Home winemaking

I have been a home brew maker since I was a kid. I would say I have brewed a batch of homemade beer every year for 25years running. Sure I missed a few years. Hard to brew beer when you live in a dorm in college. Any ways long story short I have always wanted to try my hand at homemade wine. Well last year my neighbors mentioned they had grapes that they did not know what to do with. Turns out they had some cabernet grapes. I went over there and tested the alcohol content with my Hydrometer. The Brix level was too low. In talking to homeowner I find out that the vines are only on their 2nd season. That was in 2009. Now this year in early Sept I tested the brix reading in early Sept. It was still too low. It was only around 18-19. I waited a couple weeks and checked again and the brix reading was 24. I harvested prox 1.5 5 gallon buckets of grapes. The harvest was easy and only took 1/2 hour. The hard part was cleaning the grapes and destemming. This took me most of the afternooon. AFter destemmin I crushed the grapes and placed in a 5 gallon bucket. I learned after the fact that you are not really suppose to crush the grapes when you do the crush. And You really do not want to break the seeds. But I did both. Also next year I need to remember to store In 40 degree temperature with some dry ice on it right after harvest. This allows the grapes to stay on the skin for a longer time period. Also good to harvest in the evening or early morning before it gets too hot. Also must remember to look at the stems. Good to harvest after the stems have started to get woody.

SO now I have a bucket of crushed grapes and I get to start the fermentation process. But first I want to measure the Acid level and measure the Brix level. My acid came in at 5.5. I used a Acid test kit to get this reading. 5.5 is too low. You want it to be around 7.5. I added some Tartaric acid to bring my acid level up to 7.5. I then added a bit of sodium Bisulfite on the wine. This santitizes the grapes and kills the native yeast that is on the grapes. Now I waited another day to let the bisulfite do its work and then I added my yeast. I mixed up a cup of room temp(75 degrees) with the yeast in it and then added to the grapes. I tried to keep the room temp during this phase around 70 degrees. But at night it dropped down to 60 degrees. Fermentation only took 3 or 4 days and then I transferred out of the 5 galon bucket. Leaving behind the grape must and just have juice. I put it into a 3 gallon glass jug and put an air locker on it. When I transfer I made sure to add some more Bisulfite. Waited a few more days and transfered it again to these smaller jugs. I had to get it out of the 3 gallon jug because there was too much air in it. This would cause the wine to oxidize. You want the least amount airspace possible.


Now I have waited approx one month since my last transfer. Today october 8th 2010 I took the wine out of their jugs and cleaned the jugs out. They had a fair amount(maybe 1/2 inch) of junk in the bottom of the jugs. I then put back in the jugs and added some Fench oak chips. I also retested the acid level. It came in at 8.5. This seems high but I am not sure. I will now let these jugs sit in a closet for at least 3-4 months and then do on final transfer into wine bottles. Then I will age them for another year. Then they will be ready to drink. i tasted it today and it tasted pretty dang good. Maybe a bit light in color. Next year i will try to leave on the grapes a bit longer and push down the grapes more frequently during fermentation. This should make it darker and ad more flavor to the wine. One last suggestion to anyone out there that is going to do this. It is very important to keep everything clean. Good luck!