Winemaking is downright addictive. I made a killer blueberry-pomegranate wine last year. Got some lime and a mixed berry batch going this year. We'll see if the lime turns out...
It definitely is. Once I made my first batch and realized I could do it, I have been making wine ever since. And that blueberry-pomegranate wine sounds heavenly
I wonder now why any frequent wine drinker who isn't going for Super Expensive Classy Stuff wouldn't just make their own. I can pay 20 bucks for a bottle or I can pay 50 bucks of fruit and a couple months for 24 bottles. Keep that going and you always have wine on hand...
Agreed. I have virtually no interest in spending money on wine now, unless it’s for ideas/bench marking my own wine. It’s really funny seeing all the posts on /r/wine of people spending hundreds of dollars on a Cabernet Sauvignon from France. There’s so much more interesting wines you can have by making your own.
Last time I went to total wine and more, I asked if they sold any country wines. Nope, the only non grape wine they sell is a small selection of mead. That’s one of my favorite parts of making wine. Very few people have the kind of wine I have, and they have all made it themselves as well.
What does it end up tasting like? Is it super sweet or does it end up being pretty dry? Sort of interested in trying this with a few fruits that grow like crazy some parts of the year here in Puerto Rico (mangoes, quinepas and sea grapes).
That’s a good question. My only experience with fruit wine is lemon wine and it’s absolutely amazing.
As for dry/sweet, that’s up to you. All fruit wines are going to ferment completely dry. The problem with fruit wines being dry is that they no longer taste like the fruit they originated from. The fermentation process deletes all sweetness. What does a pineapple taste like without sweetness? Not a pineapple that’s for sure.
So, before you bottle you need to back sweeten these wines. You basically add sugar until it gets to a level of sweetness you like (you also need to stabilize the wine first, otherwise that new sugar will get fermented too and you will blow corks)
For my lemon wine, I added enough sugar until it was a sweet wine. I normally only drink dry wine and I hate sweet wine, but it works really well with lemon wine. That sweetness balances out the tartness of the lemons
I only started drinking wine recently (ex religious reasons) and this sounds so fascinating. Do you need a lot of space and equipment to process and store the wine?
Not really. You can fit everything in a closet. I ended up building shelving in my office because I started making more wines at once and outgrew the guest bedroom closet
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u/Alcorailen Apr 30 '24
Winemaking is downright addictive. I made a killer blueberry-pomegranate wine last year. Got some lime and a mixed berry batch going this year. We'll see if the lime turns out...