for4-6# per gallon and a starting gravity of 1.085. Better yet, ask here for a tested and proven recipe.

 

[Wade E]

I know how other forums can be. You can use lemon juice instead of the acid, You can use strong black tea instead of tannins. You may have to get some supplies like the sorbate and k-meta and maybe even some yeats but like I said that can be subbed with bakers yeast as long as you dont want a high alc and since you just want fruit wines my advice is to keep the abv low anyway. Wine yeast will usually do a better job but the Fleishmans Active dry yeast will do fine. I personnaly would put together a small order for some stuff, most of that stuff is cheap like the sulfite and wine yeast sorbate
Here is a good sight that will not take advantage of you and I would trust this guy with my paycheck, I also moderate that forum. http://finevinewines.com/

 

[deadhead]

thanx i already distill my own vodka and rum so getting drunk isnt an issue i decided to start wine making because there is a much broader range of flavors and exotic blends you can make with wine that just arent possible with hard liquors. so if i substitute the tannins with black tea (which i might not do know that i kno about finevinewines.com) do i use just staight unflavored black tea? caffeine free?

 

[Wade E]

That should do fine. I would get a 1lb bag of k-meta_potassium metabisulfite as you use that for sanitizing and in your wine befoe adding yeast to rid it of wild yeast and also after its done fermenting to protect it from oxidatin. If you plan on sweetening your wines ai would get some Potassium sorbate also.

 

[deadhead]

how far will that 1lb bag of potassium go?

 

[Wade E]

A long way!

 

[Tom]

True.. butt, not here .. LOL I need 1+# to be comfortable with everything I do here. Then again I am the exception .. lol

 

[Wade E]

You are doingf as much wine as this person will probably make in their whole life you drunk!

 

[Tom]

I resemble that remark !
Cheers !!!
Reminds me of the thread "You know you are OBSESSED when"
Now ... was it here or another place.. ??

 

[deadhead]

LET THE BATTLE OF THE WINOS BEGIN!!!!